Sunday is family day in Paris so we thought we would join in and do the Parisian thing and hang out in the local park with our family. After a bit of a late start (another Parisian thing) we first went for a leisurely walk through the formal part of the Jardin du Luxembourg designed especially for promenades. While trying to avoid the many joggers who obviously didn't have families we slowly headed for the pond in front of the palace where you can hire a model wooden yacht to sail on the duck pond.
It was lots of fun as once you push the boat out it takes it's own course when the wind catches it, changing several times before returning to the edge. The kids were running around and around the pond with their sticks chasing our 'crab' boat (it had a crab on it's sail). It was priceless.
Amazingly there were very few crashes and the boats never just sat in the middle of the pond or capsized. We did hit a poor unexpected duck that was quite shocked to get a boat bump it's rear. After half an hour of fun sailing we headed for the swings (yes, the swings are closed except for the weekend as you have to pay). They are double-sided swings that you can swing in a huge semi-circle.
Callum isn't a great fan of swings so the semi-circles were not huge but Heather had fun going as high as her brother would allow her, testing his limits. When our time was up we wandered the short distance home for a baguette and brie lunch before returning to the park for more Parisian-style relaxation. We started this time with pony rides.
They did a lovely route of the park taking in some of the lovely statues and sights while the kids pretended they were Woody and Jessie, their favourite characters from the Toy Story movie. After the ponies it was off to the playground. By this time the park was starting to get quite busy as siesta was over and the French prefer to venture out in the afternoons. I followed Heather and she had a ball climbing, sliding and going on her favourite, the flying fox.
Callum went with Neil climbing on everything and playing in his own little world. One thing I did notice from a week ago when we first arrived and visited the garden was the weather. Last Sunday it was warm and sunny, while today there was a real chill in the air and the trees were really in their autumn colours and beginning to shed their leaves. Autumn has well and truly arrived in Paris. After about 3.5 hours of playground we called time and headed for home, via the artisan ice cream shop where your cornets and cups of ice cream are shaped into flowers.
The centre has one flavour/colour, while the petals have other flavours around the side. They were beautiful and delicious. It was a lovely day relaxing in the park and watching the kids have fun.
Tomorrow the weather forecast predicts rain so we are planning to visit more of the many museums in Paris, starting with the Natural History Museum then on to the Museum of Magic.
- Posted using BlogPress from my iPad