Mais Oui Paris - Part 4 - Good Friends

As mentioned in Part 1 of my Paris Postings, the main reason for going to Paris was people, specifically good friends that I initially met when I lived in San Francisco. The weekend before I left Paris we had a reunion, in total we were 11 adults and 4 kiddos. Friday night was dinner with Nico and Eve, and Gwen and Alex.

On Saturday afternoon many of us met at Pere Lachaise Cemetary. Yeah I know, sounds wierd right but its a pretty place and apparently a lot of famous people are buried there including Jim Morrison, Chopin and Proust. We were 10 walking around the cemetary and given that we all hadn't visited with each other for a while no one bothered to get a tourist map of the place and we were all far too into catching up on each other's news to bother paying much attention to the famous headstones.

Once we got booted out of the cemetary we warmed up our chilly bones over a coffee at a nearby cafe. I felt so happy to be there in a cozy place surrounded by familiar, friendly faces that I hadn't seen in so long. Hearing everyone's work, family, baby, study, home improvement news and stories was fantastic. After coffee Ian, Cecile and I took the metro to Trocadero for the Eiffel Tower viewing and a long walk to Fred and Michelle's for the evenings dinner gathering. Here is Cecile and I.




















We were on strict orders to arrive after 8:30 so Michelle and Martine could get the kiddos in bed before the adults showed up. It was a great night. Fred and Michelle were kind enough to open their home and provide us with a delicious meal, SEVERAL courses of desserts, cheese, wine and games. I hadn't played games with the gang for a while and the competition was fierce at times but everyone was in good spirits and happy to be together again like the old days in San Francisco.

The party ended at 2 am and 5 of us drove back to Nico and Eve's. But the fun wasn't over yet! On Sunday our resident crepe chefs (Eve and Nico) cooked up a crepe/galette feast. I swear I ate so much chocolate and cheese in Paris that week I won't be surprised if I put on a few kilos!! By 5pm it was time to say goodbyes. Ian, Cecile, Gwen and Alex were heading back to the city and to their trains home. After 5 hours of eating and snacking we took this pic to wrap up the meal and the weekend.