Thursday,
May 8 was a bank holiday in France. It's funny how there always seems
to be an unexpected bank holiday when traveling in Europe.
Back in 1962 when I was first in Paris, Bim fretted
about not being able to change her dollars into francs because of
the unexpected bank holiday.
This time
I was smug until I discovered
that French ATM machines only accept six digit PIN numbers and my
PIN number has
8 digits. Yikes! Luckily, Peg's ATM card worked. Whew!
By this time we had seen the Louvre, the d'Orsay, and the Pompidou
so we were ready for a little fun. We walked from our hotel to
the Rodin Museum past the Invalides, a veterans hospital built
by Napoleon.
When
he died, he was buried there.
Our hotel was right by the Metro station for the Ecole Militaire,
the West Point of France. It was a great location because we were
able to take interesting bus rides in the evening all over Paris.
The Metro, of course, was the fastest way to get to any destination
and our Cartes Orange were great!