Monday Last full day in France...

... this trip, I hope. I am due to fly to Frankfurt at 6.25 pm tomorrow.  I know i will not settle in the morning so will go to the airport when I am ready in the morning. My travel agent got back to me and said it was expensive to change the ticket. The airport staff should have sorted themselves out by the evening.

This morning I went out at 8ish, there was no one around. Public holiday for 1 st  May. Workers day.  Again, no usual cafes open. But some have opened later.  The place I had brunch yesterday was open , I went there and got talking to a local who is a tour guide. He was meeting a group from Houston. We talked for about an hour. He has been to Australia and knows how vast it is compared to European countries. Earlier I was talking to the lady behind the bar. She told me to be careful, there were many manifestations , the French word for protests. I said i was going to look at Place de Bastille ( having just read Tale of 2 cities ( read is a loose term, I read probably 2/3 to 3/4  of each page. Dickens is very wordy))  She waggled her finger at me ' No, No' nor Place de Republic etc . So she told me of some nice little places to the NW of here. The first was a garden like others I have seen,, which are only open to visitors occasionally  but locals have a key.  Usuually vegies and flowers all muddled up. i donot think individual allotments, sort of joint. There was a good view of Sacre Coeur  photo coming, maybe) . Then I walked on to Buttes- Chaumont ( butte =hill) which is a big park, 25 hectares. I walked though it. The half of Paris who were not protesting were there walking/ jogging / picnicking  families, groups of friends, couples old and young. I was heading for another area of what were described as little houses, same as a few days ago.  Most of the land is covered with apartments, but these houses were usually 2 storeys high, often only 1 room in width and only 1 family ( going on the doorbell) Quite cute and interesting.  Another thing which I saw the other day as well was narrow streets called Villa such and such. I think villa such and such used to be a grand house with a big garden  but apartments were added with access from what we would call a laneway. So they each had a small garden,  and were sort of at right angles to the main street.  There were usually about 6 on each side of the lane way (villa).  Not sure if that makes any sense. A diagram would be better, but too hard now.

Then I stopped for lunch and walked back a different route.  The nice man over the road where I have been several times wasn't open earlier, but he now is so I might go and have a glass of wine and some salad. I think I can do better than rice crackers on my last day in France.