I HATE Charles de Gaulle airport with a passion. All I'm sayin'.
Sorry for the crowds at Notre Dame, but yeah, I made the same experience at around the same time of year a few years ago. In fairness, Sainte Chapelle probably wouldn't have been much better, so good for you for at least having memories of the interior of Notre Dame to hold on to.
Les Halles has been f*cked up ever since they decided to do away with the original "Ventre de Paris". OK, it was big and messy, but at least it had character ... and they could easily have transformed it into something along the lines of Covent Garden. "Le Trou des Halles" was an urban planning sin -- and its replacement isn't much of an improvement. (Well, alright, at least it looks pretty at night ... I'll give it that.)
Sounds like by and large you're having fun, though! Vivent les bouquinistes! :)
I have yet to meet anyone who doesn't hate CDG. LoL. When work trips come up, most of my office tries to find routes that avoid CDG, even if it means paying extra or spending more hours on the road. Unfortunately, CDG is unavoidable when going to Paris.
Les Halles is a big mess. There is very little signage, too. Coming out of the station and into shopping centre makes no sense for either travellers or shoppers (seriously this is one of the main stops of the RER coming from CDG). I must have circled it twice before finding my bearings to get to the hotel. But at night, the space between LH and Saint-Eustache becomes a lovely little piazza.
I would have loved to have seen the original market. It must have been quite something.
The bouquinistes made me buy a book! In French! O_o
The weirdest memory I have of Les Halles / St. Eustache is watching the 1998 World Cup final in a bar there (pretty much the only bar we found that wasn't already crammed to the hilt ...) And yeah, that RER station is something else, too.
My BFF has to travel to Africa every so often for her job; mostly, to French speaking countries (former French colonies), and therefore has to go through CDG whenever Brussels or Amsterdam aren't alternative options. She needs a wheelchair when traveling, which is a huge complication factor even in the best of cases, but CDG manages to top every other airport in terms of nightmare experiences every single time -- all the way down to her missing the only available connecting flight and having to spend the night in Paris because folks at CDG didn't have their act together and plain forgot to pick her up and take her to her gate for her connecting flight -- and there was noone available whom she could have turned to in order to procure assistance. (On another occasion, only a chance encounter with colleagues likewise connecting flights via CDG spared her a repetition of the same experience.) That said, CDG is a nightmare even for those of us who have the unimpeded use of both of our legs.
When I changed hotels earlier today, a couple of ladies from the US were preparing for leaving tomorrow and tried to book a taxi to the airport so they would be there exactly 2 hours before their flight. I did advise them to plan in some extra time (they were standing next to me).
As for my return flight, apparently there is a strike on which may or may not include the airport that day. We'll see. ;D
But yeah, I can't even imagine going through CDG with a wheelchair or in any other condition that makes long distances and long waits difficult.
Sound advice. 2 hours is cutting it fine at CDG, and that's even assuming you get there without a traffic jam or other sort of hiccup. Fingers crossed for your departure day!!
Sorry for the crowds at Notre Dame, but yeah, I made the same experience at around the same time of year a few years ago. In fairness, Sainte Chapelle probably wouldn't have been much better, so good for you for at least having memories of the interior of Notre Dame to hold on to.
Les Halles has been f*cked up ever since they decided to do away with the original "Ventre de Paris". OK, it was big and messy, but at least it had character ... and they could easily have transformed it into something along the lines of Covent Garden. "Le Trou des Halles" was an urban planning sin -- and its replacement isn't much of an improvement. (Well, alright, at least it looks pretty at night ... I'll give it that.)
Sounds like by and large you're having fun, though! Vivent les bouquinistes! :)
Les Halles is a big mess. There is very little signage, too. Coming out of the station and into shopping centre makes no sense for either travellers or shoppers (seriously this is one of the main stops of the RER coming from CDG). I must have circled it twice before finding my bearings to get to the hotel. But at night, the space between LH and Saint-Eustache becomes a lovely little piazza.
I would have loved to have seen the original market. It must have been quite something.
The bouquinistes made me buy a book! In French! O_o
The weirdest memory I have of Les Halles / St. Eustache is watching the 1998 World Cup final in a bar there (pretty much the only bar we found that wasn't already crammed to the hilt ...) And yeah, that RER station is something else, too.
My BFF has to travel to Africa every so often for her job; mostly, to French speaking countries (former French colonies), and therefore has to go through CDG whenever Brussels or Amsterdam aren't alternative options. She needs a wheelchair when traveling, which is a huge complication factor even in the best of cases, but CDG manages to top every other airport in terms of nightmare experiences every single time -- all the way down to her missing the only available connecting flight and having to spend the night in Paris because folks at CDG didn't have their act together and plain forgot to pick her up and take her to her gate for her connecting flight -- and there was noone available whom she could have turned to in order to procure assistance. (On another occasion, only a chance encounter with colleagues likewise connecting flights via CDG spared her a repetition of the same experience.) That said, CDG is a nightmare even for those of us who have the unimpeded use of both of our legs.
As for my return flight, apparently there is a strike on which may or may not include the airport that day. We'll see. ;D
But yeah, I can't even imagine going through CDG with a wheelchair or in any other condition that makes long distances and long waits difficult.