Bordeaux and Palmiers

I’m going to take a little break from telling you about Paris to share another French city just a few hours to the north: Dauville.

I’m not usually a very romantic person: heck, I forget my own anniversary, so I’m definitely not going to fault anyone for forgetting it too.

Usually, I’m much more of a realist: I live my life the way it is and take pleasure in the little things that make me happy. I don’t expect or even really usually like grand gestures: it’s pretty to watch in old movies, but in real life, I find it a little bit strange and awkward.

But as I was writing about this on my other blog , I realized that there are a few exceptions to my rule, and my first and only visit to Dauville a few months ago is one of them.

I’ve never made a big deal out of Valentine’s Day, but this year, Alex started hinting a week in advance that I would be packing a bag and heading out for the weekend. Excited at the prospect of a trip, I did as I was told and got on a train. It wasn’t until we were safely on the train (after the train had already left the station–the train pulled out as Alex was still standing on a stair and holding on to the opened doors) that I learned that we were heading to Dauville.

Dauville was popular that weekend: it’s the city of love here in France, and a lot of couples had taken advantage of the short distance from Paris to head to this northern city.

The only image I had of Dauville was a sort of fairy tale idea from one of those aforementioned beautiful romantic movies: Gigi, the story of a call girl who finds love in Gaston, a rich, Parisian socialite. At one point, Gaston takes a young Gigi and her grandmother to the shores of Dauville. Seeing as we were visiting in February, I was eager to see the differences between the movie and real life, the summer and the winter.

Instead, the fairy tale never really faded. Because the city was so full of tourists, it never became real for me: I never once saw a local living his day-to-day life. This “private eye” made the city seem even more like an old Hollywood movie set.

The only other beach city I’ve been to is Cannes, where I lived for four months two years ago (wow… it definitely doesn’t feel that long). Cannes and Dauville are very different cities: separated by more than six hours of train, the cities do not even feel similar, unless you count the giant casinos that loom over both shores and the restaurants filled with seafood.

Cannes is very Mediterranean and extremely influenced by the affluent population of nearby Monaco as well as the summer Cannois who arrive in time for the famous film festival from the world over. Dauville is just as wealthy–the prices in the windows of the real estate offices prove this–but the feeling of the city is less “party” and more “old world.”

I especially loved the architecture: in Paris, I often forget that I’m in northern France, but in Dauville, you’re constantly reminded.

The buildings that make up the markets and most of the houses all have a similar pattern: light background held up by dark planks. I really loved this design, and I took pictures of it pretty much everywhere.

I also like pictures that show off perspective lines.

When we arrived, Alex and I took a ride on the petit train that the Mairie of every major French city installs. Alex likes them because they fund the Mairie and the city. While I’m usually against tourist attractions of any kind, I’ve come to appreciate the petit train. When you only have a few days in a city, taking the petit train can show you the basic layout of a city (great for someone like me with a horrid sense of direction) as well as hint at places you may want to explore more fully later. The petit train in Dauville stops for a bit at the beach so that you can get off and wander before getting back on.

One thing that surprised me about the beach was how wide it was: the sandy shore stretched for a long time before being broken by houses and streets.

As with many cities that have tourism as their main source of income, Dauville offers a lot of activities to the population: horseback riding on the shore, mini golf, markets, shopping and gambling are only a few. Alex and I contented ourselves with wandering most of the time, taking lots of pictures and enjoying the city.

Paris has over 400 parks and gardens all over the city. Embarrassingly, I have visited probably fewer than ten of them. Even more embarrassingly, until a few days ago, I hadn’t visited the park closest to my new home: the Jardin des Plantes.

The Jardin des Plantes, in English, the garden of plants, is the main botanical garden here in Paris. It’s also home to a small zoo, a botanical school and four galleries of the national museum of natural history: the gallery of evolution, the mineralogy museum, the paleantology museum and the entomology museum.

On my first visit, I decided against visiting these museums and instead strolled through one section of the park, getting a feel for it. Like the Jardin de Luxembourg and the Champ de Mars, the Jardin des Plantes has an attractive symmetry about it. An aisle of flowers decorates the center of the park, while benches and trees line aisles that run on either side.

On a sunny day, like the day I visited, people are there reading or picnicking. I didn’t see a lot of children there. As a park, it actually seems to be a bit child unfriendly. Although I know that there were more child-friendly areas, at least in the section where I was, there was no playground or even a field for kids to run around in.

The flowers had a “look, don’t touch” appeal to them and reminded me of the “living room” that so many Upper East Side New Yorkers have as a display case for their nice furniture and antiques. You’re not supposed to “live” in these rooms at all.

For someone like me, though, the Jardin des Plantes is a pretty place to stroll and people-watch, and on a sunny day, it’s a gorgeous place to sit with a picnic and look at the flowers.

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I love to visit the morning markets here in Paris.

The markets are a great way to get a feel for a certain neighborhood: the one I used to frequent close to the Eiffel Tower was expensive and had a wide variety of things that may be appealing to tourists. There was even a stand that operated like a grocery store produce aisle: customers were free to peruse the merchandise, picking up what they liked and paying for it at a cash register at the end.

At most other markets, this is unheard of. Bartering and discussing your purchases with the seller is an integral part of what shopping at the market is all about.

At my Place Monge market, there are a few regular sellers. I love to watch them interact with one another, discussing their items for sale and how much they sold at another market the day before. I also, of course, love to talk with them myself.

The man at the fish counter loves to flirt with me

“Vous venez d’où, mademoiselle? Canada? Allemagne?”

“Etats-Unis,” I tell him. He smells like fish, but not in an unpleasant way.

“Oh! L’américaine. Je cherche une femme américaine. An American wife, yes?”

I laugh and walk away: I’m not in the market for mackerel or a husband today.

What I do need are peas for my Easter dinner. “Les petits pois, s’il vous plaît. Un kilo.” I point to the peas at one of the vendors. He starts to gather them for me and asks me how I plan to cook them. I love how protective vendors can be of their produce: they want to make sure you’re going to do it right, and if you’re not, they’ll be happy to offer you a recipe.

Fortunately, I know what I’m doing: “Avec du beurre et de la menthe,” I answer. Butter and mint: perfect with lamb. He raises his eyebrows and nods appreciatively.

“Je vais l’essayer.” I’ll try it, he says. He likes new recipes.

“Et un super melon? Vous voulez goûter un super melon?” I don’t really need a melon today, but if it’s really super, I suppose I can try. He hands me a slice and I taste it: it’s like melon concentrate, nothing like the styrofoam melons I’ve tried back in the States. I smile and nod, and he grabs one.

“Vous allez le manger aujourd’hui?”

Yes, I’ll eat it today. I know that if I’d said no, he would have grabbed another one, making sure it would be perfect on the day I planned to eat it. He adds it to the bag with the peas, and I wander off, looking at the rest of the stands. I pop some fresh peas out of their pod and eat them as I stroll: they’re sweet and lovely.