One of my favorite walks in Paris is along the Seine river. When it's sunny and warm, this is probably the best way to take in the sights while avoiding the crowds of the bustling streets. 

The river runs right through the middle of the entire city and takes about 90 minutes to walk from one end of the city to the other, but I suggest walking along the North (or "right") bank as there's more of a walkway close to the water.

We took a walk up to see the Sacré-Coeur on Montmartre on a chilly day in February and discovered a pair of older ladies taking care of a group of 11 cats that live in the park next to the Basilica. The ladies seemed to love the cats very much, even though they claimed that "these cats will be the death of us" :)

We arrived in Paris just in time for the Great Cold "Le Grand Froid". Although it's only around -3 Celcius it feels a lot colder, maybe I'm just not used to the cold or maybe it's the humidity level, either way it's really cold and tough to enjoy walks through Paris for more than an hour. But I did end up getting a really nice French sweater (or "Pull" as it's called here) to keep me warm, and it was only 15 Euro!

Last weekend it even snowed a little bit and the Canal St. Martin partially froze, which was actually kinda cool to see. We can't wait for it to warm up a bit, especially since the electrical grid in France is being pushed to the limit so we end up turning down our electric heaters in the evening for a few hours to reduce the strain on the country. 

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After a great week in London, we boarded the Eurostar to Paris. Traveling on the train at 250 MPH was a great way to go and the trip only took 2.5 hours. Unfortunately there was no Wifi on the train and no checked luggage, so the luggage area is a bit of a mess and worrisome that someone could just grab your bag before you get to it. 

We arrived in the afternoon and walked about 10 minutes to our first apartment. As we booked online, we didn't want to commit to a place for the whole month without first seeing it, so we booked our first place for just one week. And a good thing too, the next day we heard a horror story from another traveller who prepaid for a few months and ended up at a terrible apartment she couldn't even stay in (and didn't get her money back).

The apartment is fairly large for Paris, it has a nice bedroom and living room, with 2 desks so we could both have our own workspaces. The kitchen and bathroom on the other hand are a different story, both are very tiny (typical) and not very clean (kinda typical). We may eat out a lot this week as the kitchen is so cramped. But other than that we felt very at home and the owners were very nice and helpful. 

Unfortunately this was going to be the coldest week in Paris, and the next day our pipes froze so we couldn't use the bathroom or any sinks until the plumber arrived in the evening. Everything was then fixed and now things are back to normal.. time to eat some delicious crepes!