There is an old covered market in the Marais called les Enfants Rouges-an old orphanage had children who wore red, thus the name. Not only do they sell vegetables, it is ringed with little restaurants so you can eat there.

Over one of the entrances.

The interior of the market.

A view of one of the places to eat. Tagine meals seemed to be the most popular along with a Japanese place.

I didn’t get this but thought it looked so colorful.

This was in a nearby street. It’s called a Twizy and it’s just a little wider than a motorcycle and has four wheels.

I took a lot of photos on that sunny day in the Marais-it rhymes.

Love this window.

This lady looked so fashionable with her black outfit with accents of orange.

The garden in the Musee Carnavalet-it’s free by the way.

And there’s a victory angel there as well.

Place des Vosges was full of people enjoying the sun. This is one park where people are allowed on the grass.

France has a new president, Hollande, and we went to Bastille to watch the celebration there. It was full of people-most of them young- when we arrived but after thirty minutes or so more and more people poured into the square and we decided to leave. We had a hard time returning to the metro as you can see by the last part of the video.

I got off the metro a few stops from our apartment at St Paul because it was such a pretty day and I wanted to enjoy the sunshine which has been sort of a hit or miss proposition lately in Paris. There are always great things to photograph there.

The Marriage Freres Tea shop as seen from the door. I like the dark wood there and the scent of many teas that waft out the door.

I seem to see a lot of red velvet couches in restaurants and bars. They always catch my eye.

This is a little street, rue de Tresor, used to be pretty empty of people but they added some really nice flower beds and now all of the cafes along the side are full.

A little blurry, but I like the behind of the dog as it entered the building. It seemed so excited to get inside as dogs often are-excited by just about everything.

Each time Maurice and I return to what will be our new place in Chatelaillon we leave very happy that this is where we decided to build. The little town is delightful, the beach beautiful and we always just feel good there.

Here’s our beach which goes on for quite a while. There’s a paved path higher up as well and we can walk or bike all the way to la Rochelle. We were sort of walking/jogging on the path and then decided to go down to the water where the sand is packed and all of the sudden I had all sorts of energy and we ran for quite a ways. Maybe it’s the ozone in the air.

We drove over to nearby Ile de Re while there which is a fairly popular island with the French. I had never heard of it before. It’s pretty perfect, sort of like Disneyland and full of tourists but still a delight to visit. I spotted this little fishing boat pulling into the little harbor.

And here is yet another lighthouse. They are just so photogenic.

There are donkeys on the island and they are famous for being “dressed” in little pants or culottes as they call them. I wonder who in the world thought this up? This small group of donkeys had little saddles on them for children to have rides.

Elegant door knocker on an elegant door.

There’s a huge beach there called the Plage des Bois which is sort of wild looking. When the tide goes out there are all sorts of tide pools to look at.

This last weekend was what they call a bridge because a holiday falls close to it. In this case, May 1st, was on a Tuesday so many people took Monday off as well and had a long holiday weekend. We did the same with some of Maurice’s family and headed to la Rochelle and Chatelaillon which will be where our beach apartment will be one day. We made a day visit into nearby la Rochelle which is such a lovely and interesting city.

There are two light houses there right by the harbor, one red, one green, to guide boats into the narrow opening of the harbor. I just have a thing for light houses. I love the way they look and there is something romantic about guiding ships at night into safety.

Here is what a boat would see as it headed into the harbor. I love these two towers.

An interesting building with a model of an iron ship on the corner. There were a couple of buildings like this with some sort of tiles on the outside maybe covering timber in the building? One day I will find out.

I especially love this scallop shell on a freshly renovated building. So pretty.