Round and round we go.. This is an old post (first one for paris) that I haven't been able to put up until now

Technology has a lot to answer for It turns your brain to mush.  We rely on it so much that our natural instincts eg sense of direction are no longer valid as we rely on GPS in cars and on phones to guide us to our destination.  

We had a long day on Saturday when we farewelled provence to visit Paris.  I had plugged into the computer at home direct trains to paris from Provence  and our departure town was marseille.  We had to be at marseille by 10 am to hand back our hire car.  Although our train was not departing until 1.30 pm. 

 We had an early start with everyone up by 7.30am.  On a normal school and work day everyone is up dressed and almost out the door no later than this time but on holidays it meant  we had to get up early. 

We plugged marseille into the GPS but our suspicions told us that it took us the long way around.  We managed to arrive on time to drop the car back with a minute or two to spare.

With 3 hours to kill before our train departed to paris I  stood in an enormous queue with 20 mins to spare to try and catch an earlier train.  By the time I got to the front of the queue a fast train was leaving in 5 mins.  'No madam there is no way you can make that train you will have to stay in marseille for 3 hours'. 'Monsieur you have not seen me and my family in action we can make the train, load our luggage and be comfortably seated with minutes to spare'. 'Just try test me and I will prove you wrong'.  'No Madame I will not issue you with a boarding pass so no Madame you must wait for the later train.' 

3 hours in not a long time to kill, this can easily be done with s cup of coffee, some food and a  toilet stop or 2. In my travels with  most places if you miss a train, plane or a connection it's not a disaster but in marseille it is. You do not want to spend time here if you don't have too. We ventured to town, held the kids tight had some morning tea and headed back to the train early to get our seats.  The kids were most pleased that we were allocated seating.   After the Positano bus experience anything with a seat is considered first class. 

It was not a bad experience in marseille but what  was annoying, was that the direct train we were on stopped at aix en Provence which was a much closer drive from us from bonnieux and far prettier.  if we hadn't relied on GPS and the Internet and just relied on a good old fashioned map we could have worked that one out for ourselves.

Despite all of this, the train was fast and good (apart from annoying passengers but I would just be a racist for passing comment so I won't) and at last at 5pm we arrived in paris.  I was so pleased to be here,  we arrived at our hotel in the lovely Madeleine area.  for this part of  the trip for the accommodation I chose location over the hotel quality.  It's in a great part of town but the kids were disappointed with the 3 star rating. Once we checked in we dropped our luggage and we set off with little information about where to go.  We set out full of excitement and in search of somewhere nice to eat on our first night in paris, as we walked and walked (mostly round and round) in circles) hunger and   sore feet took over and it was a case of anywhere!  We walked for abut 40 minutes and ended up eating hamburgers at a restaurant just around the corner from our hotel! Needless to say phones with gps and natural instincts have now been replaced by good old fashioned maps.

All was not lost, after dinner we ended up on the champs élysées eating Hagen Daaz ice cream and bored the enfants with stories about how when we back-packed all we could afford was an ice cram and we would sit at Hagen Daaz for hours, people watching and using their clean bathrooms. We took a walk up to the arc de triumph and walked the long way home!