Paris: Cafe de Flore & Tuilleries

Once upon a time, I was exceedingly anal retentive when it came to planning an itinerary which included an hour by hour schedule. It was enough to drive a person traveling (usually the husband) with me bonkers. If you're coming from a long way - say, New Zealand and you've saved for years, you want to cram EVERYTHING (every church, museum, palace) in a short space of time. It was exhausting. I couldn't bear seeing another majestic cathedral or read the history of x, y and z building for the next decade or so.

We spent the previous day just......what's that new popular word these days? Chillaxing? I loved gazing at the street style (the real stuff) in Paris from a cafe, chatting with Josephine and Lil L, wandering aimlessly and getting hopelessly lost.

We figured that we needed to do one REALLY touristy thing - go to Cafe de Flore. The ever gracious waiters there kindly let me photograph the cafe several years ago without even ordering a single cup of coffee. Yes, the coffee is pretty average and completely overpriced but hey, we got to pretend we were chic Parisians for a few hours.