Since an excessive amount of Champagne, some white wine, some red wine, oysters and other nibbles in Montmartre on Saturday did nothing to get rid of my cold, I thought I should give into reality and try taking it easy for a day. So I decided to take a very easy stroll, with my camera of course, and show everyone the neighborhood where I’m staying. It’s not off the beaten track by a long shot, but it doesn’t seem to be a neighborhood many people, or at least many Americans, know. I stayed here last year as well and like the area very much.

It’s called the Sentier. It’s the center of the textile business. More recently, it’s attracted internet startups and, at least according to Wikipedia, is called “Silicon Sentier.” Hmm. I wonder if anyone is looking to hire a middle-aged, female, American, inexperienced programmer.

It’s in the second arrondissement, just a little bit north of Les Halles and the Montorgeuil neighborhood and to the northwest of the Marais , and, at least when I was looking for a place to stay, a tad less expensive. That’s not to say it’s cheap, but why pay the trendy tariff to be in the Marais? At least that’s my logic. To the west is the Opera, so it’s very close to many things. From the point of view of a former New Yorker, it’s walking distance to the Louvre, or five minutes by bus for you wimps.

Rue du croissant, a small street, more or less typical for the neighborhood. The emergency vehicles at the end of the block are infront of what I presume is a police station.

The democratic socialist poitician Jean Jaures was assassinated by a nationalist in front of the Croissant Cafe just before the outbreak of the First World War.

This is the block on the other side of the street on the rue Montmartre. I liked the juxtaposition of the older and new buildings.

I stopped into this bar last year with my mother. Despite the flags in the window, which includes an Austrailian flag not visible in the photo, no one in there speaks English. However, the music was loud enough that it wouldn’t have mattered if they did. Should you find yourself in this section of Paris homesick for a dive-bar, keep this in mind.

In the background you can see the Rex cinema. There is a nightclub there, too.

Many of the streets in the area are closed to cars during portions of the day.

This is one of the garment related wholesalers in the area.

This plaque is located on the outside of an elementary school. It reads: “To the memory of the students of this school deported from 1942 to 1944 because the were born Jewish, innocent victimes of Nazi barbarity with the complicity of the Vichy government. They were exterminated in the death camps. 140 children living in the 2nd. 22nd of March 2003. Never forget them.”

It’s hard to see in this photo which I took through a glass door, but in the entryway of this building the heavy timber framing is visible.

A pair of weathered doors on rue Beauregard

A wholesaler’s show room on the corner of rue Saint-Phillippe and rue Aboukir.

An ornament in a small park.

A window with some flowers over looking the small square.

Rue Saint-Denis.

The ornate, late nineteenth-century building of a former department store on rue Reaumur.

Montorgueil is a street which has plenty of food stores, butcheries, cheese shops, a fish monger’s, bakeries and tons of cafes. It makes this a very convenient area.

I’m not sure, but this looks to me to be a living wall.

Almost home.