​Last time I visited my fathers grave in France was 2013 and did that with a good friend of mine. Here is the blogpost for that: Visited my fathers grave 2013

Now doing the same, but this time accompanied by my son. The cemetery is located a bit outside Paris in suburb called Rueil-Malmaison. Back in the days I periodically used to live here as a kid with my grand parents. I remember the tobacco shop where I always forced my mom to buy me small toys preferable small model trains. Yeah, I probably wasn't easy for my mom to handle.

From Rueil-Malmaison it's about 4 km of walking to the cemetery but there are actually two cemeteries in the area and I did the same mistake again as last time 2013. We ended up at the wrong cemetery but fortunately my son was patient with me so we finally made it to the ​right one, the Cimetière des Bulvis. 

The best way to get around in Paris is the Metro and by foot. The Metro system is impressive both to its size and how many lines there are. It's a mix of old and new lines. On some lines you need to open the doors manually when you are getting off the train and some lines are fully automatic with driverless trains and platforms doors. And then we have the smell, not particularly a bad smell but special. I remember the smell clearly from my younger days when I was there with my folks. As a wise man once said: The Paris Metro smell isn't easy to describe but here goes: eggy, garlic, bodies, feet, musty, drains, urine and ever so slightly piquant – like a particularly ripe Camembert. 

Did I mentioned that walking is the best way to discover Paris? If not then you know now. So good shoes, an umbrella and put on the step counter then you are ready to go. Luckily for me my son agreed so I had no problem dragging him with me. First stop was the Jardin du Luxembourg. This park is so relaxing and it's my favourite park in Paris. Then we just headed on and crossed the Seine and ended up near the Louvre. My step counter showed 30K steps something so happy walking!

As I mentioned before there are some mandatory things you need to see if you are in Paris. The Eiffel Tower is the most famous one I believe, We started our walk at Place du Trocadero which has a beautiful view over the Eiffel Tower and is definitely a must for all the Instagrammers out there. When we came to the Eiffel Tower the line to get up in the tower was simply too long for us to wait.

I persuaded my son to go with me to La Défense. A visit to La Défense gives another but interesting perspective of Paris. In the 80:s when they built this business district it was the state of the art in many meanings. The architecture was about innovative thinking and boldness and with a large exciting art exhibition scattered all over the area. It's still until today Europe largest business district. We ended the day with a nice dinner at Café Montparnasse.

I have certain "mandatory" places I must visit when I am in Paris. The Sacred Cœur Basilica is one of them. It's located in Montmartre which itself is a very special and beautiful area in Paris where there are tons of coffee shops and small restaurants everywhere. It was also a perfect moment to lit a candle for my late father.

So I decided to go to Paris for a week. I usually prefer to stay in area of Montparnasse. But this time it was a little bit hard to find a suitable place. Finally I found the Hotel Celtic in the heart of Montparnasse. I was lucky, I even got the last room. A typical Parisian style hotel where my room gave the shape of a pizza slice a new meaning. It was located opposite of 8 Rue d'Odessa which actually was the address where my mom and dad lived with my grand parents many years ago!