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By Elizabeth Brunazzi
Imagine yourself at Paris Beach. It’s not a lap of a theme park or a hotel strip in Las Vegas. And it’s not a website. It’s a temporary, artificial beach in central Paris stretching about two miles along the Right Bank of the Seine River from the Quai du Louvre to the Quai Henri 1V, aka “Georges Pompidou Way.” An annual event since 2002, the beach lasts a month, July-August, when millions of Parisians clog the roads and head out of the city for non-artificial beaches on the Mediterranean or Atlantic coasts.
To create the gigantic stage set that is “Paris Plages,” 2,000 tons of sand are loaded on a convoy of barges and pushed along the Seine to the beach site, hundreds of snappy, Deauville-style blue and white striped beach chairs, umbrellas and matching cabanas are offloaded, and thirty-foot potted palms are placed along the promenade.
You can take a stroll on the boardwalk (the plage de bois or “wooden beach”), or loll on your beach towel on either sand or grass, courtesy of the city of Paris, but most sunbathers pay a small fee for chairs and umbrellas. You can change into your suit in a cabana just like on a real beach somewhere in France, Saint-Mâlo, Biarritz or Saint-Tropez, and go swimming in the pool especially installed for the occasion.
This year you can enjoy a fencing studio or a fitness center, play tabletop soccer (“baby-foot” in French), ping pong, or minigolf on a course laid out in an artificial marsh and forest in front of the Town Hall, hang out at the dance hall café with its blue canopy and strings of lanterns, check out the offerings at two ice cream parlors, or sample freshly made crêpes. No hot dogs on this boardwalk.
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By Elizabeth Brunazzi
I hadn’t planned to travel after I got to Paris in July. I thought I would stay put. But then the thunderclap of the summer exodus began, August set in, and even Paris Plage, the artificial beach installed annually now on the Seine closed on August 21st. My favorite city started to seem forlorn. Damn the exchange rate, I had to go somewhere, else.
A Parisian friend suggested the northern coast of Brittany, le Finistère, and La Résidence le Roc Fleuri near Saint-Malo, but it would probably be booked in August, she warned, as people reserved there up to a year in advance. I spent a couple of nights in Saint-Malo and Cancale twelve years ago, and it was an appealing idea for a longer stay. On the off chance, I called and nearly dropped the phone when the proprietor, a Madame Ledevic, quietly and politely said, yes, there was one studio apartment with ocean view available for a week, the minimum stay, price 355 euros. Yes, the dog would be alright. That’s about 50 euros per day. I prepared for a shabby and perhaps not-so-chic accommodation, but this was adventure, and cheap. I am from the Europe-on-five-dollars-a day generation, I told myself, I could do this. I could get a TGV from Paris Montparnasse to the Saint-Malo station, just a three-hour ride, and a mere 130 euros round-trip, plus 5.90 for George, my scruffy black and white half-breed terrier. I started to pack.
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