Another hotel recommendation in Paris. I have used this hotel for 16 years.

The price is not as budget as it formerly was but it is a great property and has a excellent location.

Address: 29, rue Cler - 75007 Paris France Tel. : 01 47 05 49 15 Fax : 01 45 50 49 36

Subway : Ecole Militaire - La Tour Maubourg E-mail : info

The Grand Hotel Leveque is on the Rue Cler, a pedestrian street. It is one of the last real market streets in Paris. Everything you want to buy for a picnic is just outside your hotel door. It is fun to get a room that faces the street and watch the street come alive in the morning. The merchants open up early and start setting their merchandise out on the stands. This is in winter as well. There are flower stalls, hardware stores, butcher shops, candy stores, boutiques, restaurants, a frommager, fruit and veggie stores, and a post office. Metro stop Ecole Militaire is only a short distance away as is La Tour Maubourg.

Some time after the first morning activity, you start to see very nicely dressed women and men come out of apartment doors and head off to work. Then mothers and fathers will be walking their neatly dressed youngsters to a parochial school which is about two blocks to the west. Another morning in Paris is off and running!

If you go to the hotel#s homepage at http://www.hotel-leveque.com/index.php, in the lower right corner you will find that the bottom link is to more information about the rue Cler. This is a GREAT Rick Steves article which explains this area fully. Even if you don#t stay in this area, try to make a visit to this fun street.

The hotel has just remodeled and they even added a mini-lift. Breakfast is available at the hotel but my preference is to go to the Glacier which is a boulangerie. You turn right as you come out of the hotel and the Glacier is on the next corner. A little before 8 the butchers from the Butchery Caocaud come trooping in for a morning demitasse.

The last time I was there was January of 2002. I was taking a charter from Paris to Egypt and not trusting Wisconsin winter weather (and not having been to Paris in a few years), I went a day early and returned to the Grand Hotel-Leveque. I was checking out at noon the next day and a man in a nice overcoat and beret was talking to them in French. I was adjusting my luggage and not paying much attention. He rolled his bag to a luggage storage room and I stepped up to the desk.

While waiting for the clerk, I glanced at his registration slip that was still lying on the counter. It said La Crosse, Wisconsin, I had lived there for 33 years. A few lines above the city was the person#s address. One look at that and I thought, #Oh my gosh, it#s Tom.# I waited by the door and when my friend I hadn#t seen in ages emerged, he was one very surprised man. He said, #Well, you told me about this hotel 12 years ago!#

A stroll on the rue Cler and a lunch at the Glacier was a very unexpected but wonderful plus for the day.

Harlene