Butte aux Cailles

It's always a pleasure to go to the Butte aux Cailles district in 13eme. Little known by tourists but highly sought after by those in the know. We do live in the most visited city in the world you know and sometimes you need.......peace. The village atmosphere can also be appreciated in the public places, bars and restaurants, where almost everyone knows each other.

My meeting was at a fabulous loft with great church like ceilings which I had my eye on for a couple of clients who are looking for a more out of the way apartment with all the pleasures of Paris but without the chi-chi.

Later the owner shows me around her favourite neighbourhood haunts, Catalan owned La Paracou at 25 rue des 5 Diamants (speciality is great salads for 6 euros), Salon de The, Hansel and Gretel and tells me about La Piscine de la Butte-aux-Cailles, a red-brick Victorian building on Place Paul-Verlaine, one of Paris's oldest établissements balnéaires, or spas. It's an open-air swimming pool fed by a natural spring of warm water.

Once home to workers, Butte aux Cailles hangs onto it's Communist credentials (you'd have to go to Ivry or Montrouge to hear anyone whistling the Internationale these days). There is still a political bookshop with a pamphlet about Louise Michel in the window. Aaah, Paris pre-Sarkozy.

I stroll down Passage Barrault, a famous road and just like one in a sleepy country town and hit an amazing new market on Blvd Auguste Blanqui. Well, it's new to me. Great fish stands but also clothes, flowers, household stuff and organic produce.