Batofar

(Katherine) We spent another day exploring our area, including a leisurely late lunch at a café right by the Abbesses Metro station and a carousel. This area in particular is overrun by cute babies - there are strollers everywhere! Robert and I would be on “cute baby alert” and let each other know when a new one had come onto the scene. Something about French children is just quite adorable!

We then went on adventure to find picnic supplies - there are so many great parks in the area, and picnicking is a great way to save money over constantly dining out. With our new supplies in hand, we packed up a meal and headed to a small park just behind Sacré Coeur. It was quite relaxing to lay on the grass, drink wine, stare at a beautiful church…and appreciate not being stuck in a cube at work. These are the moments that remind me why we’re doing this trip!

 

Once the park closed, we got ready for our next adventure which was all the way across town. Years ago, Robert had been to a venue with his sister, Joanna, which was actually a boat repurposed as a floating nightclub, Batofar.  He spoke very highly of his experience and wanted to share it with me on this trip. We took a very complex series of Metro lines to finally reach the 13th arrondissement and walked along the Seine River before we finally came to Batofar. It looked different than what Robert remembered, and what we learned is that the upstairs was now just a huge bar area, the middle was now a restaurant, and the club with the DJs was located downstairs inside the boat. I think Robert was a bit disappointed that there was no longer an open-air club concept since the music was now hidden away in the hull of a ship. The other issue was that the headliner did not appear to be getting on the decks until at least 3am since the second DJ didn’t start until after 1:30am. Since the Metro shuts down at 2am, we had to leave and run (literally) to the nearest station and still missed the train. The taxi home was $15 euros, not as bad as I had suspected, but the Metro shutdown will definitely ensure that we select our late nights carefully!