Left Thessaloniki this morning, headed for Paris for a few days before we fly home. News hasn't been good from Paris the last few days so we were not sure what to expect.

The flight we were on actually landed at a regional airport, Beauvais, about a 100k north of Paris. This meant we had to take a shuttle bus to Paris. then catch a couple of Metro's to our hotel. Day was shaping up to be a long one. Bus trip was fairly comfortable. It also gave us a first hand look at the Yellow Vest protests which have been occurring across France. Didn't cause any problems. They were just making their presence felt by stopping traffic, talking to drivers and then letting them through. It all seemed very civilised.

Things were a bit different in Paris though. Getting off the bus the first thing we noticed was the smell of cordite in the air (lefto over from smoke bombs going off). Large police presence around the Palais de Congres (near the bus terminal). On the opposite side of the intersection were large groups of yellow vests. Either a stand-off, or the police had just broken up the latest flare up., not sure which. Either way, the Metro station we wanted to use was closed. As were more than half the Metro's in Paris. Seems like the city was in lock down. Anyway, backtracked to the bus depot, found a taxi, explained where we wanted to go and we were off. Luckily our hotel was in a part of Paris that was untouched by the demonstrations.

Good to be back in Paris again.