La Petite Ceinture de Paris et Le Jardin du Ranelagh

Every weekend E and I try to spend a little bit of time outside.  He is big on walking and used to spend his Sundays strolling around Paris and enjoying the city.  Unfortunately, now we’re both so busy that our walks are much shorter than what he used to do.

Since we’ve moved to Michel-Ange-Auteuil he has been telling me about an old railroad track that used to run around the outskirt of the Paris.  The majority of the railroad was abandoned in 1934, however, the rails in our neighborhood (Auteuil) ran until 1985. The reason that they made the station in the 16^th arrondissement was so that the wealthy inhabitants could easily get to the big train station, Saint-Lazare, when they wanted to leave for vacation.

Edouard remembered walking along the old rails when he was little and said that he heard they had made the route into a nature trail.  As we were looking for a quick walk on a dreary Sunday, we decided to go check it out.

What we found was that the rails had been uprooted but the nature trail was still there.  Since we were feeling kind of lazy, we didn’t do the whole thing, but here are some pictures of what we did do:

E getting ready to head down the nature trail

The route today

The beginning (nature in the city)

The trail

The trail is made up of 6 different natural environments. Signs along the way explain which area you are entering and what elements you will find there.

Eyesore on the trail

Not wanting to go too far, we got off the trail at the first exit.  We ended up at Le Jardin du Ranelagh, which I discovered is a beautiful park with tons of fun things for little kids.

I mean if I could have gone here when I was a litte girl, I would have thought it was the coolest place ever.  There was an old-fashioned merry-go-round, a playground, and even pony rides!  We had a great time watching all the animated little munchkins run around.  Kids really are so funny.

Children at play

Girl teaching her little brother how play in the sandbox

Rollerbladers, mini bike riders, and the Eiffel Tower

Pony boy

Not sure if you can tell, but the little kids all have sticks in their hands and they are trying to grab keys.  There are a few of them that keep missing 😛  Also, did you notice that this merry-go-round is man-powered?

If any of my readers are in Paris and looking for a nice walk, I definitely suggest the trail along the old route of La Petite Ceinture ending with the Jardin du Ranelagh.  E and I agree that it was a wonderful way to spend our Sunday 🙂