Experienced house and pet sitters will tell you there are a number of cities where they love to go. Paris regularly comes up as a popular housesitting destination. If you experience house-sitting in Paris then you will understand. You can benefit from a visit to the City of Light, often your hosts will be happy to tell you their favourite local markets and places to buy fresh bread and croissant. What is more you don’t pay for accommodation because you exchange your services as a house or pet sitter for free accommodation. Read on to learn about my experience.

Experience house-sitting in Paris

Not long ago, friends in Paris asked us to do a spot of house-sitting in Paris while they went on holiday. They were going to Spain for five weeks, July through August.

Housesit in Paris

A tough challenge I grant you, but we agreed to step up to the plate. These are long standing friends you understand. Almost all the occupants of their entire building would be away as well as their guardienne (care taker) for part of the month. So we would be there to hold the fort. And that is how we spent a fabulous time in Paris, housesitting. This time in the Summer was remarkably quiet and peaceful. The city was rather empty, despite being the fifth largest capital in Europe with a population of 2.2 million people. A BBC report by Joanna Robertson estimated that the population of the capital literally halves in August.

Catsitters in Paris

Although they lived in an apartment it was important to them to have catsitters because they had a cat. And they wanted Feline, the cat to be well cared for in its own home.

Housesitting and living like a local

If you are fortunate enough to have spent any leisure time in Paris – let alone house-sitting in Paris with no accommodation costs asked of you! – you will no doubt have your own favourite spot from which to view the City of Light. With my family it tends to be the rather cliché Eiffel Tower but we never tire of it. And we like to view it from every perspective. Breathtaking at any time of year, with so much for the eye to take in that it is hard to exhaust that horizon for all there is to see La Tour Eiffel is our favourite. I justify the costs of each trip up the tower by reminding myself that our accommodation is free because we are house-sitting in Paris.

House-sitting in Paris for the cake!

No trip to Paris is complete without a visit to a boulangerie or patisserie (after all what’s an éclair or two between friends) – there are so many excellent establishments around the city that it seems disloyal to select one over any other. Nonetheless, it is always worth paying a visit to Angelina’s near the Louvre, the pastries are works of art, the building itself is a confection and it is always open in August especially for the tourists…

When house-sitting in Paris one is fortunate that the Metro gives access to almost any where you want to go – even in August when the much of the city takes on the guise of a sleepy village in the provinces – one can still travel easily and efficiently all over the place. A trip to Versailles in August from the northern centre of the city took only 45 minutes.

Touring and house sitting in Paris

On this experience house-sitting in Paris, with few visitors to negotiate, we found that while the inside of the Palais de Versailles was closed to us (it was August after all) there were enough grounds staff to supervise a visit to the gardens. And so we spent a fantastic day discovering the immense grounds of this extraordinary scene. Somehow it seemed impervious to the ravages of time. And outdoors the palace was remarkably untouched by either revolution or the recent global financial disasters.

Gardening by hand at Versailles

After touring the network of lakes and the Trianon we walked the miles of avenues of trees. There were oak, cypress, and many other varieties of trees. Then finally we returned to look at the intricate parterre. The gardens were at once splendid, and incredibly intricate.

Closer inspection showed exactly how manicured each and every shrub and tree really was. As you can see, the groundsmen hand sheared all the angled topiary. This is one way to sustain employment in a growing population during a recession.

A final word on our experience house-sitting in Paris

It was a really fun visit. And the house-sitting in Paris was a genuinely fabulous experience. It was a feast for both the eyes and the palate. Moreover, it was enlightening and easy on the pocket because of our stint as house-sitters. We didn’t have to pay for any accommodation, despite staying in the centre of one of the most expensive capitals in the world. Our friends were happy because we could take care of their cat for them in their absence. And we were happy because we could run around Paris in the quiet of August being tourists. It was a real quid pro quo. House-sitting in Paris for us was a classic example of what they call collaborative consumption..!

Lamia Walker is the founder of HouseSitMatch.com.

Reference Sites –

Google – Street view from the Eiffel Tower
La Maison de Angelina – Home Page
Versailles Palace – Home Page

To Register as a House-Sitter yourself for housesitting and pet sitting follow this link HOUSE-SITTER REGISTRATION

To Register as a Homeowner yourself follow this link HOMEOWNER REGISTRATION

FURTHER READING ON TRAVEL AND HOUSESITTING IN EUROPE

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