On the whole, we thoroughly enjoyed our stay in Prune's 'lovely pad in the heart of Paris'.

There were only two issues with which we had difficulty (i) gaining initial entry into the apartment, & (ii) lack of water pressure in the shower.

(i) I do not recall any prior emails advising that we needed a 5-digit pass code to gain entry into the lane way (solved as it happens by the very helpful Patisserie store owner, who keyed this in for us). Also once inside, it was not clear which stairwell to take (the lefthand 'EST B', from memory?), nor on which level (3) the apartment was located. A phone call to Ludwig set us straight, & his friend Remy arrived in person shortly after (who provided us with most of the information we needed).

(ii) There was insufficient water pressure to have a proper shower - we we reduced to washing under the bath tap.

That aside, we quickly settled in and thoroughly enjoyed our week's stay.

Ludwig had provided a comprehensive local guide (pdf), but we quickly discovered Patisseries, Fromageries, Wine Cellars, Coffee Shops, Fruit Stores (& Markets) etc. in the vicinity for ourselves; likewise the location of our local Metro station (Ledru Rolin), which we used as the base for our daily explorations of the city (also, Ludwig had previously given us good advice on how to get from Gare du Nord to the apartment). We quickly settled in to our daily routine of coffee, baguettes & sightseeing. The Wi-Fi was excellent, as were all apartment facilities in fact.

On the morning of our departure we cleaned the apartment, defrosted the refrigerator & took out the garbage (to the downstairs garbage bins, which we only discovered towards the end of our stay); we also replaced two broken wine glasses. Afterwards, we forwarded to Ludwig a (Van Gogh-like) painting of the chair in the apartment which Ione had done during our stay.

In closing, I should mention that thanks to Ludwig's apartment, we were provided with a definite 'heart of Paris' experience - on the night before Bastille Day, there was a 'riot' down our street (complete with gun shots)! All in all, a marvellous experience, and we would recommend this 'lovely pad in the heart of Paris' to anyone.

John & Ione.