French Pharmacy Goodies & Souvenirs
Now that I’ve recapped our entire vacation (see parts one, two, and three), I’m doing a show and tell of everything I bought! Somehow, it didn’t occur to me prior to our trip that it would be a great opportunity to shop for skin care. Once we arrived in Paris I realized that I needed to hit up some pharmacies!
French pharmacies are different from those in the US in that they carry a mix of mass market and luxury skin care brands; I’m talking CeraVe alongside Caudalie and Skinceuticals. We do have many of the brands here, but they also had some that I hadn’t heard of. Also, the EU allows some ingredients in sunscreen that the FDA doesn’t allow in the US, so they have SPFs that aren’t available here.
Here’s a list of all the skin care that I bought:
- Talika Paris Bio Enzymes Brightening Mask
- Embryolisse Lait Crème Concentré
- Pure Altitude Eau d’Herbes with Mint and Balm
- Saint-Gervais Mont Blanc Anti-Dryness Shower Gel
- Pure Altitude Sheet Mask with Edelweiss
- Nuxe Rêve de Miel
- Avène Eau Thermale
- Avène Very High Protection B-Protect SPF 50+
- La Roche-Posay Anthelios UVmune 400 Invisible Fluid SPF50+
- Pure Altitude NutriAlpes Cream
- Pure Altitude Fleurs de Givre Face Mask
- Mini Bioderma Sensibio H20 Micellar Water (not pictured)
I’ll likely write a separate post about the skin care that I bought, because it’s too much to discuss here!
Souvenir Shopping
Of course I had to buy some souvenirs for myself on our trip. We also bought a bunch of gifts for friends and family, but I’m not going to post about them because we haven’t given any of them their gifts yet.
I collect magnets and shot glasses, so I bought several of those along with a bunch of other fun items:
While browsing the Louvre gift shop I decided to buy a French edition of Le Petit Prince. At the Catacombs of Paris gift shop, I bought a shot glass and a cute magnet that doubles as a mini book with photos of the catacombs (see pics below).
In Megève I bought a magnet with a cool vintage design and a shot glass featuring the cable car that we rode on our first afternoon in town. And in Chamonix’s shopping district, I bought a bunch of things: a few gemstones, a t-shirt, a little Alpine cowbell for our holiday tree, and a magnet. I also bought a shot glass and a magnet from the Aiguille du Midi souvenir shop all the way at the top of the mountain.
Look at the inside of this adorable Catacombs magnet book!
The crystal shop in Chamonix had sooooo many things that I wanted to buy. But I kept it to a minimum and bought a beautiful grey/purple labradorite piece, along with these two small gemstones (smoky quartz, I believe) that are actually from Mont Blanc!
European Snacks!
At the end of my Megève recap, I mentioned that we stopped at the Casino Supermarché on our way out of town. I wasn’t kidding when I said we did a supermarket sweep…
First, we picked out five bags of Lay’s. I had actually bought a bag of the Emmental-flavored chips in Paris, which we ate and loved, so we bought another bag on this shopping spree.
We also bought some local brands of chips along with a small box of crackers and a bag of puffs:
So far we’ve eaten the pizza crackers, country ham Lay’s, Casino brand curry chips, and Vico spicy goat cheese and herb chips. All were so good. I’m sad we didn’t buy a second bag of the spicy goat cheese chips, because I really loved them.
We also bought some sweets (along with a salty treat):
We’ve eaten the chocolate-covered cookies and the Twinuts, and really liked them as well. The Twinuts were super crunchy and salty, and were a great on-the-go snack.
Le Vin
[EDITED TO ADD] I can’t believe I forgot to include the one bottle of wine that we bought on our trip!
I picked up a bottle of 2022 Sylvain Ravier Savoie Chignin Bergeron from a wine shop in Chamoix. We had tried an incredible Mondeuse (a red Savoyard wine varietal) by this winemaker at our hotel’s restaurant in Megève, and we kept our eyes peeled for a bottle of it to bring home. We didn’t find that exact wine, but I decided to get a white wine from the same producer. It’s a young wine, so I think we’re going to let it age for awhile before we open it.
Okay! I’m just about finished with posting about our vacation. 😛 Stay tuned for one more post, about my skin care haul. Thanks for reading!
