Rue de la Huchette 3.17

The rue de la Huchette is one of the oldest streets running along the Rive Gauche in Paris. Running eastward just below the Seine river from the Place Saint-Michel, it is today an animated Latin Quarter artery with one of the highest concentrations of restaurants in the city — Greek specialties predominating. It is situated between Boulevard Saint-Michel and Rue du Petit-Pont and faces the cathedral of Notre-Dame de Paris. This almost exclusively pedestrian street is very popular with tourists. Disdained by some guidebooks as "Bacteria Alley", the street nevertheless has an intense night life with no less than four pubs and several bars.HistoryThe rue de la Huchette existed as early as 1200 as the rue de Laas, a road running adjacent to a walled vineyard property known then as the clos du Laas. The property was sold and divided for urban development in the early 13th century, grew many noble properties in the centuries following, but from the 17th century the rue de la Huchette was known mostly for its taverns and rotisseries ("meat-roasters").The inhabitants of the rue de la Huchette in the period leading up to the Second World War are portrayed in Elliot Paul's book The Last Time I Saw Paris (1942). The period after the Second World War is covered in Paul's book Springtime in Paris (1950).