All the time spent in Paris … and it is hard to recall more than one day spent in the 18th arrondissement.

A visit to Sacre-Coeur. A very long time ago.

However, we are staying a week in the 18th this time around, and it’s not quite like the areas of Paris with which we are familiar.

To wit:

–It’s hilly! Especially this southern half of the 18th. At all times you are going uphill or downhill. The best-known place in the arrondissement is Sacre-Coeur, a basilica on the highest point inside the Paris city limits.

–Park areas are at a premium. The biggest patch of green in the whole of the 18th (well, it has trees, anyway) is Montmarte Cemetery, which doesn’t really count as a park. After that? Looks like it might be something called Square Leon-Serpollet.

–It is difficult to get to the parts of Paris most of us would prefer to frequent. “Us” being tourists or fixed-term visitors. The 2 and the 13 metro lines are not particularly useful. Not like the 1 line, certainly.

–It is surprisingly expensive, considering it is mostly a working-class arrondissement. The most expensive meal we have had in Paris in a long time was in the southwest corner of the 18th. A day later, we paid something like 4.5 euros for a ham sandwich in a pricey bakery. One working theory is the presence of a couple of four-star hotels in the neighborhood.

–The 18th shares (with the 9th) the biggest red-light district in Paris — the area around Place Pigalle. Included in the quartier is the Moulin Rouge, (which is shockingly expensive; 170 euros with dinner, 110 without), but don’t expect to see Nicole Kidman hanging around. The stain of it doesn’t extend far, but it’s only a few blocks from the busy part of the 18th.

–Significant chunks of the 18th are given over to train tracks, coming from the Gare du Nord and the Gare de l’Est, which have their stations in the 10th. Not sure there is a good side of tracks for either one of those swaths of tracks blighting the 18th.

Maybe to live here is to love it.

But for this set of tourists, the 18th is better to visit. And perhaps for only a day.