It never ceases to amaze when I see Americans lined up at McDonald's from Toronto to Tokyo, Marseilles to Melbourne. All I can figure is that McFood doesn't intimidate people who lack language skills or a sense of adventure.

Those people are missing one of the greatest pleasures of travel, serendipitous dining and the fun of finding restaurants that offer a delightful and usually superior change of pace from what's available at home.

A few years ago, my wife, Susan, and I were out for an evening stroll in Paris and came across a tiny restaurant called Rendez-Vous des Camioneurs on the Ile de la Cite, a few blocks from Notre Dame and a few yards from the Pont Neuf bridge over the Seine.

We had a great meal, fish for me and beef for Susan, and when we were in Paris again last October decided to go back. It was just as wonderful, and we had a chat with owner Dany Haye, whose grandparents opened the place before World War II.

Back then the Rendez-Vous des Camioneurs was what its name says, a cafe for truck drivers who hauled produce from the now-gone market at Les Halles to restaurants and stores all over Paris. (Haye has an album of black-and-white photos that depict the cafe's history, with him as a kid of 7 in 1950 standing with his grandparents in the doorway.)

The Rendez-Vous still has only a dozen tables, but has developed a reputation as a classic Paris bistro, and the album also was filled with glowing reviews from Paris newspapers and magazines.

You don't have to leave the country to enjoy serendipitous dining.

In Ft. Myers, Fla., Susan and I were taking a bike ride and stopped for lunch at Delicious Things in the old downtown.

Lunch was so good we decided to try the dinner menu a couple of weeks later, and the largely Italian cuisine was superb, like visiting a first-class restaurant in Italy. I had a pasta dish and Susan went with lamb, and the bill came to less than $70 with a decent bottle of wine.

On a recent trip to Key West, I fished with Frank Piku, a charter captain who lives in Sylvan Lake in the summer. We caught grouper and yellowtail snapper, two of my favorite eating fish, and Piku suggested we take some to his favorite restaurant, Cafe Sole, where owner-chef John Correa would prepare it for us.

We were soon gazing happily at plates filled with fish that had been swimming in the Gulf of Mexico not six hours before. I know that some people would have said a word of commiseration for the fate of fishes before lifting knife and fork. All I said was, "Please pass the salt."

Truthfully, I didn't say even that, because Correa had grilled the grouper and baked the snapper so exquisitely in a lemon butter and capers sauce that additional spicing would have been sacrilege.

But don't expect restaurants to knock something off the price just because you supply the fixings. You're paying for the ambience, service and the chef's expertise, and our dinner, with wine, ran about $100.

If you ever have the good fortune to visit Auckland, New Zealand, there are so many great restaurants that in some neighborhoods you could almost gain weight by sniffing the air. We spent several months in Auckland on a couple of business trips and would often hop in the car on an evening and drive cautiously down the wrong side of the road until some place caught our eye.

One evening we were in the suburb of St. Heliers, sitting on a seawall and enjoying the beach scene, when we noticed a small place across the road called Annabelle's.

Susan, who never met a lamb chop she didn't like, said the chops were the best she's ever tasted, which was saying something in a nation of 4 million people and 45 million sheep.

Some of the best finds we've made have been on whims. We were driving along in Italy one day, with me trying to convince Susan that 170 kilometers an hour was equivalent to 70 mph, when she looked up from the map and asked if we were anywhere near Pisa. When I said it was about 80 clicks up the road, she announced, "I want a pizza in Pisa."

So we drove into a town that we had intended to bypass and that night had the most remarkable pizzas we've ever enjoyed, laden with all kinds of fresh veggies and exotic herbs you rarely see on pizza in America. We also found a great hotel and liked the place so much we spent two unplanned days there.

If you're in England, there's nothing quite like the taste (and fat grams) of take-out fish and chips, slathered in salt and pepper and vinegar, wrapped in paper and eaten on a park bench or roadside picnic table.

And the best noodle soup I've ever eaten was served in a truck stop along a freeway near Yokohama, Japan.

Even the smallest European towns have bakeries that offer wonderful breads and pastries. If you find yourself in Vienna, you'll learn that Austrians like nothing better than an elaborate sweet nosh enjoyed at mid-afternoon, bought from a bakery whose window display is like a trip to an art museum.

That's the kind of thing that makes serendipitous dining memories.

Eric Sharp: esharp@freepress.com