Our Final Full Day, Days Later

On our last full day in France, we took the train out to Versailles; this was way back on Tuesday. So, so long ago.

France has several train lines. There is the metro system within Paris, the RER that originates in Paris and goes out to the edge of the suburbs, SNCF that goes further out and then another one that goes really far afield, including across country boundaries. At least as far as I could tell. Anyway, put me in the ranks of people who are mightily impressed by the train system.

Once we got to Versailles, we found, you guessed it, a really long line. We noticed people following signs to the left that led one to Le Jardin Aux Musicales and that line was really short and moving quickly! It turns out we bought tickets for the garden, which is really huge and amazing.

So while I still have not seen the inside of Versailles, I have spent 5 or 6 hours touring through the garden. Or gardens, I suppose. Fountains and statuary, orangerie and chestnut trees, cats and daffodils, lilacs and pools. And music! Each little garden area has a different baroque-ish soundtrack going. Rob kept looking for the band and we discovered that they were tiny little people inside those boxes!

There was also a water show with music at one particular pool/fountain that was really nice. It was in front of the Royal Garden, which was my favorite garden. It was full of flowers and rare trees and was really well laid out.

We had our last lunch in the garden and shared it with a very cute cat that was a champion beggar. We both ordered pizza because we had not yet had a French pizza with a soft boiled egg in the center. Sounds weird I know, but it really is good. And I finally had my crepe nutella; yummy!

After we had thoroughly examined the internal garden, we went outside to the part that is open without a ticket. The full grounds for the chateau are enormous and include the Grand Canal.

We did finally get a bike ride in around the Grand Canal. You can rent a bicycle right at the back gate of the ticketed area. So we rode all the way to the far back wall and discovered that we can arrive by a small, secondary road and slip in through the back gate on our big bike tour, whenever that happens.

We stayed at the gardens until almost closing time and then did some quick shopping at a tacky souvenir shop. Then our private car picked us up in front of Versailles - actually, it was Rob's friend Florent, whose business is in a small town about 10 miles away.

Florent took us back to his workplace and gave us a tour. It is quite impressive; there are cars in process of being transformed into custom race cars, big tools that mean nothing to me, but made Rob jealous, ovens for baking carbon fiber parts. Rob was like a kid in a candy store.

We rode back to Paris with Florent and went to his apartment for a drink. We got to meet his father-in-law, who has been staying with them during the week to do work on the apartment.

Once again we were fooled by how late it stays light in France and realized that it had somehow gotten to be 9:30pm. We skeedadled out of there and headed for the metro; we still needed to eat dinner and pack.

We ate at a little restaurant down the street from the apartment that had this great cat mural. We both got steak frite (steak and fries) since we had not had that yet. It is a small serving (actually a reasonable serving) of a not great cut of meat served with fat fries that is traditional bistro or cafe fare.

Then we headed back to pack and get ready for our departure.

Au Revoir with Sadness

We are off to the airport momentarily for our flight home. Some airports in Ireland and Scotland are closed due to the volcano, but so far France is unaffected.

We had a late final evening last night - dinner was at about 10:30pm - so I will update on yesterday's activities later. It involved a lot of wind.

The Louvre

Today dawned cloudy and cold, so it was the perfect day to spend at the Louvre. We actually slept in a little and didn't get there until 11:00am or so. Of course there was a line. But we stood in it and got our tickets.

We spent several hours looking at the excavated foundation of the Medieval era Louvre, Egyptian antiquities, and Greek, Etruscan and Roman antiquities. We dragged our poor starving selves to a cafe at about 2:30pm, had a wonderful respite from standing while we ate our lunch and then went back out to look at paintings for the duration of the visit.

We saw Jesus and others bleeding and suffering a lot, German, Flemish and Dutch painters, as well as some of the Italian masters. We saw the Mona Lisa from afar and other Da Vinci's close up. We also saw several Vermeers from behind a few people.

As far as action goes, it was rather a dull day. But for stuffing our brains, it was very busy! The Louvre itself is amazing. For those that don't know or have forgotten, it was originally a palace that has over time morphed into being exclusively a museum. It actually served the dual purpose of palace and museum once. Some of the rooms have amazing ceiling frescoes and I had a hard time figuring out whether to focus on those or the paintings.

Once they pulled out the cattle prods and forced us out at closing time, we took the metro home to Montmartre. We have shopped for dinner items again and Rob is creating another masterpiece in the kitchen. We will likely do a little laundry this evening, passing the washing time with a little dessert in a cafe. I saw someone eating a nutella crepe yesterday and have wanted one ever since.

Old and New Friends

Dinner last night with Rob's friend Florent was a delight. He still lives in the same apartment on Rue St Denis he had as a student 20 years ago, but it has been greatly improved. According to both Rob and Florent, it was a bit of a pig sty way back when. But Florent is married with two small children now, so it has to be a bit more liveable! It is a work in progress, much like all the places we live. (I would tell you there names, but other than the four years old - Ronan - I have no idea how to spell anything. Will work on that and try to report later.)

I discovered that I do not have the vocabulary to follow the random conversations of a four years old! Florent's son and I played with play dough after dinner, but I could not understand what he was saying most of the time. Our evening was an interesting mix of English and French. Florent's wife speaks some English while he is quite fluent.

We will try to stop in the town in which Florent works on Tuesday on our way back from Versailles.  They make custom upgrades, etc for race cars for people all over the world, hence his fluency in English; he says bad English is the universal language. Rob is eager to see the business.

We got up early this morning despite our late night; we managed to make it up the Eiffel Tower this morning and only had to stand in line for a few minutes. We took the stairs to the first and second platforms and enjoyed learning about the construction of the tower. New elevators are being put in - they are using the original compressed water technology of the first elevator installation. We did not make it to the top platform - you had to stand in line for a second ticket, then stand in line to ride an elevator and then ride the crowded elevator with the masses of other people. We moved on to the next sight instead.

There was a Jewish celebration and parade of some sort going on in the middle of the gardens leading up to the Eiffel Tower, so we got to enjoy our time there to the rhythms of the klezmer band. Rob kept threatening to dance.

We grabbed sandwiches on the way to the Musee Rodin and picnicked on a bench. The museum happened to be free today, so it was a little crowded, but still enjoyable. Many of the sculptures are outside in the garden. The garden is full of blooming flowers and we got to enjoy a springtime rain while hiding under a densely leafed tree. It even hailed!

In fact, in rained on and off most of the day. One minute it was sunny and warm and the next the wind would pick up and bring in the clouds and a shower.  We would just duck under something or just walk through it if it did start to rain.

After the Musee Rodin, we headed over to Ile de la Cite and Saint Chapelle, with a stop at the gardin at the west end of the island. We had an ice cream and waited out another rain shower under a big chesnut tree. 

Saint Chapelle is one of my favorite sights in Paris. It is smaller than some of the other churches, so it is on a much more human scale. I love the painted walls and the stained glass windows. We also visited Le Concierge, which neither of us had been to. It is below street level now, but was once the level of the island. Embankments have been added over time, raising the level of the street considerably. The age of both is just amazing and sometimes hard to wrap your head around. They are both part of the Palais de Justice now, which is on the site of earlier residences of the kings.


We then walked over to Notre Dame de Paris, but the line was really long again. We decided to head back to Montmartre to the apartment, but got waylaid by the entrance to La Crypte de Archeologique. We took a quick pass through. It is an excavation of foundations and lower parts of houses and other buildings that lie below the level of the current street near Notre Dame. It was fascinating. Some of the later buildings used stones from the earlier buildings. We would have like to have spent more time, but they closed about 40 minutes after we got there.

We finally headed for home on a different subway line from our normal route. We got waylaid again by a church, Saint Jean de Montmartre, in the square where our regular metro stop is. The doors were open and we both made a beeline for the church without even talking about it.

It was built in the very late 1800s and was one of the earliest concrete buildings. It's construction - like many buildings in Paris - was very controversial at the time. It even involved the builder going to court to finish it because it was claimed he did not have the proper papers; red tape would get you even back then!

It too is very beautiful and much smaller. I might even be persuaded to go to church every once in a while if I could just sit and look around the whole time. It has some wall paintings, which were never finished due to loss of financing (sound familiar?) and is fairly dark but something about it really appeals to me.

Then we hit a few stores to get supplies to make dinner and got to cooking. Rob made a version of his pasta called Spaghetti Robert Montmartre. Very good, but, of course, a bit spicey!

We followed up dinner with dessert and coffee at a cafe a little off the beaten track just up from the apartment. There was a big, beautiful wisteria vine covering the outdoor seating area. Rob had a warm, gooey chocolate cake thing with caramel ice cream and I had a tarte tartin with creme fraiche-sort of a not very sweet apple pie without a top crust. Both were delicious!

Now we are ready to go to bed so we can get up bright and early and try for the Louvre again tomorrow.

Plan B

So it turns out that May 1, is a major holiday in France and all the museums are closed. We got to the Louvre only be to turned away. The Musee d'Orangerie was also closed so we figured the closure would turn out to include all the museums, which was the case. We did get the chance to walk through Le Jardin Tuileries twice - once on the way to the Louvre and once on the way back toward the Musee d'Orangerie

We began to make our way over to the Eiffel Tower with the idea of going to the top since neither of us had ever done that. We strolled around the outside of Le Grand Palais; the building is highly ornamented with lots of bas relief sculpture and mosaics on the outside. We also took a picture of the main hall on the inside through the glass doors. The interior ironworks is beautifully decorated in the art nouveau style.

Across the street is Le Petit Palais. It is no less ornamented - in this case "grand" and "petit" mean large and small. In fact, the inside of Le Petit Palais - at least what is visible through the front door if you press your nose up against the glass - is even more grand. It has a mosaic floor, decorated walls, and murals on the ceiling.

We also saw Les Invalides, though the army museum housed there was closed, as was Napoleon's tomb. But again, the building itself is very interesting.

We stopped for lunch in a cafe across from the military school - Cafe des Officers (sp?). Our waitress was great fun; she opened bottles of beer by putting the opener on the top and then bracing the bottle over her shoulder. She definitely had young French attitude. We also observed a youth riding over the pave (paving stones) on a bicycle wearing what appeared to be a smoking jacket, pipe in mouth, and sporting long dreadlocks. He later took a table with two friends at our cafe! We were not sure what look he and his friends were going for, but they were certainly going for something. (Do we sound old, or what!?!)

We finally made it to Le Tour Eiffel after walking through Le Parc du Champ de Mars. The lines to go up into the tower were mind numbingly long. We did not stand in line. Knowing us, is anyone surprised? We plan to show up there at 9:30 am tomorrow when it opens. Instead we walked through a little garden in the shadow of the tower and watched baby ducks and some other baby swimming bird we did not recognize frolic in the pond. Much better than standing in line.

After we watched boat traffic in the Seine for a bit, we decided to head for home for a few hours. When Rob was in school here in 1989-90, he made friends with a classmate named Florent. We are going to Florent's apartment for dinner tonight.  We are resting and blogging before our evening out. And continuing to download those dang pictures. The problem is that we keep taking more!

Au Revoir!

Domestication

we spent the day as promised getting ourselves all settled. Clothes have been washed, travelers checks cashed and groceries bought. Some pictures have been uploaded, though they are not yet ready for public consumption. Takes a long time to upload 300 or so pictures.

 
We slept in a bit this morning, then got a three cheese quiche to split and a pain au chocolat apiece. We hopped on the metro down to L'Opera to the American Express office to cash our travelers checks. Of course the office was not quite where we thought it would be, but we found it eventually. And boy, was it a madhouse down around the Opera. Tourists, hustlers, crazies, you name it!

We left our clothes washing at the laundromat and did today's shopping. It was lots of fun. You go to lots of different stores for each kind of thing you want. A bread store, a veggie store, a cheese store, etc. I think we made about seven different stops in all. Great people watching as we went. Back to the apartment to put things away and then back down to the laundromat to get our clothes to bring back to hang to dry. Lots of walking and stair climbing.

We had gotten these great bread, tomato, feta cheese, basil things that we had for lunch. Then I had to take a nap. Our apartment is great, but the bed is not so awesome. It is a futon that sags in the middle, so I spent most of the night hanging onto the edge for dear life. If I turned on my other side, I would roll down into the hollow in the middle and smother. Not terribly restful. Plus, it is vacation and I can nap when I want.

Rob made the infamous Big Salad that he perfected mere blocks from here when a poor student without a real kitchen. I think the one we had tonight was  bit more high brow - roquefort blue cheese, white anchovies, fancy olives.

We went for a stroll after dinner, hoping to drop into the Montmartre Cemetery, but all the gates were closed for the night. So we went up to the top of Montmartre and down over the other side a bit into the really expensive neighborhood. We window shopped for an apartment or house over there - they are going for $2-3 million. That's actually euros, but I have no idea where the euro symbol is on my computer. So, a lot.

According to our hostess, the movie Amelie has had a huge impact on real estate here in Montmartre, much like Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil or Fried Green Tomatoes. Apparently, it has had a lot to do with Montmartre getting trendy and yuppiefied.

So we are off to bed early tonight. We plan to hit the Louvre tomorrow, which will likely be an all day event. I hope to finish the pictures tomorrow, but, hey, I'm on vacation; I'll get to them at least by the time we leave.

Home Sweet Home a Paris

We made it back to Paris late this afternoon. We are comfortably ensconced in our apartment, where we will be staying until our departure on May 5. 

We had a wonderful stay in Maintenon at Le Vieux Logis in the Coquelicot room. Unfortunately, the WiFi (pronounced WeeFee in French) did not work, so we were unable to update you on our progress. We have not had a chance to work on the picture issue either, but rest assured that we will get on that tout suite!

I am afraid this will be rather long, as I have to go back to yesterday morning to begin reporting and we have seen a lot between then and now! So go get a drink or a snack before reading the rest of this - I'll wait....


Okay, all ready? So we awoke in Chartres yesterday morning after a wonderfully restful and quiet night at the Hotellerie St. Yves. We had breakfast at the hotel and it was quite the experience, at least for me. They had a self serve coffee maker contraption that was quite the delight! You just put your cup under the spout and the pressed the button for the kind you wanted. 

I started with a cafe court (cafe short or espresso), and then, because it was so much fun, I moved onto a cafe au lait (coffee with milk, which is two cafe court with frothy milk added - like a latte). I could have stayed there all day making myself all sorts of coffees and chocolates. Alas, there were sights to see! Plus the waitress already had a great deal of material for telling stories about the silly Americans at breakfast.


Our first stop was a climb up the north tower of Chartres Cathedral or Cathedrale Notre Dame de Chartres . We went up and up and round and round a teeny little spiral staircase. The view from the top is unbelievable. Rob took tons of pictures of the sculptures that surround the arch openings even at that height. The amount of work and craftsmanship that went into the construction of the cathedral is amazing. We could have stayed up there for hours, but...

We had to go on the crypt tour at 11:00am, so we had to come down. The name of the tour is a bit of a misnomer as most of the area we toured is actually the lower church. Masses for the public are held there regularly, as are christenings at the baptismal font, which dates from the 12th century. 


This tour included the Carolingian St. Lubin crypt that was constructed in 858. A column there dates from the 6th century and some paving from the 4th century. There is also a well from Gallic times (4th century?) into which the Vikings supposedly flung people in 858. We are talking REALLY old stuff here. I love old stuff. The tour was in French, which I followed a little until my brain got tired (about 3 minutes in), but I was just happy to be surrounded by really old stuff.

Interestingly, they are continuing the tradition of continually adding to and repairing the cathedral. One of the stained glass windows in the lower church was installed about a month ago. The cathedral is a living, breathing building that is still serving the religious community, as well as displaying beautiful religious art for the enjoyment of all. It is also still a pilgrimage destination for the devout.


After our crypt tour we bought a baguette and some camembert and enjoyed a picnic in a park directly behind the cathedral. We then went to the Chartres Centre International du Vitrail (Center for Stained Glass, where you can attend classes even as an average Joe). It has a very informative exhibition of stained glass (all text in very technical French). I really enjoyed the building, the cellar of which was built in the 12th century. It had gothic arched ceilings inside and rough stone outside, but the outside was below ground - thus the word cellar! The upper floors were newer, but still old - timbered with huge beams. All very fascinating.

Our brains were ready to explode after all that visual candy and French translation, so we sat at an outdoor cafe in lounge chairs looking up at the cathedral. Rob had his first citron presse, of which he is now a great fan. It is pressed lemons to which you add your own sugar and water to make the perfect lemonade. I, of course, had a cafe (espresso). We watched the birds riding the updrafts created by this massive building and generally stared in awe. Then we grabbed our bags and headed to the train station (la gare) to go to Maintenon.


We managed to get on a train which had its first stop in Maintenon, so we only rode for 10 minutes. We headed to the city center to find a map to find our hotel, only to discover that we had actually passed it on our way in. So we back tracked a few blocks to Le Vieux Logis. 

The house was a relais de la poste long, long ago. It is several centuries old and backs up to the Louis XIV Canal, which was built during the 17th century during his reign. It was covered in a wisteria vine that was also extremely old - the stem is the size of a good sized tree trunk! It also had a lovely garden out back complete with cats to play with.

Once checked in, we had a stroll along the canal followed by a lovely dinner at Le Vieux Logis. Dessert was ice cream that was flavored with real flowers - a scoop of violet and a scoop of rose, as well as one called pain epice, or spiced bread. It tasted of maybe anise or cloves or cinamon or all of those. It was very good and very interesting.

This morning (Thursday) we had breakfast in the bed and breakfast, ran along the canal and then headed out to tour the Chateau de Maintenon

The property includes aqueducts that Louis XIV ordered built to carry water from the River Eure to Versailles to keep all the fountains flowing. War broke and the master builder died so the project was never finished. It was a bit of a boondogle anyway as the aqueduct was to be about 66 miles long with three levels. Only the first level covering a short distance was ever built and it has been allowed to fall into ruin since. Very bucolic ruins with vegetation growing from it and birds nesting in its cracks.

We left Maintenon in mid-afternoon on the train and returned to Paris. After a quick walk down a long tunnel, we hopped on the metro. We walked up the long staircase to emerge from the Abbesses metro station in the heart of Montmartre in Paris. A short walk up a steep hill brought us to our Home  Sweet Home a Paris .

We are very glad to stay in one place for multiple nights. The apartment is very spacious and in a great location. We got moved in, went for a stroll and then stopped in a cafe for a great dinner. Probably the best meal I have had yet. I had a butterbean (white) soup, tomato pie with a side of olive paste and a green salad. For dessert we both had a tiny chocolate cake with warm chocolate syrupy stuff in the center and raspberry coulis (drizzly syrup). Yum!


Now we are back in for the night. Rob is checking out all the books, of which there are many, including a cartoon book that he is chuckling over as I type. I think it is making fun of George W. Bush. Plenty to laugh at there.

We plan to reconnoiter, do laundry, label and post pictures, grocery shop and generally get thoroughly moved in tomorrow. Maybe get our travelers checks exchanged. It may rain and it will be a bit cooler, but it is spring time in Paris, after all. 


A bientot!