Paris by Night and Day

 

We spent our last day in Paris trotting around different neighborhoods, squeezing in whatever sights we could on a rainy day. Montmartre was our first stop of the day. We made the steep climb to the top of the hill to this ancient looking church, though by Parisian standards it's brand new. It is only about 20 years older than the Eiffel Tower. Inside the basilica of Sacre Coeur, 24 hours a day, someone is praying for Christ to understand the sins of the world.

It's not hard to ask someone to take your photo, especially if you already heard them speak English.

 

Sacre Coeur offers another great view overlooking Paris

 No pictures allowed inside Sacre Coeur. I bought a little bookmark with a picture of the mosaic ceiling, only to have the bookmark fall out of my shopping bag when it got wet and split open. C'est la vie!

Our next stop is the Opera Garnier, home to one of the greatest ballet companies in the world and the Opera Nationale, not to mention a masked phantom...



There are enormous beehives on the roof, you can actually purchase the honey they harvest when it's in season!



 

I would have very much preferred to come and see a performance here, but there were no productions on during our visit. Seeing the actual theater was very limited as they were working on lighting for next weeks performance. We couldn't actually see the famous ceiling art. I will not be satisfied until I can come back and see a ballet or concert on that stage.

This place made me feel underdressed in the extreme.

 

 

 

Everything about this opera house was designed so that the rich and famous could be seen seeing the opera. There is less space dedicated to the seating than there is to the grand entrance. The most expensive seats have restricted views of the stage but can easily be viewed by all the other patrons.

Here G. F. Handel is honored in a manner that would have suited his ego.

By this time were so ready for a rest and a meal. We took the metro to the Marais district where we dined on inexpensive and heavenly falafel and slightly expensive but no less heavenly eclairs.

We wandered by Place des Vosges, the square Victor Hugo would have looked out on as he penned Les Miserables...

 

And we spent a few minutes at the Musee Carnivalet. The former mansion is a free museum of the history of Paris. We visited the revolution rooms, we were feeling a little too tired to spend much time in a quiet warm museum.

Musee Carnivalet's  garden courtyard.

 

Vive la revolution!

 Behind Lee is a model of the Bastille. The infamous fortress was ripped down, brick by brick, so nothing is left of it now, it has been replaced by a roundabout, a victory column, and a sleek new age opera house, The Opera Bastille.

We visited the Centre du Pompidou to checkout the wild exo-skeletal design, but we didn't go in to see the modern art galleries. We'll get our modern art fix elsewhere.

 

The blurry smudge next to me is either a ghost or a raindrop on the camera lens.

We found that taking a break in the late afternoon before going out in search of dinner helped to keep us on our feet later in the evening. As this was our last night in Paris, we decided to finish it off with a night time cruise up the Seine. We were completely freezing for the whole hour, but it was well worth it. Sure we could have gone to the heated, glass covered lower deck, but I wanted better views and better photos, so we stuck it out on the upper deck. And so, without further ado, I give you Paris by Night:

The view from the Ile de la Cite

 

Pont Neuf

 

Pont Alexandre and the Eiffel Tower

 

No idea what this is...

 

The Left Bank of the Seine.

 

Notre Dame by night.

This is my poorly done video, if all you do is look at it for a few seconds to see the Eiffel Tower sparkle, then you've seen enough.





Paris: Leap Day The Right Way

When megalomaniacs build monuments, they dream big. Welcome to the Arc de Triomphe. Napoleon's monument to the victory  at the Battle of Austerlitz, not completed until after his death, is now a monument to military victories of the French.

I know someone is making a joke about this right now, but before 1914, France was a major military power in the world, never more so than under Napoleon's rule. Many battles of WWI were fought on French soil. Fully half of the men of France lost their lives in that war.

When Napoleon's body was brought back from exile for burial, the funeral procession passed under the now completed arch and the little emperor was finally laid to rest at Les Invalides (see previous post). Let's take a closer look...

One can reach the top of the arc on a seemingly never ending spiral staircase. inside the arc there are a few displays, toilets, gift shops, the usual monument accoutrements. Up on top there is the view!



 

Straight down a grand boulevard you can see La Defense, the more modern great arc that dwarfs Napoleon's. It is something like 36 stories, office space fills the interior.

And there is far off Montmartre, crowned with the great Basilica of Sacre Coeur. We will take a closer look at this in another post.

Another windy view. You think I would learn and stop wearing my hair down, but no. I guess I'll just look like this in all my photos.



 

From underneath the Arc is very impressive. From every angle, really, and one can easily imagine some of the remarkable events that have played out here. An early aviator flew his plan through the Arc as a stunt. Under this monument rests the tomb of the Unknown Soldier, guarded by an eternal flame.

 

We left the Arc de Triomphe, but that wasn't the last we saw of it. We got a final glimpse as we strolled down the Champs Elysees.

I snapped this photo while cross the street (don't worry, we used the cross walk and obeyed all traffic signs). The Champs Elysees is a nice place to walk, but it is an even nicer place to snack.

 

LADUREE! The famously posh tea house on the Champs Elysees is most famous for it's macarons:

Flavors from left to right: Praline, Chocolate, Pistachio, Lemon, Green Apple, Caramel

I am not the type to take pictures of all my food, but macarons are pretty, they came in a pretty bag, and they taste even better than they look. We tried some run of the mill macarons earlier in our trip that were good, but they weren't this good. These were other worldly! I voted we spend our entire food budget for the rest of the trip on macarons, but Lee shot me down. I guess with Laduree's prices we would have only been eating a couple cookies a day. While that may have been enough calories, we would have been malnourished.

 

We continued towards our next destination with a brief detour to Pont Alexandre and a rest at Place du Concorde.

The Obelisk of Luxor was a gift from Egypt to...Napoleon?...it now rests in the very square where the guillotine severed the necks of the revolutions most high profile victims: Louis XVI and Marie Antoinette.

Our next stop was a small art museum at the edge of the square called the Musee de L'Orangerie. It houses the greatest work of one of the greatest artist in history: Monet's Water Lilies.

These enormous canvases--over 1,000 square feet altogether--were Monet's final great creation. By this point in his life he had cataracts. With his dimming sight he worked all day, working on each canvas in turn depending on the time of day.

Monet designed the space inside the Orangerie for his painting to be displayed though he didn't live to see them hung here.

I think this water lily is my favorite. Especially up close when you can hardly tell what it is.

There are two rooms, each with a 360 degree view of Monet's garden at different times of day. The second room features the willow trees by the pond. It's amazing how clear these paintings look through the camera when I had difficulty deciphering some of them with my own eyes.

We walked back to our hotel and as we were resting up we decided to visit the Cluny again as our museum passes would no longer be valid the next day. Might as well take advantage of the free admission! We did some more thorough exploration, so we were able to see the lower part of the building which used to be a Roman bath. The upper floors were a Catholic Church, now the whole of it is a museum of medieval art.

The Roman Bath behind me is probably near 2,000 years old.

Perhaps the Cluny's most celebrated treasure are the six tapestries known as The Lady and the Unicorn. The first five each represent one of the five senses. This one represents touch:

The sixth tapestry says "Mon Seul Desir," or "My soul's desire" on it, but scholars have argued about the ambiguity of what that desire might be for centuries. 

Apparently for many years the myth of unicorns was perpetuated by the sale of Narwhal horns as "unicorn relics." This horn is one such relic.





feel the power of the mighty Narwhal!

 

This ancient well is pretty cool!

 

Lee found some kind of sundial etched into the wall.

 Another successful, exhausting day! The only things I would have done differently would be to wear my boots all that day instead of trying my tennies shoes. One day of tennis shoes gave me blisters that I was feeling for a week. I threw the tennis in the trash that night, never to curse the feet of human kind again. But as they say, that which doesn't kill you will still make it really hard to walk around for the rest of your vacation!

Turning 27 and the Fountain of Youth

Yes, I have broken Rule #2 of Womanhood by announcing my real age--Rule #1 is asking/stating body weight, #3 is asking/stating BMI--on a public forum. But I turned 27 in Pairs. Being in Paris on your birthday, as you well know, makes you age backwards. It's basically the fountain of youth! And if you don't believe me, ask the woman I saw on the Metro dressed to the nines in a blue fur coat. No matter how old you are, you are always young in Paris.

This is the formula for a perfect birthday, take notes so you can copy it for your next rotation around the sun!

Step One: Immerse Yourself in Timeless Art

If you wish to be timeless yourself, then you have to get a good idea of the kind of greatness that withstands the test of time. Seems as if the Musee D'Orsay is the perfect place to find that kind of great art!

The former train station is practically a work of art in it self. From the beautiful time piece in side..

A toast to you, Great Gilded Clock!

To the clocks that can be viewed from both sides. There is something so beautiful and brilliant about using these enormous time keepers as windows, I just love the feel of it.

Step Two: Enjoy the Art

Most of what you find in the upper galleries are the great masters who were ahead of their time, so much so that they were despised by the high brow art circles of their day. Today, nobody remembers those critics, but we all know Renoir. Who hasn't seen this painting at one point in their life?

Ah! Vincent Van Gogh! Just walking around the Van Gogh gallery with the song "Vincent" stuck in my head, trying not to be too emotional. What I might love best about Van Gogh is that his art is very literally 3 dimensional. Look at the thickness and texture of the paint:

This photo is for the Doctor Who fans, you know why.

Step Three: Treat Yo' Self.

Food is always an important part of a birthday, this year we opted for a lavish lunch at the Orsay Restaurant. I chose this place for it's beauty, but the food was good too.

Not pictured: The chubby cherubs painted on the ceiling.

 

Step Four: Enjoy the Great Outdoors (and more art)

The Rodin Museum in Paris is not to be missed, but the garden is the best part. You can see most of Rodin's greatest pieces in this beautiful setting while enjoying a sunny day.

Experience your own existential crisis with The Thinker

 

Marvel at the gory detail on the Gates of Hell

As I understand it, The Thinker was originally created as the figure of Dante--top center--on this enormous depiction of "The Inferno," but Rodin identified with the figure so much he created a large free standing version and renamed it. A copy of this pensive figure is actually the grave marker at Rodin's tomb. And speaking of tombs...

There is an excellent view of the dome of Les Invalides from Rodin's garden. beneath that dome is the largest monument to a dead guy I know of outside of Egypt.

Napoleon Bonaparte! Easily the most famous despot in history. I salute Napoleon style by sticking my hand inside my jacket. Legend has it that Napoleon did that to keep Josephine from getting at his wallet (I know, I'm hilarious), but I'm not sure I've ever seen a painting where he is actually doing this pose.

Step Five: Contemplate Your Own Mortality and Wonder if You Will Have Any Descendants Rich Enough to Bury You Like This. Decide That Would Be Too Wasteful And Move On.

 

Napoleon's great coffin is inside that enormous brown sarcophagus behind Lee. I am in no way exaggerating when I say that 15 people could RIP inside that thing comfortably. Seriously, it is absurdly huge. But then, so is the dome:

I've seen cathedrals dedicated to saints that were less splendid. Even though Napoleon destroyed the Republic that the French celebrate and value so greatly, they really loved the guy for making them militarily dominant in Europe. I sometimes wonder if he'd been able to leave Russia alone, what would the map of Europe look like today? Or if the Duke of Wellington had been on holiday during the Battle of Waterloo...

Step 6: Get Some Exercise

Walking around Paris is not for the faint of heart or faint of...leg. We averaged 8 miles a day, I think this was our biggest walking day of the trip at 8.9 miles. A big portion of that walk was because of this:

 

The Eiffel Tower is somehow even bigger than it looks. I have heard people say, "I was disappointed, I thought it'd be bigger." These people clearly took the elevator. We did not.

 

We were the only people doing this with a real camera and no selfie stick.

M. Eiffel's Tower is truly a modern marvel. She's over a 100 years old now (born 1895), but she definitely doesn't give off an air of being an artifact of days gone by. If anything, I was strongly reminded of an amusement park ride. Big crowds, long lines, over priced souvenirs and snacks; everyone waiting to go up really high on a skeletal steel structure. That's not to say I wasn't mind blown by the views or anything, just that I didn't expect the Eiffel Tower to feel so...current.

We are standing on the glass floor (terrifying) on the first level. Those little dark flecks are not wads of gum, they are humans on the ground. There was an ice staking rink set up on this level, a restaurant, brisk winds--to put it mildly--and more stairs to level 2. 

Lee and the restaurant behind him, still on level 1



I had to pose sheltered from the wind by this enormous pillar so I wouldn't look like Cousin It in the photo.

Step Seven: Have Your Breath Taken Away

Just looking at this photo makes me relive some of the vertigo I felt taking the photo. On level 2, 720 steps up, 400 feet above ground, this is how far we are from the top of the tower.





The views from down here were just fine. Incredible, in fact. After all the effort of climbing those stairs, we made sure to really take our time up there. The snacks were too expensive to bother with but the benches were a very welcome reprieve for our tired legs.

 

Of course we made a short video while we were up here. Again, I apologize for the poor quality. I don't currently have any video edited software as my laptop is sleeping the sleep of death, so just edit the badness out mentally.

To say that we were tired after all this living would be a gross understatement. I'd say we were fatigued in the extreme and agreed that we should take it easy the next day. We did a little extra wandering in search of dinner, almost too exhausted to be able to make a decision. But we happened upon a cozy little place with excellent quiche and cheese, which brings us to the final step to having a perfect birthday:

Step Eight: Splurge On Exotic Cheeses That Are So Strong They Literally Make Your Mouth Burn.

That's how our day ended, taste buds burned away by French cheese, and the bells of Notre Dame.

And that is the secret to a perfect birthday and eternal youth! Or, at least, enjoying life regardless of your age.