Craig Writes;
07/07/13. We landed at Charles
De Gaulle Airport at 7.15am local time and
1.15 am US time. We just lost 6 hours of our life. We stayed awake for the
nearly seven hour Atlantic crossing. The thought was that we would take a nap once
we're settled, around 10am, and then get up around 1-2pm, go out , shop
etc and try and have a normal day till we collapse from lack of sleep around
9pm. Hopefully we all wake up tomorrow and are back in the swing.
We went for a walk down to the
Tourist Bureau to sort out transit passes etc. It was a beautiful Sunday
afternoon to be walking in the shady quiet streets of Paris. Our apartment is
in a building that is right on the main restaurant, cafe and boulangerie strip
but set back and behind two big security doors. Once the doors clang shut and you
charge up the four flights to your apartment you can't hear a thing. The streetscape caught Claude Monets eye and he did a series of paintings
on Rue Montorgueil in the 1870's.
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| Monet loved our street so much he painted it in 1878 |
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| The view from our kitchen window into our courtyard |
8/07/13 Aaarrghh, jet lag, the
bane of every traveller. Forget global warming, it's too late anyway, the
whales are big enough to look after themselves and if we cured the common cold
people would find quickly find another excuse for taking the Monday after the
long weekend off. No, we need a cure for jet lag. And wash your mouth out if you
say, "well just don't travel", you heathen. I staggered to bed at 9pm
last night falling face first onto my pillow and slept like the dead till I woke up
at 3am as if someone had come screaming through the bedroom banging pots. I was
now wide awake and there was no going back to sleep, so I got up. I read, I
wrote, I did my yoga, I did some exercise, I read more etc etc till the rest of
the house was up and awake...six hours later.
We eventually got going about
11.30 with the aid of the first really descent cup of coffee I've had in three
months. Sorry USA, but bigger is not always best. No sight seeing of lovely
Gothic cathedrals or Neo Classical Museums today. Today was a "work
day" and we were off to find the EUrail office and stand in line for two
hours listening to a group of 20 year old aussie travellers trying too hard to
impress everyone around them with their aussie accents and the
"famous" aussie larrikin charm. It was painful. Eventually we found ourselves at the front of the line. Why have ten assistance
windows and only 2 to 3 open when there is a perpetual line of a 100 people was a frequently asked question among the crowd. Having said that, the girl who helped us spoke good english
and was very helpful. We left all stamped, validated and with a good idea of
where we were heading. We then hopped back on the train and decided to go to
Luxembourg Gardens to sit and eat our home made baguettes. Then, a nice casual
walk back down the Blvd St Michel, past Notre Dame and eventually home.
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| Luxembourg Gardens, beautiful, but dont dare try sit on the lawn |
9/07/13 Nothing.Damn you
cursed jet lag.
10/07/13 Our broken body
clocks are still out being repaired but we were determined today to march on
without them. This is Paris after all and our time is limited. Even then we
found our original plan to catch the 11am free tour around Notre Dame pushed
back to 2.30pm. Still, we were out of the apartment by 1.45 all half fired up
and ready to go. We are only a very pleasant 20 minute walk to the Cathedral
and what better way to adjust yourself than by walking through the busy streets
of Paris on a beautiful sunny day.
The last time we saw Notre
Dame it was covered in scaffolding going through one of it's many renovations.
This year it is celebrating it's 850th anniversary and it looks magnificent.
When we first arrived there was a cue of eager tourists stretching about 200
metres around a bend. But, to our delight, our English tour guide, the
aristocratically spoken Elizabeth, took us straight through a side entrance.
She was an absolute delight. I'm guessing around late teens to early twenties.
Hard to tell with the English sometimes with their perfect pale complexions and
rose bud smiles.
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| Happy 850th |
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| The much under appreciated rear end of Notre Dame |
Notre Dame is a stunning
medieval gothic church with it's huge flying buttresses and the famous
gargoyles peering down from above. It is an imposing building dressed in it's
ancient grey stone but how magnificent would it have looked in it's day when it
was all brightly painted. Even the gargoyles, that today are daunting if not
fearsome, would have appeared like cute monkeys looking fondly down on the
masses.
It claims to have in it's
vaults vast and important treasures and relics, amongst them, The Crown of
Thorns, a sliver of The Cross and a Holy Nail. When you read a bit about how
they have come to the conclusion that these are in fact the real deal you do
have to wonder, just a little bit. There are about 30 venerated Holy Nails in
various reliquaries around the world. I'm not a religious guy but I'm pretty
sure they didnt drive 30 nails into the poor fella. So there are obviously a
few dud Holy Nails out there. Who's got the real ones, if anyone, god only
knows.
The massive stained glass windows
on the north and south walls are so beautiful. Though they have both been
renovated and repaired over the centuries, the north wall window is still 75%
original while the south wall window, which was severely damaged by fire in the
17th century, is only 25% original.
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| It's hard to capture how beautiful they are on a camera |
Just behind the Cathedral is a
little know memorial to the French citizens, mostly Jewish, who were rounded up
during WWII by the gendarmes under the orders of the occupying Nazis and
deported to various concentration camps. The Memorial Des Martyrs de la
Deportation commemorates the 200,000 who were taken and never returned. Before
you enter you are instructed by a sombre
gentleman to please observe silence. As you walk down a steep set of stairs you
descend into an open air grey stoned crypt. Uncomfortable large gaps between
the large square stones mean you have to watch your step. A small barred window
gives an inviting but unattainable glimpse of the Seine rushing by. This is
guarded by an imposing black sculpture of large scythe like blades. Behind you
are two dark narrow slits. These are the doorways into the memorial. It is
dark, claustrophobic and haunting. This is not meant to be a comfortable experience, the idea is to move you physically and emotionally. There is a large medallion with an
inscription around it and roped off with thick red cord. Behind that and
staring straight at you, is a long tunnel with a gleaming light at the end of
it. On each side of the tunnel, mounted on panels along the walls, are 200,000
shining crystals. Each representing one of the souls of the men, women and
children who were snatched from their homes, their familiar streets, their
shops and schools,bundled into trucks and trains and herded like cattle to
their demise.
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| This was very moving |
11/07/13 Another very slow
start to the day . We had all sorts
of plans but ended settling into the
apartment and then heading out for a walk down to Musee D' Orsay around 2pm.
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| Everyones favourite, Musee D'Orsay |
The renovations that were underway when we were last here and prevented us from
eating in the 5th floor clock restaurant were now complete.
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| Christina and Callum, very happy with their order, Charlie and I think we should have gone bigger |
The fifth floor was
now opened with a very impressive new gallery full of all our favourite
Impressionists, Monet, Pissarro, Manet, Degas, Lautrec, Renoir, Sisley and
others. We decided to eat early before
the crowds got in. The food was delicious but the servings were small and for what
we paid we could have feed ourselves in the US for a week. But hey, you don't
do it every day.
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| From Musee D'Orsay looking over the Seine to Sacre - Coeur |
We cruised the halls of the galleries, liking some but not
most of the post impressionist. You get very picking when your on your fourth
or fifth National Gallery and probably seen a billion dollars worth of art.The Impressionist's have always been our favourites. I
like the bold flowing brush strokes and the bright colourful outdoor scenes
that they were known for. Anywho, we headed back walking down
beside the Seine enjoying the early evening rush, even at 8pm the streets are
packed with people going every which way. The roads, the sidewalks, the cafes
and restaurants are all busy.
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| Those old romantic French fools, locking up their love and throwing away the key, tres agreable |
An observation here, the cafes
are full of people chatting, drinking, smoking, eating and people watching. No
one and I mean no one, sits with their face glued to a device, tap tap tapping
away. Even people who are sitting by themselves dont do it. It is so refreshing
to see people interacting, socialising or just sitting and enjoying their
surroundings without feeling the need to be connected. This is the first first
world country I have seen that in. Now, if only the French would get the
message that smoking is not tres chic.
12/07/13 I'm not going to say
another word about jet lag, except that it SSUUCCKKSS!!. Bed at 11pm up at 2am,
asleep again at 5.30am, awake at 8.30am.
What the!!
We had plans to go to the
Eiffel Tower but that was so "last trip". So we decided to catch a
train to the Arc de Triomphe instead, have a look around up there and then walk
down the Champs-Elyse'es to the Louvre.
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| Two likely lads in Paris |
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| Deja Vu for us, same spot for us back in 1997 |
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| Looking south down the Champs - Elysees |
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| Charlie in the stairwell of the Arc De Triomphe, fantastic shot by Christina |
The Louvre is massive and
deserves, like just about everywhere we've been, more time than we had to give
it. We had a look at the early Renaissance painters and some of the Bottecelli
sculptures and then it was pretty much straight to the Mona Lisa.
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| About to enter.. The Louvre |
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| Watch and see how their eyes follow you around the room. |
"What's
all the fuss about", says Charlie. As far as initial impact goes, the painting
at the other end of the gallery is quite breath taking just in it's enormity
alone. It is quite literally, a third the size of an indoor soccer pitch. Sure
it doesn't have the mystique and profile of the Mona Lisa, but wow, it's big.
Still, the crowds were in front of the Mona Lisa and it was here we had to
squeeze, shuffle and push our way forward to eventually get close enough to get
a picture without the mop of a fellow tourists head in our shot.
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| Head and shoulders, the most popular painting here |
It would be
nice to be able to linger and look a while but once you get anywhere near the
front the claustrophobic pressure from those around you is a bit overwhelming
and you want out. Napoleon the III apartments were next on our list and they
did not disappoint. The nephew and heir of Napoleon Bonaparte I, these were every bit as opulent, if not more
so than Versailles. As with the Louvre itself, most of the amazing works are on
the painting ceilings. But, here, on these apartments, there is not a single
surface that is not gilded, lacquered of painted. The artworks, the furniture,
the fittings are everything you would expect of a French Emperor at the height
of his game with endless resources of wealth and artisans at his disposal.
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| Have you.. |
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| ever seen.. |
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| such pure opulence.. |
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| and indulgence. |
As the sun started to set on
our last night in Paris we made the trip home at a slow meander. We had put
about 6 - 7 klms of walking under our belt today and we were all looking
forward to putting our feet up before packing in anticipation of an early start
tomorrow morning. We had a 10.30 am train
to Amsterdam to catch. This is our third trip to Paris and it is truly
magnificent. I am slowly defining those places that I could live for an
extended period. The places that I would really like to get to know. San
Francisco, New York and Paris, three to six months in each would be very nice.
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