My Trip to France
In the morning we packed up our cheeses and breads and strawberries and tomatoes and wine and water and headed out to the famous cemetery. We took the Michelin guide with us and enjoyed finding the graves of Bizet and Balzac, and the Hugo Family. The cemetery is very atmospheric and full of new and old graves and mausoleums and worth a trip there. It is full of trees and benches and paths and I really enjoyed having our breakfast there. We walked down past the chapel and looked at the graves of Colette and Oscar Wilde (Egyptian). Frank needed to make the pilgrimage to Jim Morrison's graveside (they were born in the same year0 and we found it with it's armed guard and a large group of people. But the rest of the cemetery was quite quiet. Family members tending the graves of their ancestors, planting flowers. Lots of lovely statues and stained glass in the mausoleums.Pere LaChaise Cemetaire
We took the subway to the Arc and came up inside of it and saw the grave of the Unknown Soldier and mixed with the throngs of tourists there. It is true that the Rude sculpture La Marseillaise is better than the other three, depicting the uprising of 1792. We walked down the Champs Elysee past all of the big cafes and the big stores. It is a big tree-lined boulevard and quite lovely. We turned off and walked through the Grand Palais, which was built for the World's Fair in 1900. It and the littler (relatively speaking) pavillion, the Petite Palais are now museum/exhibition halls. We crossed the Alexandre Bridge which has been reguilded beautifully to look down to the Hotel d'Invalids and the Dome church where Napoleon's Tomb is, sparkling in the sun with it's astounding guilded dome and tower.Arc de Triomphe and the Champs Elysee
We returned across the bridge and took a subway up to La Madeleine. It was May Day and as we came up the stairs we heard the rally of the socialist parade. There were many demonstrators and a big parade and police everywhere. La Madeleine is a very large church in the style of a Greek Temple. Inside is a huge fresco of the last judgment on the ceiling. It is enormous. We walked past the Opera Garnier afterwards, a truly pompous ornate building from the 1860's. On most days you can go inside for a small fee - but it being May Day it (and most things were closed).La Madeleine
Our favorite haunt, the Latin Quarter was where we intended to have our last dinner. As we arose from the subway there was a mime dressed as an Egyptian mummy covered in gold lame with a mask - all he did was look at you and if you gave money he bowed. That was crazy! A terrific trumpet player filled the busy streets with music. We had hoped to see the Palais de Luxembourg and it's gardens (nearby) and ended up skirting right around it - and we decided to save it for our next trip. We decided to do one of the Michelin walks through the Latin Quarter around the Sorbonne and past the Pantheon (where Victor Hugo is buried), and it took us past the old Roman baths and past ancient ramparts churches and the College de France (where Ampere worked). We enjoyed the church of St. Etienne - gothic, renaissance and baroque. We had dinner at a tiny fondue restaurant and enjoyed a fabulous tomato salad and lovely Bordeaux along with our cheese fondue. This is something I will learn how to make soon. We were right off the church of St. Michel, which was all lit up with lights for the evening.The Latin Quarter and the Sorbonne
Crossing the bridges to the Ile de la Cite and then again to the other side the moon rose and it was so incredibly romantic. We had to kiss like all the other couples in the middle of the bridges for good luck. We walked down to the path along the Seine and listened to a musician (there were so many all through out our trip) and then back towards the Metro.La Lune et l'Ile de La Cite et les ponts
We did not get to see inside the Concierge Prison though, where Marie Antoinette (and the rest were held before their executions. Marie spent nine months there after Louis was killed before her own execution. It is a museum now and you can walk the halls where they walked and see the rooms where they were kept.
And so we returned to our tiny room and said goodbye the Eiffel Tower and packed up all of our art and film and gifts and new clothes. In the morning we had arranged for a taxi to the airport and had plenty of time to spare to change money and shop in the Duty-free. I picked up a few little things and we climbed aboard the plane tired but happy, though so sad to go. I know we will return.
I returned home with 4 impressionist painting prints from the Louvre, a poster of the interior of the cathedral in Bourges, an old print of the cathedral's exterior, a lovely watercolor of the river in Bourges, a small watercolor of Notre Dame, a neat little drawing of a giraffe becoming the Eiffel Tower, a vibrant print of a painting of the Moulin Rouge in Montmartre where we stayed, a nice small print of a painting of Versailles (and the 2000 calendar!)...and I am hoping that I get some great photos from my 11 rolls of film that I can blow up...and of course the usual selection of postcards of everything (including a great Eiffel Tower and UFOs one)...Just marvelous.The Art
The Photos The best photo is that of the tomato tree at the market. But there are others, which I shall scan in to the computer and send off from time to time.
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