French Gardens: Paris 3

 

Friday, May 30.  There are two incidents which I (John) forgot to tell yesterday. (1) When we boarded the always packed Metro, a young seated lady offered this old man (ME!) her seat.  I politely declined.  (2) A few minutes later, while walking from the Metro to the Louvre, a lady stopped me at the EXIT and told me she observed someone trying to break into my backpack.  She advised me to “never wear your backpack in the Metro”.  Another observation: I’ve seen more people smoking the first day in Paris than I’ve seen in the past 6, maybe 12, months in Dallas.

So last night we went on the “Night Fat Tire” bike ride.  There were somewhere between 80 and 100, all English speaking, people signed up for this!  Fortunately we were in groups of 20.  My bike was no prize: a loose headset, the 3-speed Nexus drive train slipped in 2nd gear and neither headlight nor taillight worked - which was not too good since we cycled until midnight!  But it was a fun event and included a boat trip on the Seine river (with plenty of wine to drink).  One particularly interesting thing we saw on the boat trip was boat coming toward us and the top level had maybe 200 people exercising.  Our guide said it was primarily local people.  Of course no one on the bike tour wore a helmet; they weren’t even offered.  Below are photos from the ride.

  

  

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Left above: “SAUF” is a French word that means except and in this context means “One way for everyone except bicyclists”.  We need an English/American/Texan version of that word.  Photo on the right is of a family picnicking on the Right Bank.  It reminded me of a Cartier-Bresson photo of a family picnic on the banks of a river.  Later that evening we heard of a Henri Cartier-Bresson photo exhibit at the Pompidou Museum and quickly changed plans for tomorrow.  The Musee d’Orsay will have to wait for another trip.

It’s Friday and we’re at the Pompidou

It’s a trying and tiring day.  Although our Museum Passes get us into the Center, the special exhibit costs us $50, audio guides included.  Then there is an hour and 20 minute wait in three queues.  Once in the exhibit, it is enormous – over 500 photos and paintings. Plus several videos. 

    

Two photos on left are from inside the center, see end of the queue in the 1st picture.  And almost at the end of the queue in the third picture, over an hour after the first two photos.

  

Above. Left, photo from China.  Center shows that the Pompidou is not overly crowded and maybe the wait was worth it.  At the Louvre, there are so many people that you cannot get within a mile of popular works such  as the Mona Lisa.  The photo on the right is of Henri himself, who hated to have his picture taken.

So after three days of walking over all of Paris, visiting three museums (which I find only slightly less tiring than shopping) and walking up and down thousands of steps in the Metro stations, I’m beat.  Totally tired.    I need something relaxing to do.  Like riding a bike.  So that’s where we’re headed.  Tomorrow we take the high speed TGV train to Joule-Les-Tours.   And on Sunday, we begin riding.

French Gardens: Paris 2

 

Thursday, May 29.  We woke to sunny skies but they soon turned overcast.  Nonetheless, we headed off the Louvre.  We are beginning to learn our way around the subway system.  This is John’s first experience with the Paris subway; his only complaint is that the stations are not well marked at street level.  We triple check our decisions just so we don’t end up somewhere unexpected, like we did yesterday.

The two photos on the left show the wonderful lighting provided by the I.M. Pei remodel on the Louvre.  And to the right, the ultimate markings of civilization, Starbucks in the Louvre.  You got to love it!

  

 

  

 

  

  

The crowds at the Louvre were massive, and they continued to build all morning.  I was amazed; thousands of people. It is a French holiday of some sort; but that doesn’t explain the hordes of Japanese.  We toured around  – were lost most of the time – but saw some of the ‘must see’ pieces. 

And then we sought out the stone containing  the Code of Hammurabi.  (Photo on right)  We had read about this set of laws written by this Babylon king last summer. Some think this is the beginning of civilization; the first time that laws were written down.  Tthey applied to everyone including the king; the law was written for the common man to read and understand. Of course some may grimace at the thought of civilization beginning with a lawyer.

We had a nice lunch at Café des Nemours (recommended by Rick Steves) then walked along the Tuillieres and took the subway back to the hotel. Tonight we’re taking a four hour “fat tire” bike tour of Paris.  We’ll include that in tomorrow’s blog.

French Gardens: Paris 1

We got a welcome notification the morning of our departure (Tuesday, May 27) to let us know American Airlines had upgraded us to Business Class!!!  The trip over was much more relaxing.  Brenda slept about 5 hours, John less, and we both felt pretty chipper on our arrival into Paris.

We easily found our bus into downtown Paris, the Montparnasse Station and walked (A taxi refused to take us.) about 2 km to Hotel Sainte Beuve. Quite a nice place tucked into a good location but away from maddening crowds.  We were into our room by 2pm. 

   

  

  

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The afternoon was filled with a Rick Steves walk beginning at Notre Dame on Ill de la Cite.  Also included were Ile St. Louis, the Left Bank and Sainte-Chapelle.  The skies were overcast and we had periods of mist and light rain and were glad when that all passed. Photo on right above shows Brenda’s new rain poncho, much needed at this point.  Another Container Store purchase, no doubt.

Notre-Dame was begun in 1163 and had it’s first mass in 1345, 182 years in the making.  And then it is was renovated 150 years ago.  The cathedral will hold 10,000 people for mass.  ‘Not sure there are than many practicing Catholics among the French these days.

 

 

This marker is front of the cathedral is the center of Paris and the center of France.

The other two photos are from the Deportation Memorial, dedicated to 200,000 French victims of the Nazi concentration camps

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

For dinner we looked at quite a few menus and took our chances. Brenda had salmon and John ate chicken and we were both pleased.  We passed on dessert since we were both about to do a face plant because of fatigue.

Brenda  was fast asleep by 9pm; John stayed up to do laundry and edit Blog photos.

French Gardens: Introduction

Above:  Le Rivau Gardens

The official title of this tour is Gardens of Touraine.  The tour is led by our Dallas friend Jane Holahan, who has knowledge and expertise in French, Gardening and Bicycle Touring. Could you ask more of a leader?

This will be a different, and possibly difficult for me:

• It is the easiest tour we’ve ever done.  But with my advancing age, that may not be so much of a problem.  I may like 27 mile days!
• For the first time we’re using rented bikes.  And hybrid bikes to boot – the first tour without our custom road bikes.
• But the biggest problem for me may be France and the French.  My experience in this country (actually its people) is not good and I’m biased against them.  But I’m going to give it – and the French – a try.  I’ll try to have a positive attitude.  Only time will tell how long it lasts.
• I hope we can do the blog differently.  I’d like Brenda to write the text (maybe I’ll butt in now and then) and I’ll concentrate on the photos.

We have a full agenda planned for Paris before the tour.  The last time Brenda took me to Paris to see the fantastic museums, the museum workers were on strike and there wasn’t much to see.  Surely, it will be better this time.

We leave Dallas on Tuesday. Hopefully you’ll see a blog post on Wednesday.