Etienne_dOhio

Day 1: Flight/arrival uneventful. Shopped a little for food at Rue Cler, one minute walk from our apartment, which is in fact as good as Rick Steves says it is. Loved it. And I am not otherwise a Rick Steves fan at all. This is a non-threatening introduction to Parisian street markets, and has longer, more regular hours than most markets (900-1930 Tues-Sat, 900-1300 Sunday, running full blast on Easter). People who say it is dead must have gone outside these hours or on Monday, when in fact it is dead. Prices are comparable with most other inner-arrondissement markets (prices do drop once you get out of arrondissements 1-8).. Recommendation: at least at first, buy bread at the bakeries, cheese from the cheese shops, wine from the wine stores, fruit from the fruit and veggie vendors, and have a picnic. Prices do drop at the bigger grocery stores, fairly substantially, in fact, than buying at the individual stores, but the quality and selection is higher at the individual stores, and it?s more fun. Bakeries with ?artisan? in their names are uniformly of superior quality than the others. There are a lot of Americans in Rue Cler, but they are still outnumbered by the locals. And it?s a quiet neighborhood, which we wanted (if you want night-life, try the 5th or 6th arrondissements, not the 7th). Anyone going to Paris should make an effort to find out where the street market closest to their accommodations is (there are something like 60 street markets) because it seems silly to go to Rue Cler when there may be something much closer. Also it makes sense to check out the markets relatively close to the sights you plan to see that day. Many are located near metro stops, and if you will be within two or three stops anyway, the markets are definitely worth a look.

It was so overwhelming on that first day of arrival?. I purchased all our veggies and fruit at ?Top Halles? produce on Rue Cler, and was presented with the receipt as a way of showing me how much I owed (Myth: shopkeepers in Rue Cler speak English. Reality: most do NOT). Anyway, I saw 59 at the bottom and as I just happened to have brought 60 euros with me and had them in my hand, I handed them over. The cashier let out a sort of muffled giggle, said ?non, non, non, non, Monsieur?, and showed me that the number I had seen was francs, not euros, all I really owed was 9 euros ($11), shown on the receipt just above the 59 francs. The receipts still show both currencies so people who have a hard time with numbers can see the ?old? price in francs, which have recently been replaced by the euro as the currency. Moral: Take a deep breath and RELAX. ?Foreigners? are typically just as nice and behave the same as your next door neighbor on Main Street, USA. Needless to say, I bought all our produce from this shop from that moment on. And I relaxed.

Having dinner in hand, we viewed the Eiffel Tower from Champs de Mars, walked along the Seine, crossing at Pont Alexandre III (we love bridges, and this was one of the nicest). Walked through Tuileries gardens (toilets at Place de la Concorde end, price 40 cents), had picnic on the pedestrian only Passerelle Solferino (a bridge across the Seine at the Tuileries, new in 1999), facing the Ile-de-la-Cite in the sunset, with the Louvre, Notre-Dame, Ste Chapelle, Pont-Neuf and Institut de France in the view, finished walk after dusk at Hotel de Ville, admiring the Conciergerie and the Louvre courtyards in the floodlights (unforgettable! the Cour Carree at the Louvre is free and open until 10 pm, and virtually empty after the museum itself closes at 6:45), took bus home at 8:30 (remember? a lot of busses stop running around that time!).

Day 2: Picture taking of the Eiffel Tower from the Champs de Mars and Ecole Militaire (essentially closed to the public, don?t go out of your way to see it, then a bus to the heart of old Paris. Walked through Ile-St-Louis (the eastern end is much less crowded and authentic than the now touristy western end), walk through Notre-Dame. The crowds there are horrendous and can ruin the experience? very disappointing, combined with scaffolding inside and out.
There is a free toilet practically beside the front door of Notre-Dame that no one seems to know about. The Crypte Archeologique is down some stairs in the middle of the plaza (correctly, the parvis) in front of the cathedral. Take the door to the right of the crypt entrance leading to a parking garage, follow the sign to ?caisse? (cashier), and the toilets are on the right. Very convenient : ) A good tip for travelers to Paris is that a big blue P stands for ?parking? and also for ?pee?, as many parking garages have such toilets?. There are also many freestanding toilets in the street, very very clean, at 40 cents each though.
Walked south across the river to Square Viviani, where the view of Notre-Dame is terrific and the crowd non-existent. St Julien-le-Pauvre. St-Severin (great choir, worth the visit), picnicked on the grounds of the Cluny Museum, walked to St Etienne du Mont, listened to high-falutin? street buskers (playing Vivaldi) at the place de la Sorbonne, walked through the Latin Quarter to the Luxembourg Gardens, saw the Medici Fountain; walked through the area around St Germain-des-Pres, had dinner at the apartment.

We watched the Eiffel Tower sparkle that night, a terrific, breathtaking experience the first time you see it. Our apartment was a 10 minute walk from the tower, and we saw this many many times over the following two weeks.

Day 3
Walked through the Invalides (the main courtyard is free).
This was a Sunday, and on Sunday they close roads on the Left Bank that are normally choked with traffic and give them over to pedestrians. So we walked along the river, the quais, the bridges. Heavenly. Walked around and through the Louvre (again, the courtyards are great and free to the public? see them on a different day than the interior, and you will save money). The pedestrain Pont des Arts took us across to browse the bookstalls along the quais. Then back to the small Square du Vert Galant at the very west end of the Ile-de-le-Cite for a picnic lunch, quite delightful, watching the boats go by, the view of the Louvre to the right, the bridges, the dome of the Institut de France on the left. Via St Germain l?Auxerrois (boring interior, but some nice sculpture outside) we walked to the park of Jardin des Halles, which we liked better than expected, very well tended, full of Sunday walkers, men playing boules (horseshoes crossed with lawn bowling), street performers and musicians, all most interesting and colorful. Visited St Eustache, with a very beautiful interior, rare in a Parisian church. Visited the gardens at the Palais-Royal, just full of kids and their parents on this gorgeous Sunday afternoon, very few tourists here, almost all locals, despite the very close proximity to the Louvre. Saw the Place Vendome (impressed), St Roch (snore? most churches we visited in Paris itself will go henceforth unmentioned), walked again through the Tuileries to Place de la Concorde, spectacular at sunset with the fountains going.

Day 4
Bus to the Arc de Triomphe, for a quick look around the base, then another bus to La Defense. Liked it more than we thought we would, although it is on a hill and fairly windswept. This is a good place for modern architecture buffs. Then took a tramway (really a light rail) to Parc St Cloud. Getting to the park entrance from the train stop was slightly confusing, but we found it in short order and were impressed with the fountains and the size of the park, as well as the views over Paris. Felt fresh and far from the city. Spent all morning there, and picnicked there. Walked across the Seine to the metro, to Pont Mirabeau, another beautiful bridge, for a view of the mini-Statue of Liberty and the Eiffel Tower rising above the Seine, and then enjoyed Parc Andre Citroen, which we loved and can describe only as an ultramodern take on classic 17th century French formal garden design. Then a bus to Montparnasse, arriving near dusk, which is apparently when this part of town comes alive. It reminded us of the area around Times Square in New York. No major sights, but lots of night life. It was here that my small-town-Ohio partner Mike, carrying a baguette he had just purchased, was asked in French by a young Winona Ryder lookalike, where had he bought his baguette (the bakeries were starting to close? you see lots of Parisians carrying baguettes at about 7:30 pm). Mike answered, in French, ?Desole, parlez-vous anglais??, and we were so proud : ) he was mistaken for a real live Frenchman. Anyway, we showed her to the bakery and found our way home for another sparkle show at the Eiffel Tower.

Day 5

Montmartre in the morning, really charming if you avoid the area around Sacre-Coeur, which was utterly awful. Abbesses metro station, for its entrance, one of only two original Art Nouveau entrances left, and very beautiful. Place de Clichy (why people call this area bad, I don?t know? it looked fine to me). St Denis in the afternoon, the cathedral just north of Paris, reachable by metro, that inspired Notre-Dame, and containing interesting tombs of French royalty and a 1500 year old crypt. For sunset, the garden in front of Napoleon?s tomb (Jardin de l?Attendant). Eiffel Tower at night, again. How can you resist when it is so close?

Day 6:

Marche d?Aligre, near the Bastille, fabulous and really cheap street market, the best prices for fresh veggies and fruit we saw in Paris. Visited our only café there, paid 1 euro ($1.20) for a coffee at the counter (as cheap as it gets in Paris). Walked along the Promenade Plantee, a beautifully landscaped former railway viaduct, reminding us of a superdeluxe American rail-to-trail. Walked around the Bastille area, which we really liked for its varied mix of businesses and people, not precious, not deluxe, just ?plain Parisians?, if there is such a thing. We liked that area a lot. Then on to the Marais with its many fine old mansions and stuck-up bistros and shops, and the most interesting Musee Carnavalet, housed in a 400 year old mansion, with gardens and interesting exhibits on the history of Paris. Really worthwhile, and free to boot. Past the Hotel de Soubise (one of the grander mansions in a whole neighborhood of grand mansions), to a picnic lunch in the Place des Vosges, the oldest square in Paris, from about 1600, with a nice shady park in the middle, and beautiful old houses all around, almost untouched by modern intrusions. We followed the typical guide book walk through the Marais, past the remnants of the 13th century wall that once surrounded Paris and is now almost at its heart, to the Hotel de Sens and its decorative arts library, which we enjoyed exploring since it is housed in a beautiful 15th century mansion and since Mike works at a library. Again, free to the public. Then caught the Metro to the chateau de Vincennes? think of it as the royal family?s Versailles before there was a Versailles? a place for the king to get away from Paris in medieval times. It is a most interesting complex of medieval and classical buildings, bigger than expected, but undergoing renovation with a lot of scaffolding. At night? the Eiffel Tower, this time couple with a stroll to the Trocadero for a view from there, returning by the pedestrian only Passerelle Debilly, a bridge practically next to the Eiffel Tower that no one seems to know about in these guidebooks.

Day 7:
Our first daytrip outside Paris. Train to Chantilly station, walked to the chateau. There was supposed to be a bus, but after 20 minutes it hadn?t appeared so we walked the mile or so. The chateau is at first glance impressive, but it is mostly a 19th century reconstruction, and lacks the genuine castle feel that the older chateaux exude. It was pretty, but in a fake way. It was like a pretty store-bought cake? you just know Mom?s old-fashioned homely one tastes better. 7 euros ($8.50) to get in? 6 euros more if you wanted to see the duke?s private apartments. With the train trip, this was the most we had spent on a sight yet. We skipped the duke?s apartments in favor of what had really drawn us there in the first place? the first public exhibition ever of the famous ?Tres Riches Heures of Jean, Duc de Berry?, arguably the most beautiful and treasured medieval illustrated manuscript in existence, so rare and fragile that normally only a facsimile is on view. So we gladly paid the 3 extra euros to see the real thing, being shown to the public for the first time Most people have seen copies of parts of this book whether they know it or not. Its most famous section are illustrations of the months in a calendar format, featuring princesses with tall pointy hats and veils, and knights, and peasants sewing or reaping grain in green fields in front of castles, with illustrations of the signs of the zodiac in a semi-circle over each illustrated month? As it is a book (and a small one at that), they can only display two pages at a time, turning the pages every three days or so. We saw Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden. It was really beautiful and the best thing we saw there. Otherwise, the collection, which contains some excellent works from the Renaissance, is so poorly displayed in a 19th century style (the last duke?s will forbade that the art be moved), that the effect is one of stuffiness. A lot of mediocre stuff next to a stunning Raphael detracted from the impact of the collection as a whole. I was sorely disappointed and can?t really recommend this place, when there are great museums and fine houses right in Paris to see. Even the park was mediocre by French formal standards.
Then we took a bus to Senlis, only six miles from Chantilly, a real treasure of a small town that we enjoyed much more than Chantilly. Simply made for wandering around aimlessly, soaking in the atmosphere. The tourist office is in front of the cathedral, and provides map with suggested walks.

Day 8:
Walked the Republique area , a working class neighborhood, full of life and an interesting contrast with the more upscale, staid-by-comparison parts of town. Like the Bastille, the Republique area had a genuineness about it that we felt was being sucked away by tourism and gentrification in the Marais and the Quartier Latin. And the Republique area has some really interesting attractions, such as the Louis XIV arches on Rues St Martin and Rue St Denis, and the complex of restored medieval buildings at the Arts and Metiers museum, including a free public library with the world?s squeakiest chairs, housed in a medieval monastery?s refectory, in the Arts and Metiers museum complex. A lot of guidebooks describe this area as slightly seedy. I don?t think so. There is a block or two on the Rue St Denis further south towards the Beaubourg that has a few peep shows, but they seemed almost quaint to us.
Then we walked to the Beaubourg and sat for a long time in the square there, for the great people watching and the interesting building. Something you don?t appreciate from photographs of this plaza is the way it slopes down to the building, forming almost an amphitheatre type space that really opens up the views of the building. Loved it.
Then we walked all the way home along the Left Bank, stopping to examine each and every bridge. We love bridges, so Paris appeals to us! There are 36 crossing the Seine there.

Day 9:
Catacombs day. Got there right at opening time, already a line, but we got inside in about 20 minutes. Lots of bones, not really spooky at all because of the crowds and the new lighting system. Took a bus to Port Royal, but the famous fountain there is dismantled for renovation, so we sat in the park in front of the Observatory and relaxed, and then took a bus through the Gobelins neighborhood to the market at Val de Grace, another great street market. The church of Val de Grace itself is impressive from the outside, but the supposedly gorgeous interior is rarely open to the public. It is part of a hospital.
On we went by bus to the Jardin des Plantes (Botanical gardens). Loved it. A lot of guidebooks disparage this place a little but it is really very nice. Then the Arenes de Lutece, an essentially 19th century rebuilding of an arena over the 2000 year old remains of a Gallo-Roman amphitheatre. Not really much to look at, but it made a nice spot for a picnic. Then on to another street market in the Rue Mouffetard. This street market struck us as more touristy than the others, but we still liked it. There were street musicians in medieval costumes. Then a bus to Pere Lachaise cemetery, which we enjoyed immensely. It is big, beautiful, peaceful. We visited the graves of Jim Morrison, Oscar Wilde, Gertrude Stein and Alice B. Toklas, and Isadora Duncan. We also walked around Charonne, at one time an outlying village, now swallowed up by Paris, where there are a couple of really village-like streets surrounded by modern high-rises. This type of swallowed-up village is found in other parts of Paris as well. We made our way to the Square du Salamandre, where we found a sculpture of a 20 foot salamander scaling a wall. This is the type of weird little offbeat thing we tried to seek out in all our little jaunts. And it was one of the best. Took the bus home.

Day 10:
First Sunday of the month, and that means many museums are free. We choose the Orsay, the best collection of Impressionist works. No waiting as we are there in line 20 minutes prior to opening, and only about 50 people are in front of us. The line got hundreds deep by opening time. Saw memorable art there, loved it. Van Goghs galore! We loved two pieces in particular, a Monet of poppies, a print of which my mom ordered from Spiegel when she was first married, and which hung on the wall in my room as a kid, and a Millet (or was it Corot) of farmers praying, a copy of which hung in farmboy Mike?s grandparents? house that he remembers as a kid. So cool to see ?the real things?. It really connected this marvelous city with our childhoods, with our real homes.
It is hard to compare the room of 22 Rembrandts we saw next at the Louvre. Again, no waiting, even on Free Sunday. People seem willingly ignorant of the fact that there are several entrances to the Louvre, not just the one at the pyramid. We spent most of the rest of the day at the Louvre, and saw most of the most famous works, even got a close look at the Mona Lisa. Nowadays they basically herd people by Mona in a line instead of making people fight it out for a spot in front of her. It actually works better.
I had studied the floor plan of the Louvre and knew my way around, and we saw many things we wanted to see without much trouble. One of my favorites was a medieval tombstone for someone named Phillippe Pot, which was very moving and strikingly modern ? Rodin-like ? in its conception and execution.
We had seen pretty much what we wanted to see by 6 pm, so we headed to the apartment for a ravenous late lunch, and then at 7 headed for the Eiffel Tower, this time, to go up it! The weather was sunny and the line looked long, but we made it to the elevator after a wait of ?only? 45 minutes, and although the top level was closed, the view from the second level is terrific, and we stayed for 1 ? hours, long enough for the sun to go down and the lights of the city to come on. You will never see a more cosmopolitan crowd anywhere in the world than at the Eiffel Tower. It is like a mini, low-rent UN.

see part 2 for days 11 to 18

cigalechanta

Etienne, a very helpful travalogue. You had a very relaxing time, yet saw so much. Thank you. Have you posted photos?

Etienne_dOhio

Tanks! Took lots of photos, no time to post them yet. Most are trhe typical views, but some are fun, like the 20 foot salamander

janis

Great report! But some (gentle) advice. You should post all of your report on the same thread. Otherwise the four (so far) threads will all get separated and will get disjointed responses.

crepes_a_go_go

I need to ask a question here. Why is it when some people post, apostrophes and other punctuation marks show up as question marks? I have been reading all of Etienne's threads and that is happening on all of them. Is there a way to overcome that? Just curious as I see this quite a bit on this forum.

WillTravel

That usually happens when someone composes his post in Microsoft Word and then copies and pastes it to the post box. Word uses special characters for apostrophes that aren't handled by this post box.

The solution is to compose your posts in Notepad. Or if you want to spell check your posts, compose them in Word, spell check, copy to Notepad, and then copy and paste from Notepad.