Paris

“French are Italians who think they are Germans “


Walked an easy 20 minutes to Ile de la Cite, in the centre of Paris. Our plan was to spend the day casually wandering around and getting orientated. We needed an easy day after the 10 hour days of walking in Prague, Venice, Florence……. Wandered into Saint Chapelle to look at the brilliant stain glass windows. We ended up buying two 2 day museum passes for 32E each. So now we had just one and a half days to see over 60 galleries/museums/cathedrals. If we could visit four we got our monies worth. We had to keep moving.
Musee d’Orsay was second. Contains all the modern art from the Louvre (1848 to present), impressionists, realists, cubists, and was top of our list to visit. When we left we were exhausted mentally and physically, but we still had time to cross the Seine to visit Musee de L’Orangerie. Specially built to display the ‘Water Lilly’ paintings of Monet, in two large oval shaped galleries. To sit in the centre of either gallery, and squint at the surrounding blue and green impressions was like being in his garden at Giverny. Especially in our state of exhausted delerium.
In the evening we walked around the Latin quarter at St Michelle. It is a meeting place for large numbers of students, who stand around chatting in the squares. As eating out is very expensive in Paris we went to a restaurant popular amongst students, because it is cheapish, a Saracen crepes restaurant.
Second day of 60 galleries started at the Pompidou building. Looking like a building constructed inside out, it displays contemporary art, but more importantly had a great view of Paris from the top floor. There was a feminists artists exhibition on one floor. The Louvre engaged us for most of the day, 1000 km of corridors and we picked the eyes out of only about 10 per cent. After we desperately needed to have a sit and a cuppa. We walked into the Jardin des Tuileries, where I cued at an outdoor café kiosk, for too long, standing, only to be scoffed at by the waiter when I attempted some ‘school boy’ French. Place de la Concorde is a very important landmark in my mind because of it’s significance in the ‘Tour de France.’ The last stage rounds the obelisk several times, and it is the final corner leading to the sprint finish on the Champs- Elysees. I had to see what the corner looked like to a sprinter, and was very surprised to see the size of the cobblestones they have to race over. It has doubled my respect for those super athletes.
We caught the metro up to the Arc de Triomphe, and then walked down Champs-Elysees, past very expensive cafes. Even Maccas charged $8 for a burger, so we sort out a Lebanese restaurant down a side street. Later joined the circus at the Eiffel Tower. African spruikers constantly trying to sell models of the Eiffel and flying disks. Every hour the lights on the tower sparkled.
Next morning walked to St Denis and did what locals did on Sunday mornings. Had coffee in a café on the narrow little street, with vegie markets and bakeries nearby. Watched the locals walking by with their mornings shopping and bought some fruit ourselves. Dogs and smoking welcomed in cafes. Almost felt French for awhile! Booked dinner for Del’s birthday (and our final night in Paris) at Brasserie Julien, over the road. French a la carte, excellent service and art nouveau decorated restaurant.
Walked up to Sacre Coeur. Lots of tourists and young alternative locals enjoying the festive atmosphere - good view of Paris with market stalls selling wine and stuffed snail shells. Caught the metro to Pere Lachaise cemetery. Some family mausoleums are bigger than the homes of some people in other parts of the world. Oscar Wilde’s grave had kisses all over it and messages in lipstick. Jim Morrison’s was almost hidden and quite insignificant, but the most popular. There was Modigliani & Jeanne, and Chopin’s with candles burning and fresh flowers. There was even an admirer tending to the little garden.
Caught the metro to Grande Arche de La Defense - walked Esplanade du General Gaulle, through the modernistic sculptured buildings, reflecting distorted images of each other.
We had left some flexibility in our itinerary from Paris, so Del didn’t book tickets on the Eurostar to London. An expensive mistake. Ended up wasting 2 hours at Gard de Nord and costing $600 more. There was only first class tickets left, at full price. Still champagne & smoked salmon was quite nice.


Paris Metro is possibly the most practical transport system we encountered in our travels (second to Tokyo). Trains are frequent, stations are clean and closely spaced. We felt safe, but had been warned. As I was stepping through the doors of the train I felt fingers in my right hand pant pocket. I grabbed his hand and checked there was nothing in it, there was only maps and tickets in that pocket anyway (my wallet was safely zipped in a leg pocket.) I glared at him, he looked nonchalantly straight ahead. Just before the doors closed he stepped out, and a large African-Parisian suggested I should bop him.


The French are very image conscious, but dress casually, chic with understated jewellery. Slim skin tight jeans are in, with boots, scarves - it was very cold (for us). They do however smoke heavily and everywhere. Compared with Italy, Paris was clean, organised and things worked, on the whole. But Parisians can be rude (they might say proudly indifferent) when tourists ask questions in English. Hence the opening quotation.