Paris, France

Paris, France

So we are off to Paris. The city of lights, the city of crowds. Possibly, like Florence, one of the ancestral breeding grounds of Tournamis. The thing about Paris that we have noticed over the many years we been visiting the city, both Kim and I when we lived in Europe, and the few times I have visited on business, is that it is filled with French people. And the French people have a rep around the globe, that sometimes is deserved, but like stereotypes of Americans, probably more often than not it is a bad rap. We had already had a week in France, and outside of one 'tough' dinner, like our experiences fifteen years ago, and like we have experienced globally, if you are nice to people, they will be nice to you. Travelling with three small kids is not easy (had I mentioned that?) and eating in restaurants, some very nice, with three small kids is quite a challenge. But my kids were great, and the French were very tolerant, and together it worked. Getting around, with my 'survival French', i.e. ou est la toilette pour les enfants?" also seemed to work.

So how does one write about France, how does one write about Paris, the core of all that is French, the center of all roads and rail lines, without sounding trite and like a tourist guide? My approach is going to be to try to marry the France of the Michelin guide with the wacky France that is always just around the corner, as well as the French past, which often lies below the surface, consistent with the ongoing Belk Tour theme that the past is always there beneath your feet.

Our GPS system in the car behaved, and to our massively surprise, given that we had to drive around the Arc de Triumph at rush hour, we got to our hotel, a few blocks north of the Champs Elysee, without any major marital meltdowns. We had warned our kids on the way into town about the scene in National Lampoon's European Vacation where Chevy Chase and Beverly D'Angelo get stuck in "L'etoile" going around in circles endlessly around the Arc, never to exit, but somehow we made it first shot! So we arrive, go to what will be a great hotel for the week, and being us, time to go take a walk. And we rapidly learned that our week in the Alps was excellent "Paris" training, as we walked and walked, even our little one. First stop, one of our favorite views in Paris, the Palais du Chaillott at sunset, with its spectacular view of the Eiffel Tower (La Tour Eiffel).

The lighting of the Eiffel Tower is much improved since we lived in Europe, with a great sparkle show just past sunset. Something about the view from the Palais though, at least for me, is completely timeless and unique. Don't know why the tower looks like it is tilting, but it does in a bunch of shots. Blame the photographer. I'm sure Kim took this shot. But in the spirit of what I am going to write about Paris, after a not-bad, but massively overpriced dinner, we started walking back to the "Champs" and saw this sign:

Now, given the French folks distaste for the English language, shouldn't this say "Pizza Lapin Vitesse"? Exhausted, we get to bed about midnight. The next day, we had to go out towards Versailles to return our Trusty Renault back to the rental company, which was located out on the Peripherique. Since we were on the way, and we still had the car for the day, we decided to head out to Versailles, even though the day was rainy, and also even though there were high odds that Versaille would be closed on the Monday we were visiting. It was, but it still ended up to be an exceptional day, The "Chateau de Versailles" was indeed shuttered for the day, but the "Trainon" palaces of Marie Antoinette were open, as were the vast and soggy gardens. However, the wetter the weather, the fewer the Tournamis, which seems counterintuitive given the aquatic derivations of the Tournami. Kim and I had been to Versailles in Summer time, and usually one shuffles through the vast galleries slowly mooing and baaing and getting stuck in immense human traffic jams. This day, albeit wet, and without the umbrellas that we stupidly left at the hotel, was different. For anybody that has ever been to Versailles, don't think this looks like Versailles in Late July…

The Trianons, which we had never visited in prior visits to Paris, were "Chateau" enough for us that day, having already done five days straight of Chateaus. And having the grounds to ourselves was special, and more than a little bit spooky. And soggy.

The next day, we started walking. Our equipment and attire was identical to our Alpine treks, sturdy shoes, well, well, well worn jeans (it was still cold!), and a backpack full of snacks, chocolate, and about three liters of water and Powerade. We saw the sites of Paris that everyone sees, and wherever possible, matched those sights with the less known and trodden.

The Obelisk at the Place de la Concorde, 3300 years old and "borrowed" by Napoleon at the beginning of the 19^th Century:

But under the Obelisk, an unadorned sign, hard to find in normal circumstances, MUCH harder to find as the "Champs" was being covered in Bleachers for the finale of the Tour de Doping, a bicycle race formerly known as the Tour de France. I had to do a long zoom shot under the bleachers to get this…

The metal square underneath the bleachers I remember from prior visits. It seems that the Place de la Concorde was where Robespierre and his merry band did the worst of their doings during the terror following the French revolution. In 1793 and 1794, about three thousand people, including Louis XVI and Marie Antoinette, were beheaded in the plaza. Like the inconvenient history of all nations, including the Etats Unis, better to bury it a little bit. But at least the plaque is there under the bleachers.

As one rambles further, you go through the Tuileries gardens, on the way to the Louvre. At the end of the gardens, you get to the Petit Arch, which is a smaller mirror image of the Arc de Triomph. On top of the Petit Arch, there is what looked to us like a copy of the Roman Bronze Horses that are on the Venice Blog post, which would make sense given the reverence of antiquity of the times (the Belk's are not the only ones fascinated with Rome).

And underneath the Arch, a woman walking her small horse. The woman is a NORMAL sized woman, and we all believe it was the largest Chien on the planet.

Passing through the Louvre, we stroll down the Rue Rivoli, towards the Hotel de Ville, or City hall, another favorite Paris building for me. When I was younger, on a trip just out of school, we discovered it was a great place to play Frisbee. 24 years later, the building is still the same, but in the spirit of tourbook Paris vs. 'other' Paris, what is now in the square is much stranger than Frisbee.

Yes, it is sand, and yes, it is people playing beach volleyball, or at least a sad facsimile thereof. It seems that the City of Paris, recognizing the tens of thousands of people that cannot escape to the beach in summer, as they are stuck in the services business servicing tourists the likes of my family, decided to bring the beach INTO the city. There was also a sand Rugby field, complete with goals, and area along the Seine River with recreated beachfront! From the Hotel de Ville, it is a bop across the river to Notre Dame, which has been sandblasted (mind the pun) since our last visit, and looks great.

Go to the front of the square of Notre Dame though, and there is the Crypte Archeologique… and surprise, you can go underground, and see the old roman roads, and the structures that both pre-dated Notre Dame, but were also incorporated into the design.

Or go further along, towards Rue St. Germain de Pres, and you will find the Musee du Moyen Age, closed when we walked by, but with the massive structures of the Roman Bath's still visible (the Baths du Cluny) from the Street…a few blocks from where the Arena Lutuce, where the amphitheatre was. It's all there, no guidebooks, no crowds, certainly no Tournamis. Enough touring for the day, Kim and the kids played the Parisian version of the Video Game Frogger…also called crossing the Champs Elysee. Even though this is allegedly a pedestrian crosswalk, we think the white stripes are actually aiming points, like for where jets aim on a runway. Lord knows, the cars go by at near take-off speed. Little did we know that the training we experienced crossing roads in Saigon and Hanoi would come in handy in Paris. Although in Vietnam we had a lot more confidence in people's desire not to nail us.

The next day we dropped into the Metro and "headed East" to visit parts of Paris that I had never really visited in past stops. We popped out at Le Marais, the old part of Paris. We started at an area called Place de Vosage, which was a palace prior to being pulled down by Catherine de Medici (they sure got around) and was turned into a square for Nobles in the early 17^th century. Tucked away in the corner is Victor Hugo's house. We visited, and left humming themes from Le Mis in our heads. Still not sure why he was exiled though, but by the time of his death his funeral was able to fill the Champs. Through more winding streets we ended up at museum that was one of our finds of Paris, the Carnavalet. Built in the 1540's, this building now houses the museum of the history of Paris. We thought it was small. It was not. But it was really well done, and covered a lot of ground. My kids liked the obligatory Louis XIV statue in the practice their Kingly pose.

Maybe it was flashbacks back to Thailand, but everywhere we started to look we started seeing elephants. Even back to the Roman stuff, that was in THIS museum as well. This was a piece of gold elephant jewelry, circa second century. Think of the trade, the craft, the circumstances that would allow this piece to show up in Paris. If it were a clump of grapes, I could understand, but an elephant?

More old stuff, and our last Roman finds of Paris. Good collection though, and we are becoming connoisseurs.

But the Museum's strength is in documenting the Parisian's favorite pastime after strolling…REVOLUTIONS! There was the revolution of 1789, the tumult that lead to the Napoleonic era, which was but one of a regular series in the 19^th century. 1830, 1848, 1870 (before the city had their first big war with Germany in the 1870's). I had already explained why the "new paris" built in the 1870's had boulevards that were so wide (to make them harder to barricade), but the paintings and memorabilia were better than any textbook.

I think this one was 1830. Here we thought we were going to a small bite size museum, but we ended up in a vast, excellently organized and endless warren of rooms and floors. And guess what, no Tournamis. Like Versailles in the rain, we had the museum to ourselves, until we had to just give up and move on, to our next museum. It's actually kind of funny, as in the first day or two in Paris, my eldest was complaining that she hadn't seen any museums yet. After the Carnavalet, she stopped the complaining. So off the Centre George Pompidou. Where there is fabulous modern art, but by then our brains were fried. As I have stated in prior posts, there is a limit to what you can absorb in terms of museums in a day, and we had hit it. Although the 'reveal' going up the five stories of elevators of the Pompidou is wonderful. You start at Plaza level, and slowly move upwards until you are at the level of the buildings surrounding the museum, only to continue to pop up above the roof line.

And the fountains contain some sculptures of Niki de Saint-Phalle, who has some great (and similar) sculptures in multiple locations in San Diego. In San Diego, on the campus of UCSD, this guy is called the "Sun God" which is apropos of Paris.

Time for a break, and a couple of asides about Paris:

The People: Again, surprisingly friendly, especially as our visit is just prior to their annual August escape, and those who are escaping are getting ready to escape, and those that can't are upset they are stuck in the city for August. A city besieged by tourists by the hundreds of thousands.

The Food: We really really really miss Chicken. Roast chicken. Poulet Grille. We try to avoid McDonalds, but with three kids, two of which eat like adults most of the time, you want a fast lunch, especially if you have Marching to do around town. So our diet at breakfast was a Parisian breakfast, and lunch was varied. Their were ham and cheese sandwiches. Ham sandwiches. Cheese Sandwiches. Sometimes with butter, sometimes without. Occasionally a tuna sandwich to break the doldrums if the tuna did not look too aged. It all cost a fortune. The dollar is in pain all over Europe, but it has been tortured on the rack in Paris, much like Rome. Dinners were mildly above average, but too saturated with butter for our "Pac rim" palettes. Two exceptions were the two Michelin One Starred restaurants we ate at, once with the kids (they did great) and once with some San Diego friends that were also in Paris when we were. A GOOD Parisian restaurant is worth the marginal cost. Food was excellent, we picked both as they were not "butter sauce" food, and truly provided a great dining experience.

The Metro. We love the metro. You go down into the ground, something you can tell we like to do. You walk a lot, as sometimes it seems that one is actually walking to the location underground, and the trains are just ancillary. Then you pop up right where you need to be. And since each trip was about $7 USD for us, it was an economic way of getting around. The trains were old and creaky, often were rather stanky, but the convenience, the cool stations, and the Art Nouveau signs made up for any deficiencies.

Shopping: Although everything in the entire city was on sale, like we have found on the rest of the trip, outside of typical tourist souvenirs, there really is nothing to buy. We miss Amazon and Target!

The weather: Not bad, but COLD. Not really cold, but high 50's, low 60's in the day, just cold enough not to be warm. We all have one pair of jeans, one warm sweatshirt, and one rain jacket, in my case an amazingly light jacket. As we were nearing the end of the trip, buying more stuff just was not a consideration, so we wear the same stuff every day. Guess it is a bit of an olden day reenactment for us, back to the days where folks did not have closets full of clothes (I vaguely remember mine). But proof again that you can survive with one 20 kilo bag for fifteen weeks.

So back on the Museum circuit. Time to try and conquer the Louvre. The Louvre is big. Really big. Scary big. And inhabited by hoardes of Tournamis, often running to see the "big three" (Mona Lisa, Venus de Milo, and Winged Victory). So what to do first after finally getting to the Louvre? Yep, stay underground and see the "Old" Louvre, as the palace itself was built on a few prior palaces.

But ultimately we pop back into the 'tourist flow', but go off to Egypt as opposed to modern stuff. Scary good.

Yes, we then say the 'big three' but what the tournami's blaze past is staggering. We actually saw one college age American girl walking rapidly down a corridor, just snapping photos of works while walking past pictures at high marching speed. You can't see it all, you can't absorb it all, but what you choose to look at deserves consideration. What amazed us were folks that would line up ten or twenty deep to view the Mona Lisa, but have no clue that there were a bunch of Leonardo di Vinci paintings right outside the wall of the gallery…often with no one in front of them! The Mona Lisa is wonderful, but it an interesting tidbit of Louvre history that when there was an expo of the museums "Best 100 Paintings" in 1750, the Mona Lisa did not make the cut. There was actually an article in the IHT while we were in Paris describing how the painting was 'marketed' until it became 'the' painting. In our view, Venus de Milo would take a back seat to tons of sculptures both in the Louvre, but also in Rome and the Vatican Museum. We REALLY liked the Winged Victory, though. Winged victory is Greek, circa 400 BC, and in our view, totally worth it's billing…

The next day we go modern again, going with our San Diego friends and their kids to the Musee D'Orsay, prior to their taking off for Italy. It's been really fun having series of folks from back home to dine and play with. Just wish a few would have ventured to Asia! I'm trying to spare folks shots of too many museum photo's, but gotta toss out this one out the clock tower of the Musee (a converted train station)

And for some reason, an Elephant outside!

It was time to Eiffel Tower. We had heard the nightmares from folks about the vast lines waiting to get up the Eiffel Tower, and they were there in force, with waves of Tournamis hitting every leg of the tower. But there are some things you gotta do, and if it your kids first time in Paris, you gotta take them up. OK, I admit it, we wanted to go up again as well! The lines were long, very long. So what to do? Walk up. Strenuous objections from one of our party, not me, not the kids, but I'm not going to name names. She without a name was saying that there was no way the little one could make it up, so I offered to carry my four year old up. Left speechless, and without any other good objections, she without a name joined us tromping up to the first level. And it was EASY! We did not know that all of our Alpine and Parisian tromping was Eiffel Tower training! About 200 vertical feet to the first level. Piece of Cake, just over six minutes. Lunch stop, walk to the second level, another couple of hundred feet of vertical, this time about six minutes. Would have been there a bit quicker, but the family got stuck behind another massively overweight American college student that looked like she was going to keel over about step 350. None of us were even breathing heavily, not only the nameless one(OK, if you haven't figured it out by now, I'm writing about my wife here). So this is a Paris tip, no line to walk to the first two levels, it costs less money than using the elevators, it does not take very long, and you can purchase a ticket for the elevator from the Second Stage to the Top…with only about a twenty minute wait for the elevator from the second to the third level (no stairs, elevator only). Save time, save money, get exercise. All good. And at last we are up on top, about 950 feet above Paris.

I took some goofy shots of the wax Exhibits of Mr. Eiffel and company in their recreated offices on the 3^rd Level, but I'll spare you them. Suffice it to say, the Eiffel Tour, like many things "tourism" is a well deserved Icon of this world, just as the World Trade Centers were to Manhattan. Seeing the French Army, all business, armed with automatic weapons, made you realize that both the French want to keep the Eiffel tower part of Paris, and that there are bad guys that want to change that fact. So, in respect to them, I'll skip the fun shots. But since we were on our continuing power tour of the world, the day was not done yet. Off to yet another Icon of Paris tourism, the Bateaux Mouches, roughly translated as fly boats. These are the one hour tour boats that ply the Seine every day, packed with tourists, and playing narration in eight different languages. My guess is that even a few years ago, the only Asian language would have been Japanese, but the world is changing, so Chinese and Korean are also part of the mix.

Oops, did a shot from a prior trip to Manhattan slip into this narrative???? Nope.

I sometimes think with all the angst that the French and Americans give one another over the decades that we forget that there are good parts of our mutual past. In school we learn about Lafayette, and how he helped the American Revolution. However, we forget that it was a bit weird for Louis XVI to support rebels overthrowing a monarch, even if it was a British monarch. Even if we helped the French in their fight with the British. We forget that the Statue of Liberty was given by the French. Both countries forget the blood that was shed through two world wars together, and even how the French experience in Indochina was followed and mirrored by ours. Just as the French continually denigrate American 'culture' they still love our movies, clothes, and even surreptitiously, our fast food. In my mind, over the years, I've learned that you can do a "Search and Replace" of "French" with "Texans". A lot of the attitudes are the same, not necessarily good nor bad, but a way to better understand. And I intend to keep the moderate views I'm expressing here up until the point where one of their cultural elite or politicians does something to piss me off as an American. Which might be five whole minutes from now.

Paris is wearing us out. Another day passes, and we trod back to the Louvre, in a vain attempt to conquer another wing. You know the line from the Eagle's Hotel California, the one that goes that 'you can check in anytime, but you can never leave'. Well, that's the Louvre. We started with the intent to go to the Napoleon III State Apartments, got sidetracked in Assyrian and other mid-east cultures that we never learn about. In one out of the way gallery (no tournamis) the Louvre showed the quirky streak that gave the world the Pyramid in the middle of the Palace courtyard. A giant fun house mirror in a gallery of 4000 year old bas reliefs that somehow jumped off their temples and made their way to France. Wild. The first shot goes well with my gondola shot from Venice.

So we made it to the State Apartments, humming the Hotel California songs, and saw my ultimate dining room.

A few bottles of good wine were probably consumed in this room over the years. But then the elephants showed up again…why, we ask, why???

Are we done yet. Nope. Gotta hit the tomb of Napoleon, and the Army museum. I've always admired Napoleon. When you study European history, as I did in school, you learn the 'despotic' aspects of his rule. However, everything I learned was written in English, and it was only in my 30's when I started reading a few 'triangulated' biographies of Nappy did I learn that most of the English language stuff skews history more than a bit. Why? Cause the English were fighting the guy for most of his adult life. If the French did not like the guy, I doubt that they would build a tomb like this one for him. It is one BFT (last word tomb) for a guy that was just a bit over five feet tall, but who left a timeless imprint on Europe.

In his tomb are the fellow tombs of other French military heroes. One was not a warrior, but an engineer, one who changed the face of warfare in Europe for centuries. Vauban. And he will figure in our next and last narrative of this trip.

I've written a bunch on man's effect on man, and nature's effect on man. Well, the Army museum is certainly the former. In the courtyard, now under restoration, was plaque after plaque commemorating "mort pour le gloire de France". There are a lot of Morts. A lot of wars, and this museum details the ever more creative ways that people invented to destroy one another. As the sections that we visited started in about the 14^th century, and ended in the early 18^th century, the methods seem inefficient and quaint by humanity's methods of killing one another now. Improvements in armour, muskets, cannons. Different ways to make your horse grumpy by putting a ton of armor on it. How to make a musket that weighs less than 40 pounds. The Armory was a bit spooky, and reminded us all, nearing the end of the trip of Xi'an and the terracotta warriors of China. These guys were, steel rather than terracotta, are also standing eternal vigil.

The last stop of the museum, fittingly, described the great victories of King Louis XIV, our aforementioned Sun King. Using a professional army, new armaments, and new methods of warfare perfected by Vauban and others, he trounced a bunch of places in the 1670's. My favorite of the gallery of paintings is one of Louis astride a horse, and the phrase translated says "the nations of Europe thank you" (i.e. thanks for conquering us!). Huevos grandes. As we wandered around the hall, we were looking for one specific victory, in June 1673. A victory in southern Pays-Bas, now the Netherlands. A victory which was the first use of a new type of siege warfare that rewrote the textbook for the next two hundred years. A battle where the real life D'Artignon, one of the 'three musketeers' immortalized in a fictional fashion by Dumas, died by either a musket ball to the throat, or a musket ball that took off the bottom part of his jaw. A victory over a small city that has played a significant strategic role in Europe back to the times of the Romans (yep, them again), and was besieged 27 times in the 'modern era'. A city where the 1992 European Union Treaty was signed, taking down the borders, and unifying the currency of Europe through the creation of unified monetary policy and the Euro. A city where Kim and I moved three days after we were married in 1992, only months after the treaty signing, and where we lived in 1992 and 1993 in an expat assignment for a tech company. A city where my older daughter told us the family should spend the last three days of this journey. Maastricht, or Maestricht as the French call it, as the river cutting through Belgium and the Netherlands is both the Maes and the Maas, depending on your mother tongue. And lo and behold, in the gallery of Louis XIV's victories in the Musee d'Armee in Paris, there it was…

And there would we go, by high speed TGV Train, as opposed to horseback, to close this incredible chapter in my family's life.

 

 

 

 

Comments

[Jane Zweig]

I'm so happy you shared your family journey with us on the "outside". I'm so jealous. It makes me want to take time to stop and smell all the roses -- whether in Paris or elsewhere. What a gift you have given your children! It will be interesting to see the impact this trip has made on "next steps" in your life.
Best regards,Jane

[Paris Barnhart]

I just wanted to know the history behide my name.

[monica]

that is very in teresting I'm going to Paris this summer

[Paris Hotels]

the Musee du Moyen Age is indeed nice. I was there on a trip with my husband and kids and we had a great time (the kids were captivated). I don't know why French people have such a bad rap around the globe. When we were in Paris we stayed at a really nice hotel we found on LMT and the staff was simply adorable. Thanks for your tips, I'll use them next time.

[Shyanne]

I have recently read a book on this topic which http://www.pdfqueen.com found at pdf search engine on ebooks and must admit that from your article I've learned much new and interesting. Thanks!

[Karsten]

cool place - i was there in 1997