Tag Archives: Paris

Striking out for Provence

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Avignon, Wednesday, March 24, 8 a.m. — We’ve fallen a bit behind in our blogging, but it’s hard to blog when you’re going 300 kilometer per hour. We had a minor strike scare on Monday afternoon, when we realized that a major French rail strike was set to take place Tuesday, the very day we were hoping to take the TGV high-speed rail to Provence in the south of France. Thanks to Chrystele, a French radio journalist, we were able to find out that our train wasn’t going to be affected, but 1/3 of the other TGV were cancelled. We suspect Chrystele, a union boss herself, was behind an attempt to keep us in Paris, but she had her heavies relent at the last minute and free our train.

In the evening, we trudged to the Eiffel Tower. We tried to take the metro but someone had thrown themselves on the tracks, so we took two cabs to the heart of touristy Paris. Will begged to go up in the Tower, but the wait was far too long for the elevator to the top, so we bought tickets to take the stairs to the first level — that broad part you see partway up. We fought off some impudent Italian high school students and made our way up for the sunset and a great view of the city. As we left up the Trocadero, across the Seine with a view down on the tower and the Champs de Mars, the tower lit up. As a bride and groom had their wedding photos shot against that backdrop, we descended to the metro, where Rick deftly averted a pickpocketing with one of his steely glares. (The guy saw Rick’s backpack and darted off after him; I noticed, so did Rick, and the guy veered away. Phew.)

We had a lovely last dinner with the Papes in Paris at a charming, friendly restaurant near the Louvre and the Palais Royal. Luka and Will held out despite the late hour. We walked the Papes back to their bus through a lively neighborhood filled with busy cafes and restaurants. It was really sad saying goodbye to them; we hope to see them again soon and before Luka gets too much bigger. As you can see from the photos, he’s totally adorable.

We got off to a rough start Tuesday. We arrived at the Gare de Lyon more than an hour early, just in case there was strike-related travel chaos, but there wasn’t. Until we boarded the train. I found what I thought to be our seats, but there were people in three of the five seats. One man produced a ticket showing he, too, was in seat 21. The two women glared at me disinterestedy. Since Rick, Will, Mitchell and Alex stood behind me, lugging their suitcases and blocking the aisle, I retreated to try to find someone to help us find our real seats. Upstairs, downstairs, all around, I finally told everyone to sit down in an open seat and wait until I could figure it out. I found a very harried conductor, who told me, yes, my seats were down were I had originally been. By then the man occupying seat 21 found me and apologized, explaining he was mistaken (I think he was saving face for being such an ass) and the women were very, very angry as I showed them my tickets. They moved to other seats nearby. Whatever. I think they had figured I would give up and go away.

The Hotel D’Europe

The train ride was otherwise uneventful. Just 2 1/2 hours all the way to the south of France, what would have been a 6 1/2 hour drive. And on the one leg of our journey I had not pre-planned to the nth degree — the ride from the train station to the hotel in Avignon — we of course were left standing at an empty taxi queue at the station with no taxis in sight — and some helpful person had scratched out part of the phone number to call a cab. The weather was beautiful, but we were all bundled up for cold, so we were HOT. A taxi swung around the corner in the glaring sun and Will leapt to his feet and shouted, “SOS!!” Well, needless to say we weren’t in danger of anything, and I managed to call a cab big enough to get us to our lovely old hotel just inside the medieval city walls of this city, home of the popes and the center of Christendom during the 14th century.

The Palais des Papes

We dropped our luggage and headed out to catch the Palais des Papes, the 14th century fortress that rises above the winding streets of the city. It is a labyrinth of corridors and rooms used by the rogue popes who had moved here from Rome early in the 1300s. The first pope was austere, but the ones who followed were more like party-guys who built sumptuous chambers and beautifully arched feasting and meeting halls. (Don’t tell anyone, but Will and I think it doesn’t hold a candle to the castles in Scotland.)

We then climbed to the park behind the castle, where an unusual rock formation was the fortress of the original inhabitants of the area. Below, was the Pont St. Benezet, better known as the Pont d’Avignon of nursery-rhyme fame. It was built 200 or years before the palace and has withstood the ferocity of the Rhone river for centuries. It’s broken off half way, but it still made a magical spot to look back on the palace and the walls of Avignon in the fading sunlight.

We had a great dinner at La Fourchette, a cozy and extremely friendly restaurant near our hotel. We had an excellent Provencale meal; Mitchell ordered the escargot but declared they tasted like dirt. Will and Rick pitched in to eat a few. I had perfect salmon and a raw artichoke and parmesan salad (must try this at home); Rick and Will loved their Daube de Boeuf Provencale and mashed potatoes. Then home to bed.

King Darius Rocks the Louvre

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Paris, Lundi, le 22 mars — Today, we tackled the Louvre. Everyone slept well last night because all the rugby fans had gone home, and it was blissfully quiet outside the hotel. We had our usual croissant from Gerard Mulot around the corner and then headed off on foot for the Louvre, a short walk away across the Seine. It was an unexpectedly clear and fresh morning, no clouds in sight, as we walked along the Seine toward the enormous palace that now houses the Musee du Louvre. Will exclaimed that if stood on its end, it would be as tall as the Empire State Building.

We had purchased tickets yesterday so were thankfully spared the freakishly long line leading to ticket sales in I.M. Pei’s glass pyramid entrance. Mitchell and Alex went their own way to explore, and the rest of us headed straight for the ancient Greek, Etruscan, Roman and Egyptian antiquities. For anyone who hasn’t been to the Louvre, it’s like a labyrinth in there, very hard to navigate all the stairs and levels and twists and turns. It puts poor ‘lil Mrs. Winchester to shame. The biggest (and really only) bummer was that much of the archaic Greek art, along with ALL THE POTTERY, were closed from view for renovations, which was a heartbreak to me. But there was plenty else to see in the three-hours we alloted ourselves. It was pleasant at first, not crowded, but by noon it was a sweltering mass of humanity and tour groups and totally despicable people fondling the statues. What is wrong with people?

Anyway, back to the good stuff. We saw the Mona Lisa — on Will’s insistence. The whole experience was summed up by a Japanese man, who pushed past us through the crowd surrounding the painting and declared, “Mimashita!” Which is the one-word Japanese sentence, “I saw (it).” So we mimashita’d and vamoosed past the Botticellis and DaVincis and Titians at breakneck speed to get back to our beloved antiquities. None of this Renaissance modern art for us.

We particularly enjoyed the statues of the Roman emperors, especially Will. As Rick and I blazed ahead, Will said critically, “You’re going a bit fast.” Oh, joy to a mother’s ears, he’s becoming a museum lover. We especially loved the art from Persian King Darius in the late 6th century B.C., these amazing wall murals made of green stone that were completely spectacular. There were the double-bull capitals of these enormous columns, the size of which was hard to imagine. I was completely blown away by the 3rd to 2nd millenium B.C. Near Eastern/Iranian pottery that sported the geometric patterns that reappeared on Greek pottery after the Dark Ages around the turn of the 1st millenium B.C. I think if I could reinvent myself I’d come back as an art historian of the Middle East.

At noon, with the crowds getting stifling, we headed for a local restaurant filled with French businessmen and had a lunch (burgers for Mitchell and Alex, the charcuterie plate for Will) and then took the metro to the catacombs — underground passages literally decorated with the bones of thousands of people from the 17th and earlier centuries. I was creeped out and didn’t want to go, but was outvoted. Much to my delight and the rest’s dismay, they were closed on Monday. So we trekked back to our hotel, where we are resting and preparing for the night out with Eric and Chrystele and the Tour Eiffel, which we were too tired to see last night.