Paris: Part 6

Finally it is Monday the 31st of December, 2007 - New Years Eve.

We had planned a relatively light schedule, starting in the Latin quarter where we had an authentically French lunch, starting with escargot - which was delicious in a smothered-in-garlic kind of way - and ending with mousse au chocolat - delicious also, and with an interesting texture unlike we had found in previous mousses (meesse?).

We walked off lunch by visiting the Jardin du Luxembourg by way of the Panthéon and Saint-Étienne-du-Mont.

The Luxembourg gardens were very nice, and we plonked ourselves on the chairs there for a while and just watched people walking around and getting told off by the police for feeding the pigeons.

While in the Latin quarter I also bought myself a notepad. I had seen it before and marveled at the marketing miracle it represented - a 50c notepad in ziplock bag with 'Temporary Storage' printed on it, selling for €7. I obsessed over it later, and when I saw it a second time I snapped it up. Linda became jealous of my new stationary and we had to go back to buy one for her too. Incredibly I have not been able to find an example of this notepad on the Internet.

Later we coupled our notepads with some little aluminium pens from muji and became the proud owners of €10 notepad/pen sets. Of course I had a justification for the purchase (I always do) - I would use mine as a travel diary so I could remember what we did on our travels, for later transcription into this blog; lucky you!

We then started towards home to prepare for our evening, stopping outside the Louvre to take some photos on the reflecting ponds.

When we finally headed out for NYE celebrations, we donned our warmest gear and had a preparatory glass of Champagne (we thought glass bottles would be prohibited - a fear that would later prove completely baseless). We went to Place de la Concorde, which has a view that stretches all the way up the Champes Elysées in one direction and towards the Eiffel tower in the other. We found ourselves a good spot on a wall next looking over the Seine, with a couple of hours to wait before midnight.

We waited there with a growing crowd of people while the clock ticked down, in anticipation of a spectacular fireworks display over the Eiffel Tower. We watched the tooting cars drive by, and the glowing Bateaux Mouches cruising up the Seine, and before long the time was upon us and we joined the countdown.

When at last the hour of midnight struck, we were very disappointed to discover there would be no grand fireworks display at the Eiffel tower, but only the regular hourly flashy-light routine that it does all the time. Along with a vast number of other people, we stood and watched and waited, but to no avail. In the end the best fireworks display was from a guy walking along nonchalantly holding a firecracker that popped a small flare into the air every few seconds.

After we recovered from this minor setback we set out to walk up the Champes Elysées, which is the focal point for NY celebrations in Paris and was filled with a flood of people.

We took our time walking the length of the avenue, watching the hoards of boys pursuing single girls trying to get a new year kiss, and staying clear of the numerous police in full riot gear. It was all very well behaved, despite what you might expect from the shop-fronts, which were boarded up, and the later news reports of torched cars in the suburbs.

Eventually we made our way home, a bit disappointed by the lack of fireworks (our expectations probably set a little high after the Sydney NYE experience) but very happy to have been part of such a big event in a city like Paris.

Paris: Part 5

On Sunday we woke up with a renewed determination that we would, at last, climb the towers of Notre Dame. We'd been defeated twice before and had planned to get up nice and early and get in queue in time to beat the masses. Of course, having spent the last several days storming through a large portion of Paris, we were completely knackered and didn't actually leave the apartment until well after our planned hour.

By the time we arrived at Notre Dame the queue was huge and moving forward at a snail's pace. We tried to convince ourselves this gave us an excellent opportunity to examine the outside of the cathedral, but really there's only so much of that you can do before boredom sets in. We sustained ourselves with crêpe au beurre et sucre (crepes with butter and sugar) from a nearby shop that was making a killing feeding the frozen tourists stuck in the queue along with us.

Once up the towers, however, the view over Paris was amazing and the gargoyles provided an amusing foreground for the spectacular panorama.

We inched our way around the outside of the towers before heading up the extremely narrow staircase to the very top which had the most amazing view of all. It was a long wait, but definitely worth it.

Once out of the towers again, we stopped to watch some rollerbladers who were doing an impressive job of slaloming between tiny witches-hats they had set up on the bridge near the cathedral. I gave them 80c, which I'm sure they appreciated.

From there we walked (actually half running, not wanting to miss another museum entry) to the Musée Rodin.

The Musée Rodin is actually both the old Hôtel Biron and its surrounding garden, which makes it a very relaxing spot to visit. I've got to say that while The Thinker and couple other of his works were quite impressive I would not rank myself amongst the greatest of Rodin fans, but it was still an interesting place to visit.

A friend from work had recommended we go to Centre Pompidou and have a drink at George's Restaurant on the top floor for the view over Paris. We dutifully visited the building, which was originally built in 1977 and recently renovated, and browsed the books and postcards at the bookshop before navigating our way up to George's. The view was indeed quite spectacular, and we blended into the high-fashion restaurant by whipping our our map and guide-book to plan our next steps while sipping on a glass of wine.

Paris: Part 4

We're up to Saturday, now, and our first goal for the day was to take ourselves on a walk around the Marais neighbourhood, on the 'right' bank of the Seine. We started at Place des Vosges, which is a lovely little square of 36 identical brick houses (actually only the first few were built with brick, the rest being built with wood and plaster to save time and money).

Victor Hugo lived in one of the apartments for a time, but that is no great claim to fame as half of Paris seems to have some sort of association with the author of The Hunchback of Notre Dame and Les Miserables. There is a museum there, which we didn't visit.

From there we wandered around the Marais some more, making a half-hearted effort to go to the Picasso museum which had a huge, snaking, queue before deciding we should stick to seeing the neighbourhood, ducking into shops and pattiseries to sample the local delights. Linda bought a small silver spoon with holes in it, the purpose of which have had still yet to properly determine.

Our next plan for the day had us climbing Notre Dame and we were heading in that direction when I decided I was in caffiene withdrawal and we wandered into a random little café we spotted on the way. This proved to be a masterstroke since it was actually a boutique little coffee bar where groups of people met for phylosophical discussion (French style) on the merits of various blends. We ordered café creme (cappuccino), which may have been a deviation from the purist approach of the espress (espresso) that all the other patrons were drinking, but was neverthless the best coffee we had tasted in either Switzerland or France (and almost, but not quite, Italy). [after a brilliant and determined piece of detective work, Linda managed to track down the café website: Soluna Cafés]

We continued on to Notre Dame only to find there was an obscene queue with a sign at the end indicating we weren't to try and join, since it was now too late to get in. Instead, we jumped on a metro and headed towards Montemartre to see sunset over Paris from the steps below Sacré-Cœur.

We watched the sun go down over the city, which was beautiful as always, and walked around the neighbourhood and the nearby Place du Tertre where half the portrait painters of Paris congregate to lure in unsuspecting tourists. Montemartre is a lovely neighbourhood, despite being so heavily touristed.

Linda managed to book us a restaurant for dinner (no mean feat considering the late hour, multiple closed restaurants, and hoards of tourists) and we waited out the time for our reservation by sipping on vin chaud (a hot spicy wine) to keep us warm. Hot wines are excellent in Switzerland, but in France (at least, the one brazzerie we tried it at) they left something to be desired.

The situation was somewhat remedied at dinner when they gave us a free glass of Rosé, and our meal was very good, but then went backwards again when our desert left us disappointed and, on the way home, Linda realised she had left her gloves at the restaurant following a series of bag moves to accommodate the growing crowd of customers. Oh, the trials and tribulations of holidaying in Paris!