Parigi: Continued.
We visited the San Sulpice, mainly due to its role in the Davinci Code, home church to the albino assassin. The church has a “rose line”, a brass inlay on the church floor, much like the one in the Palermo Duomo. (I believe I had posted some photos in a far earlier blog, maybe not.) Anyway, the lines were put in to help the priests determine when Easter was going to occur. It’s the first Sunday following the first full moon of spring. Without some form of astronomical tool it became real hard to be certain. A gnomon was used as the line’s marker. This ended dependence on multiple astronomers for the date, and the different answers they provided.
After this we did some shopping, dinner and breakfast stuff, at the Galleries Lafayette grocery store, actually more of a HUGE delicatessen across the street from the main building. It’s a marvelous space, filled with every kind of goody. Fresh and processed meats, cheeses, wines, produce, etc. Think of a Fred Meyer or, God forbid, a Walmart, but so wonderfully upscale and classy. It wasn’t as Renaissance as the market in Venice in the old teatro, but it has far more selection.
The next day was set for wandering, going to the Delacroix House/Museum and garden and finishing off with a trip up the Eiffel Tower in the late afternoon so we could try to catch a sunset and the Tower lighting up. Naturally, the weather did not cooperate. More Seattle skies and temperatures. Wet and cold. Not much rain, just damp as hell with a good breeze that became a real wind when up on the Tower. The Delacroix was his home and studio http://www.musee-delacroix.fr/en/ . It’s always neat to walk through the home and garden of the artist, it leads to a somewhat better understanding of their aesthetic values.
The Eiffel Tower is just about due west of the Delacroix museum and and that’s where we were headed. We got tickets for a late afternoon “tour”. That way we’d have a chance to see the tower lit up at evening. As usual, the weather was not pleasant. A bit of rain, Seattle style, and cold with some breeze at ground level, gale force at height. Despite the weather and being mid-week. there was a large crowd. We had to wait 20 minutes in the ticket holders line, actually it’s only one line, you just have a shorter line to get into the queue for the elevators. You are exposed to the elements throughout your wait so dress appropriately. Since we’d been walking around we were prepared, mostly.
We left to have some dinner and get to the Louvre in time to get an hour or so on the one night of the week that it’s open late. This meant we had to hit the “highlights” that evening (the Mona Lisa) while the crowds would be at their smallest. Still, you could not get close. It has its own gallery to accommodate the crowd of people that want to see it. After entering through the Metro station at the museum we headed directly to the Mona Lisa and then off to some of the other Renaissance painters..
The next day was our main day at the Louvre. Naturally I’ve got more photos than I have the patience to upload here. Some may be a bit off kilter, or out of focus, but if I have no better to show what we saw I’ll include it in the pile. Sorry. Some you may recognize. There’s so much. Like the Uffizi there are miles of corridors, including restoration of the royal rooms. When you walk into Marie Antoinette’s chambers you can see why the residents of Paris revolted. The opulence is astounding. If you compare, in your mind, the situation of the average citizen, living in third-world conditions, against the extravagance of the royalty it’s not hard to see why the revolution occurred.
The next day we went to the Musee de l’Orangerie where Monet’s water lilies murals are located. The four large paintings are showcased in 2 separate salons. My camera would not do them justice. Even my panorama on my iPhone failed me. You are so close that the pano was distorted, large in the center and narrower on the ends so, no shots of those. However, there are many more of his works to capture along with Picasso’s, Cezanne’s, and other impressionists.
Since it was a DRY day we then walked to the Rodin museum and sculpture garden. To get there you pass the National Assembly and we found a great place for lunch, the Restaurant Assemblee, a block from the National Assembly building. Since it was after the lunch hour the place was almost deserted. The staff was having their lunch/dinner prior to the evening’s opening. Great place with a reasonably priced menu. It pays to eat lunch at great places, the prices are lower due to the smaller plates. Always do Michelin for lunch, not dinner.
The Rodin museum has many of the original statues used to created the castings. If the bronze isn’t there, the “mold” may be. The statue of Balzac in the Orsay, photo in first Parigi posting, is the mold for the bronze of Balzac in the garden.
One last set of photos from Paris. We finally got to the Madeleine, originally constructed as a pantheon to Napoleon’s armies. That evening they were having a concert on the massive organ. While we were there the organist was practicing. What an experience to hear a huge instrument like that fill the space with sound. We had a dinner scheduled that night in a small really french restaurant in the Latin Quarter with Rae and her friends from Malta who came up and spent a couple days with us, mainly her. If we hadn’t been leaving the next day and had that last night dinner planned we would have been in church.
Well, that about does it. No more photos to post or tales to tell from Paris. Finally got this done. Next step is to start the postings from our more recent trip to the desert environs, after we got over the BAD colds we picked up on the trip. Mine was from the airplane trip over, Cathy’s was captured while there.
Sooo, Ciao for now.