The Road Goes Ever On

Friday, October 1, 2021

Musee du Louvre, 1

So we have been there before...

and those are just the post-retirement visits I could find. The Louvre has a decent online presence and of course there's always Google Art and Wikipedia, and more, and thus individual pix of paintings and sculptures and such and virtual tours certainly are readily available. What I have hoped to present, mostly, is stuff that is not at those sites, stuff you would not ordinarily see, and stuff that is amusing or at least personally interesting to us.

We delayed visiting the Louvre this far into our 2021 September/October campaign in Paris in part because we were museumed-out after London and in part because we wanted to figure out the most reasonable approach to our usual multi-day visits to the Louvre. It's17€ p/p per day, and, at our present age and stamina, it will take several days. So we concluded it best for one of us to buy a Friends of the Louve membership (unlimited visits, additional perks, good for a year), and for the other to go as a guest on Saturdays. Vicki's interests in the Louvre are wider and deeper than mine, so she is now a Friend of the Louvre. Thus:

After the year is over I will make the membership card into a fridge magnet. The ultimate honor.

All that said and explained, I proceed now to a few pix from our September 25th visit.

Rubens' sister-in-law, Susanna Lunden, whom
we last saw in the National Gallery of Art, wearing a
(non-straw) hat; see also Elizabeth Le Brun's
self-portrait; I'm not sure how we got started off with
Rubens...possibly the Great Courses video we're
watching; but there you go

A typically happy Franz Hals sitter, a young woman,
known as the Gypsy Girl; probably a prostitute

Rembrandt side of ox

Seriously impressive Rembrandt Bathsheba

Gerard Dou, Better Hold That One up to the Light, 1663

Extremely teenie-weenie Vermeer Lacemaker,
1669; the Louvre also has the Astronomer, which
I am sure I posted sometime previously

Steen's Bad Company; we love Steen's moralizing-lite; just learned
he was deaf and mute...yet so talented, and perceptive

Attempted and unsuccessful pano of the Marie de Medici hall; not even half the room;
a dozen or so enormous Team Rubens paintings, glorifying/legitimizing her roles as
queen and then regent of France; at her request and direction; in reverse chronological
order, sorry, and only a few

Apotheosis of her husband, Henry IV (jousting accident, as I
recall)

Coronation

Birth of her son, Louis XIII

Arriving in France to marry Henry

Education of the future queen

The Louvre has one (1) Turner; and no (0; nada) Valesquez's;
some museum...

An early Mr. Fruity Butt Pants (Michaelangelo de Merisi, aka
Caravaggio), the Fortune Teller

This space reserved for a Velasquez, if they ever get one

The mob in line to see Mr. Smokey's Special Lady Friend

We saw a great deal of Italian, northern, and Spanish paintings (my camera was mis-set, so I'll have to go back for several of the Spanish), had a nice 1/2 poulet roti et frites lunch at the restaurant, finally left after four hours or so, but knowing we could come back.

Thursday, September 30, 2021

Bouillon Racine And Jardin Des Plantes

As promised, we were back in the Latin Quarter next day, for lunch at the Bouillon Racine and a walk in the Jardin des Plantes. Bouillons began in the mid-19th century as quick, cheap, and simple eateries for working stiffs, and are regarded by some as the first chain restaurants: in the later 1800s, Paris had some 250 bouillons, many owned by the same person or group. As Art Nouveau developed, some of the bouillons morphed into fancier type restaurants. A look at historical photographs from the era suggests that the "workingmen" that frequented these later bouillons are best contrasted with non-workingmen, that is, aristocrats. So also the decor. They were people who worked, but also wore fine clothes and could afford fine food in fine surroundings. Several of the surviving few Belle Epoche bouillons are listed national monuments. Thus the Bouillon Racine on Rue Racine, originally the Grand Bouillon Camille Chartier in 1906. The place catches your eye from the street, and, thanks to a thorough restoration by the Compagnons du Tour de France in 1996, it is even better inside. The food was great, and quite reasonable, by the way, but that's not why you go there.

Bouillon Racine

My zucchini and basil gazpacho

And sole muniere over baby leeks, etc.

Her pork ribs and veggies; not pictured: her creme brulee

The ceiling above us

Heading upstairs

Bar downstairs

Downstairs dining

Incredible place

Drunk with Belle Epoche art and architecture, and fine food,

we waddled on to our secondary target of the day, the Jardin

des Plantes, Paris' botanical garden and zoo; also natural history

museum and more

More history of science, botany and zoology; in

monuments

Quite a lot there

Entrance to the Menagerie, zoo and enormous greenhouses

But we just strolled the Jardin, having had enough intensity for

the day

Flora impudica (impudent flower)

Fall color in full swing

Latin Quarter

After leaving the gardens we wandered generally toward the Latin Quarter and an ultimate goal of the shops of Au Vieux Campeur, a favorite on earlier visits to Paris. But mostly just gawking at the assorted shops and restaurants of interest.

Doll store; no Barbies

Can't remember whether this was a book store or a flower shop;
or maybe something sinister...

Find of the day (mainly because Vicki never misses a menu):
the Polidor, which counted Hemingway, Joyce, and the rest of
the gang, but probably not Proust, as regulars; also famous as
seen in Midnight in Paris

Can't imagine Hemingway and Joyce being in the same room;
or even the same city

Now at an antique and hand-made knife shop

For when your Trident Solingen just won't cut it

$1,000 pocket knife

Knife-making workshop

Custom-made jeans shop

The red tag says they've been worn a year and a
half; evidently a major selling point

Bamboo bicycle shop; strong, light-weight...

Bespoke shirt shop...evidently for architects, engineers mostly

Big Find of the day: the Bar de Bouillon Racine...we'll be back!

Finally arriving in the precincts of Au Vieux Campeur, a cluster
of 23 shops, scattered over several blocks, featuring the latest in
camping, hiking, mountaineering, travel...

Thus; you need a map to find what you're looking for

And a gazetteer

Solar-powered fondue kit

Sorbonne

Favorite French philosopher, Montaigne

The custom is, rub his shoe and you will return to Paris

Thus; vigorously; Vicki now informs me she just fabricated the
thing about returning to Paris; so whatever the custom is, I am
entitled to it; or have a ticket in the lottery...