Opera Garnier, 2009

Tuesday, after packing up, cleaning, refitting and refueling the camper, we took the Metro into town one more time, walked the old Opera district, had lunch at Leon's (where we obtained a third Eau de Paris carafe), visited Galeries Lafayette and Printemps, then had coffee with a view of the Opera. We drove off that evening, getting as far as Abbeville.

The old Paris Opera, Palace Garnier

Meyerbeer, Wagner's rival in the 1840s; there are no busts nor statues of Wagner on the building (although just about everybody else in musical history is there); it was here, roughly here, well, in Paris, in the early 1860s, that a riot ended the first performance of the Paris version of Tannhauser; in 1979, Vicki and I had lunch at the nearby Cafe Wagner, now long-gone; nowadays you'd pretty much have to be a music historian to know who Meyerbeer was....
 
Cafe-table view of the Opera

Cafe de la Paix
 
Interior of the Opera district Galeries Lafayette
 
Galeries Lafayette rotunda

Organ grinder's orange cat

Cluny, 2009

Monday, we did some more of the Left Bank, including the Cluny Abbey/Hotel, which has long been the national museum of the middle ages. Some chain mail and a few swords, but mostly religious stuff, as one might expect.

Monday evening we had our last meal together at the apartment. Vicki fixed her Porkchops Liegesoise followed by hand-picked Swedish blueberries and real French vanilla ice cream. And we all bid our farewells. The girls and the boys left the next morning, Rachel and Will for Normandy and more time in France, Rebecca and Jeremy for England and a week in London. It was a very, very good family European vacation.

John the Baptist
  
Cigar store John the Baptist
  
Jesus on wheels...try to imagine what this might have been used for in the 13th century...parades, dramatization, 4-wheel drive demonstration?
  
The Cluny does have some nice windows on display you can look at close-up...

We have been to cathedrals that feature shards of the True Foreskin in their treasuries...but this is the first depiction of the Holy Circumcision I have yet seen
  
 And Cluny has not one but two; supply a caption for the guy on the right

Most people come to Cluny for the unicorn tapestries; sorry there are not more and better pix, but they keep the room very dark for preservation purposes and no flash

The unicorn tapestries are about the senses and, eventually, apparently, eschewing the senses for higher things (whatever...); here, the lady is demonstrating the sense of sight by showing the unicorn his image in the mirror
  
Cluny was built on top of Roman buildings, of which there are ample remains

Thus

Tastevin

Our last restaurant meal together was dinner at a neo-bistro called Tastevin, on
the Ile St. Louis; a model of the restaurant was sitting on the bar next to us

Interior

I had the lotte (monkfish); super!

Seine at night, from the bridge between St. Louis and Cite

 

Notre Dame at night

Ditto

Ditto, again; great night sights

Pomp 2

We also visited the Pompidiou a second time, just to see the more conventional collection. Vicki's favorite Roualt was in storage. This color photo of James Joyce was taken in 1939, in Paris, just months before his death. Sort of ties things together.

Louvre 2

The morning after Versailles, we indefatiguably went
on to our 2nd visit to the Louvre, starting with
Napoleon III's apartments, another first for us, and,
I must say, last also 

19th century Parisian conversation pit 

Cool fold-up desk; Ikea, note

Struggling artists need not despair: space remains at the
Louvre...must match moss green, no large formats, please 

 

And old family favorite, "The Pinch," we understand the
deep allegory underlying it is subject of a new Dan Brown
novel 

 

Well, by this point, I was totally Louvred-out,
again, and repaired to a cafe; Vicki carried on
intrepidly--she had the audio-guide--visiting
other exhibits and departments and taking
some 60 more pix she swears she'll look at
some day and help me edit for the blog 

She got this close to the painting they all fuss about,
inexplicably  

But her real triumph of the day was this shot of a 7-foot
American guy with the child, private guide, attendants,
guards, and the rest...later confirmed to be Kobe Bryant;
paparrazza indeed!

Versailles 3 (the last, I promise)

At its height, Versailles had 1,500 working fountains, now only 300

But one of the treats, on selected days, is to watch them all in operation, or as many as you can get to

All of the fountains are still gravity-fed, as in the 18th century; here, Vicki has found the main switch for the Neptune Basin

Neptune Basin at high tide/full eruption
 
Workers walking away with the cranks; that's all, folks

One last chateau shot

Versailles 2

Gardens















Sometimes contemporary art rears its ugly/silly head
 
Grand canal

After chateau and gardens we (some of us) went on to the Queen's domain, Marie Antoinette's private retreat and the hamlet, a village specially constructed for her to play peasant (so I think I once read)
Most of the furniture at Versailles is period-furniture, not the original stuff; except, I assume's MA's toilet
One of the larger buildings in the hamlet
 
The mill; I prefer to think of the hamlet as an early instance of social experimentation ("what if they were to eat only cakes?")

Versailles 1

Saturday we all took the train and met in Versailles to do the chateau and gardens and fountains. It was crowded, but the weather cooperated, and we had a good if exhausting day, including, for Vicki and me, several things we had not seen in previous visits. I doubt whether any of us got back home much before midnight.

We are in the third lap of the queue; largest crowd we have ever seen at Versailles The official royal chamber was below the clock; I wonder if the incessant big-time ticking kept him awake Chapel; alas, the Opera, my favorite, was closed for renovation Our guy Louis Hall of Mirrors Tagging in the Hall of Mirrors, 1842 In the Hall of War, which I had never before visited; many paintings of Napoleon, here the campaign over the Alps, early in his career Will and Rachel in the gardens Saturday we all took the train and met in Versailles to do the chateau and gardens and fountains. It was crowded, but the weather cooperated, and we had a good if exhausting day, including, for Vicki and me, several things we had not seen in previous visits. I doubt whether any of us got back home much before midnight.