Paris: the Arc de Triomphe, the Champes-Elysees, Pont Alexandre III, the Petit Palais,and the Place de Concorde

It was wet, cool and blowy when we decided that we needed to visit the Arc de Triomphe.

 

 

 It is really quite a dramatic focus to the roundabout  at Place Charles de Gaulle and the grand boulevards radiating from it.

  It seems like every street we walk on in Paris has reference to someone in French history who did something for the good of France.  Sometimes it is a musician or singer, like Josephine Baker was also a member of the Resistance, sometimes it is a politician, but this place seems to have caught France and the world's focus as being the centre for pride, triumphs and resistance to its enemies.

We thought it was too wet to visit the Bois de Boulogne so we strolled down the Champs-Elysee while the rain abated a little. gawking at the very expensive shops and deciding which pieces of souvenir jewellery that Bob could buy for me.  I did see a Daliesque watch that I quite liked,

 but thought the diamonds might get in the way of my gardening and snag on my embroidery cottons, so in spite of his pleas for me to let him invest in a 23400 E watch, or a ring for 55100E, I will come home without a souvenir from Tiffany or Cartier.  Perhaps next time I will find something to my taste.  Similarly, you won't, unfortunately see me dressed in anything by Saint-Laurent, Cardin or Gautier,  Sorry to disappoint.

Walking through gardens, we ended up at the Pont Alexandre III which is splendidly over the top with it four (naturaly) gilt statues flamboyantly watching over the bridge, atop vast stone bases.

 Facing them are the Grand Palais and the Petit Palais.

We decided to visit the Petit Palais, which is rather surprisingly glorious and  light-filled building from the inside, but has a rather mixed bag of displays.  Some of the paintings seemed a bit weak artistically, though historically interesting, but we both rather admired the portrait of Sarah Bernhardt, by George Clairin.

Other works worth noting for me were Alfred Sisley's "L'Eglise de Moret (le soir)",

Camille Pissaro's "Paris, le Pont Royale et le Pavilion de Flore",

 and Albert Bartholome's "Buste de Femme"
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I was really interested by the collection of icons and how Jesus and his disciples were portrayed.  In many of the portraits he looks like an Ethiopian, in others like a very dark Italian, and in yet others, he appears like a darkish western European.  Very different to the story books of my childhood where he looked like a benign Englishman with fair hair and eyes.

I'd never come across Jean Carries' sculptural work before.  His grotesque masks, sculptures and toads rather tickled my fancy, though they seemed to also indicate a weird mind.

In completely different styles, I liked Henry Cros' "Azur"

and Emile Galle's "Commode".

We took a break in the cafe and discovered an incongruously wild garden with ponds and archways festooned with golden swags and overlooked by yet more golden angels.

We next visited the huge Place de la Concorde, with its fountains,

 Obelisk of Luxor

 

 

 

and, its monuments topped by the mandatory gilded statues, all with the Paris wheel as a backdrop.  As splendid a site as Paris is capable of making.

Then, it was through the back streets to do more gawking at the clothing, art and jewellery shops of the rich and famous, especially in the Rue du Fauburg, Saint- Honore.  Plus, braving the armed guards surrounding the vast and walled home of the President, we peered in to see if he wanted to  invite us in for an aperitif or two.  He didn't.

Paris: an attempt at a visit to Versailles, and relief in the Jardin de Plantes, plus a visit to a petshop

We decided to visit the Palace of Versailles today, which meant changing train lines twice, catching a tram, and then catching a double decker train (decorated with details from the Palace, including pictures of the bookcases and of the floral decoration),

 then walking through spruikers to the chateau.  Like most of the buildings in Paris, the buildings are solid and prosperous looking, with an abundance of sculptures and gold adornments.

 The gardens are similarly extensive, formal and very expensive looking.

 Like everyone else, we passed through the checks by the armed guards, and joined the queue.  Then we realised we should have got there at opening time.  The queue looped and looped and looped and looped.  We decided that spending the day standing in the rain a slow moving line was not for us and resolved to visit another time, so we wandered around the outside of the buildings and gardens, and explored  the streets around the Palace instead.

The architecture in the suburbs is sometimes very different to what we have seen so far in some of the Parisian houses. The slate of the roofs descends down into the top of the walls which makes the roofs look much more dominant.

As well as odd buildings, we discovered the Cathedrale Saint-Louis which contains some of the Louis IX's paintings.

 

Its bright red "Porte de la Misericorde", with its modern colourful scenes from the Bible explains how art can be related to God.  To be honest, to me it looks a bit odd on a traditional church.

Trying to find somewhere peaceful, we caught the trains to the delightful Jardin des Plantes.  What a wonderful find.  I don't know why, but I assumed that French gardens would all be very formal and clipped and pruned.  In fact, there are elements of control in the gardens here, but they also take a great deal of pleasure in creating gay abandon.

The gardens are built around four main buildings:  the Grande Galerie de l'Evolution, the Mineralogy Museum, the Paleontology Museum and the Entomology Museum.

 

We started at the entrance with a mammoth browsing in the gardon along with  a dinosaur and a huge bird's skull on the gravel.

Then, we wandered into the rather informal section with herbs, fruit (including bananas!), vegetables and medicinal plants.  A little rabbit cleaned his whiskers, a la Beatrix Potter's Peter Rabbit, totally unperturbed by the visitors.

Fat goldfish swirled around the ponds, visited by a coot.  I got a lot of ideas for building edifices for native bees and wasps and took lots of photos of plants I just need.

 

We  also explored the more formal areas of the garden, including the Alpine Garden, the Rose Garden, the Iris Garden and the Botany School Garden.  The huge glass houses were not open to the public,

 but we enjoyed walking through the wooded areas, round the children's playground, past yet another merry-go-round,

and round the zoo.  The first animals we saw were wallabies!  There were lots of sculptures to admire - France must have the most sculptures of any country in the world -

and displays of rock forms,

 

including a calcified tree.

After leaving the gardens, we crossed the river and walked along the Boulevard de la Bastille ( which runs beside the Bassin de l'Arsenal, a canal off the Seine) until we reached the roundabout which has the Colonne de Juillet at its centre, commemorating the July Revolution of 1830, when King Charles I was replaced by Louis-Phillipe.  The French seemed to have loved gold in the past.  As usual, on top of the column is a gilded figure, representing freedom.

On one of the walls  of the Place de Bastille is a stirring call for patriotism from Charles de Gaulle.  Nearby is the Opera Bastille.  This area certainly has memeories of France's constant fight for freedom.

Next, we walked up to the Quai de la Megisserie, which is supposed to have lots of pet stores.  We only found one, but it had a huge collection of animals, including two very fat, very lazy, shop cats.

 All of the dogs and cats were pure bred - no mongrels.  Which brings me to one of the things I have noticed in France.  In  Rennes, the homeless tended to be young, fairly aggressive young men, who looked like they may have drug or alcohol problems, but they tended to be quite tredndily dressed, with mobile phones and fancy earphones.  And, they had the nicest dogs I have seen in a long time.  The mongrels tended to look like Briard, German shepherd, collie or spaniel crosses, but I saw some that looked like pure-bred huskies  and Berger Picards.  Where do they get these dogs from?  I can never find anything as nice when I go looking!  In contrast, the pure bred dogs that I have seen in the streets in Paris and Rennes - Yorkshire terriers, Cavalier King Charles Spaniels, West Highland Whites and Chihuahuas particularly - have seemed to be very badly bred, with hip problems, spindly bodies and an inbred look, though I have seen lovely dogs too - notably some Bernese Mountain Dogs.  Looking at the dogs in the pet shop, which is very clean and well looked after, I wonder if most French people buy their pedigreed dogs from pet shops.  Apart from the usual, they also sold chinchillas, Korean squirrels,

hamsters, rabbits fish and the most amazing range of birds.  They had Australian cockatoos and galahs, lots of conures, all kinds of finches, some beautiful mynahs - the list could go on for a page.  I wonder if these birds are all captive bred , or whether there is some illegal smuggling going on.

Going back to the hotel, I thought more about pets in France.  I had been told to look out for droppings everywhere, but there aren't really more than I find in Australia.  The French are obviously making an effort.  I like the way the French can take their dogs everywhere, though I suppose many would not like this.  I have seen them in shops, restaurants - even trains.  The dogs seem fairly polite.  I've only heard one snarl.  I have seen no stray dogs and no stray cats.  They all seem to have owners.  The dogs in Paris seem to be mainly small - I guess this makes sense if you live in a flat- but I have seen an English setter, a German Shepherd, Golden Retrievers and a Labrador.  Very few people walk them off lead - even the homeless use leads on their dogs and cats.  and they take them on holiday.  One couple were trying to take their dog into the church at Mont. Saint Michel!

Paris: Montmartre

Montmartre has always been linked in my mind with the paintings of Toulouse- Lautrec, so I was very careful not to expect everything to look the same today. After all, we are in a different century.   I firmly put dancing girls, working girls, drunk men and absinthe out of my mind, along with the fact that  I swear that the waiter in one of the restaurants in Montparnasse is Toulouse Lautrec's  twin.  He just lacks the top hat.

Anyway, we decided to approach the Sacre- Coeur Basilica from the highest part that we could get to by train, which meant that we walked through the African suburbs and had a lovely time checking out the latest hair-dos for men and women at the local hair-dressers.  In spite of the short cut, we did have a steep stair-case but it was better than the usual route that tourist usually use.

The basilica is very white and wedding cake like,

 but the atmosphere of purity is rather offset by the two rather violent statues of Saint Joan of Art and king Saint Louis IX.

 We walked around it and admired the gargoyles,

 then went to investigate its neighbouring church, Saint -Pierre de Montmartre, with its lovely stained glass windows.

 Round the corner from that, we found an artists market and lots of souvenir stores.  The art varied, but some of it was quite nice.  The favourite for the tourists seemed to be the portrait artists and cartoonists.

We returned to Sacre- Coeur to take in the incredible views of the city,

then descended the hill via the gardens, fountain,

 hordes of tourists and requisite merry-go-round ( this city has got the biggest collection of merry-go-rounds I have ever seen!).

 

 An American was singing folk songs on one side of the funicular, while at the foot of the funicular, a group of men dressed as Mexican mariachis and a woman dressed as a flamenco dancer were, for some reason, taking photos with tourists, I don't know why.

 

I am glad I put the 19th century out of my mind.  Montmartre is now very much a mixture of tourist destination and seediness, with a wedding cake on the top.