Paris with Deb and Gerry: Eiffel Tower, Notre Dame, Love Locks, Arc de Triomphe, and the Luxembourg Garden

September 26, 2014September 28, 2014 | Alan

The end of August and into September we were lucky to have Tracy’s Aunt Deb and Uncle Gerry come and visit us in France. Deb had come to Paris before, but always on business trips that limited her opportunity to tour the city. This was Gerry’s first travel outside the United States except as a guest of Uncle Sam and the US Army with an all-expense paid trip to Southeast Asia in 1969 where the locals were hostile.

Gerry, Deb, and Tracy in front of the Cathédrale Notre Dame de Paris.

En route to Paris, Tracy and I stopped for a short layover in Montpellier. We enjoyed a coffee and a walked through the Place de la Comédie while waiting for the OUIGO TGV to arrive and take us to Paris. We have become big fans of the French national rail system’s, SNCF, discount high-speed train. The train gets us from Montpellier to Paris (465 miles [750 km]) in 3 hours and the cost is only €10 if you book your tickets early.

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When we arrived in Paris, we found that there was a problem with apartment that Tracy had reserved. Since the apartment was unavailable we received an upgrade to a much larger apartment in the Trocadéro district in the 16th arrondissement. The apartment was located behind the Palais de Chaillot in easy walking distance to the Eiffel Tower. Great serendipity for our stay in Paris. Tracy and I are getting to know Paris, its sights, its Métro (the second busiest subway system in Europe after Moscow), and the RER (Réseau Express Régional) system better with each visit.

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We met Deb and Gerry at Paris’ Charles de Gaulle Airport (Aéroport de Paris-Charles-de-Gaulle) and zipped into town on the RER and the Métro to drop their bags off. Then is was out into Paris to see the city. While in Paris we enjoyed the Eiffel Tower Romance tour and had a private view of Paris from above the Jules Verne Restaurant on the second level of the Eiffel Tower. We enjoyed the daytime and nighttime views of Eiffel Tower and the city of Paris from the Palais de Chaillot near our apartment. The Palais de Chaillot and its grounds over looks the Eiffel Tower and was built as part of the Exposition International of 1937.

We walked along the River Seine to the Île de la Cité (one of the two islands on the Seine at the city’ center) to visit the Cathédrale Notre–Dame de Paris. It is always a stunning sight and Tracy and Deb conducted “zoom lens” wars searching for the most interesting gargoyle and detail on the Cathedral. I always enjoy admiring the flying buttress and hearing the bells ring. On the nearby Pont de l’Archevêché (Archbishop’s Bridge) we introduced Gerry and Deb to the “Love Lock” controversy of visitors securing a padlock to a bridge as a symbol of their love and their visit. It has become such a popular practice many historic bridges are festooned with locks and suffer damage. According to the Daily Telegraph in September 2014″ (All the love locks’) weight caused a section of metal mesh to collapse this summer on the Pont des Arts under the strain of some 54 tons of padlocks.” While not illegal, Paris is responding by replacing the grates with clear plexiglass panel to prevent locks being attached. Tracy and I became “part of the problem” by adding our own “love lock” prior to the practice being banned.

We walked the Avenue des Champs-Élysées from the Arc de Triomphe and the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier to the Grand Palais des Champs-Elysées (that was originally built as an exhibition hall for the Universal Exposition of 1900) with its stunning glass and steel roof. We spent time photographing the nearby Pont Alexandre III bridge’s Art Nouveau lamps, cherubs, nymphs, winged horses, and its view of the Seine and the Eiffel Tower.

Across the Pont Alexandre III, Tracy and Deb enjoyed exploring the L’Hôtel National des Invalides. Les Invalides was originally a home and hospital for disabled veterans (a role it still serves), it now contains Musée de l’Armée (military museum of the Army of France) the Musée des Plans–Reliefs (that displays military models), the Musée d’Histoire Contemporaine (with non-military contemporary history), and serves as a burial site for many of France’s war heroes, including Napoleon’s Tomb.

We liked exploring the grounds of the Musée du Louvre. Fantastic location to people-watch since the museum entertains nearly 10 million visitor from around the world every year. Tracy led Deb down to the Carrousel du Louvre (the underground shopping mall adjacent to the Lourve) for photo ops of La Pyramide Inversée (the inverted pyramid.)

At Deb’s suggestion we visited the Luxembourg Garden, (Jardin du Luxembourg) for the first time. Fantastic location to explore and a “must return” place for Tracy and me. The 57 acres (23 hectares) of public park was originally built as a private garden in 1612 by Marie de’ Medici (the widow of King Henry IV) as part of her new residence, the Luxembourg Palace (which now serves as the seat of the French Senate.) The Luxembourg Garden has amazing lawns, tree-lined promenades, sculptures, flowerbeds, playground, tennis courts, a large circular basin with children sailing model sailboats, and several fountains, including the stunning Medici Fountain. On the ground is the original model of Frédéric Auguste Bartholdi’s Statue of Liberty that has been in the park since 1906. The park has chairs everywhere and Parisians and visitors alike enjoy relaxing at their favorite spots in the garden.

Part 2: France with Deb and Gerry: Mont Saint-Michel, Normandy

Part 3: France with Deb and Gerry: Omaha Beach, Normandy American Cemetery and Memorial

Part 4: Carcassonne with Deb and Gerry: Le Cité de Carcassonne, Château de Montségur, Mirepoix

Paris with Casey and Megan: Notre Dame, Château de Versailles, Eiffel Tower, Love Locks, and the Louvre

July 27, 2014July 27, 2014 | Alan

“Paris is always a good idea.” ~ Audrey Hepburn

Our son Casey and his fiancée Megan became our second set of visitors to France. The trip was to celebrate Casey’s graduation with his Chemical Engineering degree, his hiring as an engineer with the State of Nevada’s Chemical Accident Prevention Program, and his engagement to Megan. So many important milestones to celebrate, but we were mainly looking forward to seeing Casey and meeting Megan for the first time. Tracy had extensively pre-planned the trip in the attempt to try to visit everywhere Casey and Megan wanted to visit. Tracy had the reservations made and confirmations organized to minimize the stress of traveling. Tracy and I subscribed to the “Fast and Light” school of travel with lightweight backpacks and making use of discount travel options as much as possible.

Tracy's collection of tickets, passes, reservations, and confirmations. — Tracy’s collection of tickets, passes, reservations, and confirmations.

Tracy and my "Fast and Light" backpacks that are "Ryanair" size approved. — Tracy and my “Fast and Light” backpacks that are “Ryanair” size approved.

We left Carcassonne the day prior to Casey and Megan’s departure from the US to be able to meet them in Paris. We took the SNCF train to Montpellier and transferred to the Ouigo TGV high-speed train to Paris. We love the economy of the Ouigo where we can often get a trans-France train trip for as little as €10.

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The Ouigo rolled into the Gare de Marne-la-Vallée – Chessy train station outside of Disneyland-Paris and caught the RER A (Réseau Express Régional) regional train into Paris proper where we used the Paris Métro system to picked up the key and settle into our apartment in the Belleville neighborhood of the 19th arrondissement.

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The next morning Tracy and I walked about the Île de la Cité and Latin Quarter visiting the Panthéon to see the photo project that we took part in Carcassonne and hoping to spot our photos in the display used to disguise the scaffolds used to refurbish the monument. (Carcassonne – Au Panthéon Photo Project) Then it was off to Aéroport de Paris-Orly to wait for Casey and Megan’s arrival. It was our first time at the Orly Airport so we took the RER B line early in order to figure out international arrivals.

We were excited to see that Casey and Megan arrived without any problems. We skipped the baggage claim area since they both joined us in our “Fast and Light” method of having a single backpack each for luggage and we were off to the RER for the ride to Paris talking all the way. We headed back to the Île de la Cité

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We “barnstormed” Paris trying to visit as many sites as we could squeeze in. Megan had her first experiences with a subway with the very busy, but useful Paris Métro. She was the only one of us not to be reversed and turned-around using the street and subway map. We visited Notre-Dame de Paris (a must for Casey who is a major fan of Hugo’s The Hunchback of Notre-Dame), explored the Renaissance and Egyptian sections the Louvre Museum, walked the Avenue des Champs–Élysées from Place de la Concorde to the Arc de Triomphe de l’Étoile, Casey and Megan added a “Love Lock” to the Pont des Arts bridge, and enjoyed a chautauqua-type tour of the Eiffel Tower visiting the historic military radio room in the foundation and getting an “insider’s” view of the elevator system with a view paris from above the second level’s Restaurant le Jules Verne.

Next venue on our itinerary: Marseille. A first for all of us.

Part 1: Paris with Casey and Megan: Notre Dame, Palace of Versaille, Eiffel Tower, Love Locks, and the Louvre

Part 2: Marseille with Casey and Megan: Train Strike, Chateau d’If, Vieux-Port, Phare de Sainte Marie, and Notre-Dame-de-la-Garde

Part 3: Rome with Casey and Megan: RyanAir, Pantheon, Colesseum, Roman Forum, and Trevi Fountain

Part 4: Vatican City with Casey and Megan: Vatican Museum, Sistine Chapel, Necropolis Tour, Saint Peter’s Basilica, and Saint Peter’s Square

Part 5: Carcassonne with Casey and Megan: La Cité De Carcassonne, Château de Montségur, Mirepoix

Paris: The Louvre, “Love Locks,” Arc de Triomphe, and Moulin Rouge

July 26, 2013July 26, 2013 | Alan

Off and rolling to the Louvre with pre-paid tickets in hand. The Musée du Louvre (the Louvre Museum or simply The Louvre) is one of the world’s largest museums with nearly 35,000 objects from prehistory to the 21st century exhibited over 652,300 square feet. Located on the Right Bank of the River Seine in the 1st arrondissement, the Louvre receives more than 8 million visitors a year. The Louvre is the world’s most visited museum.

Like the Smithsonian Institute, it would take days to see everything in the Louvre, we elected to see specific galleries in order to see more of the rest of Paris. That makes a good reason to return to the Louvre again (and again . . . and again.)

Alan, Tracy, Liz, and Adam in front of the Louvre pyramid.

What hasn’t been said about one of the world’s seminal museums that is located in a former royal palace and holds many of the world’s iconic pieces of art? The Louvre is amazing in its depth of art, artists, media, and history.

After accessing the Louvre’s entrance through the underground Carousel du Louvre shopping mall (with a minor delay when security screening were briefly bewildered by Adam’s juggling balls), Adam was our guide through the Louvre. So hard to narrow down choices, but included in our visit was (of course) the Mona Lisa, the Winged Victory of Samothrace, the Venus de Milo, and the Code of Hammurabi. We visited the art of Ancient Greece, Mesopotamia, and the Renaissance.

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Adam and his fiancée Liz participated in Europe’s growing “Love Lock” phenomenon. Spreading across Europe is the new tradition of leave a padlock, often engraved or marked with lovers’ names to a famous landmark. On the Pont des Arts bridge across the River Seine, Adam left a lock to commemorate his and Liz’s visit to the “City of Lights.”

Adam putting a lock on the Pont des Arts bridge to memorialize his and Liz's trip to Paris. — Adam putting a lock on the Pont des Arts bridge to memorialize his and Liz’s trip to Paris.

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Now the Métro to the Avenue des Champs-Élysées, Paris’ most famous street. A cross between Rodeo Drive, Fifth Avenue, Regent Street, and Saville Row; lined with chestnut trees leading west to the Arc de Triomphe de l’Étoile. The Arc de Triomphe (Triumphal Arch) is dedicated to those who fought and died for France in the French Revolution and Napoleonic Wars with the names of all French victories and generals inscribed on its surfaces. Beneath the Arch is the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier from World War I. Access to the Arc de Triomphe is by underground passage under the traffic circle surrounding Place Charles De Gaulle.

Tracy, Liz, and Adam under the Arc de Triomphe and in Front of the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier

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End of a long day and back to the Montmartre district for dinner. We tour down the Boulevard de Clichy and see both elegant and dive establishments along the lane. We have dinner across the street from the famous Moulin Rouge (Red Windmill) cabaret, famous for the Can-Can, Toulouse-Lautrec, and the 2001 Academy Award winning movie of the same name.

Liz and Adam in front of the Moulin Rouge

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After dinner it was off to see the view of Paris from Sacré-Cœur Basilica at the top of Butte Montmartre . All in all a great day for everyone with frequent stops along the way to sample some of the wonderful Parisian wines at local bistros throughout the city.

Paris: CDG, Notre-Dame, Les Invalides, and Eiffel Tower

July 26, 2013June 29, 2014 | Alan

We needed to pick up Adam and Liz from Aéroport Paris–Charles de Gaulle (Charles de Gaulle – Paris Airport – CDG). We were off on the Métro de Paris (subway) to the RER (Réseau Express Régional – Regional Express Network) “B” line to its final stop at the International Terminal at CDG. The airport is a city unto itself, it is the seventh busiest airport in the world, the second busiest in Europe, and handles in excess of 61 million passengers annually. Our fear was that we had never met anyone arriving at CDG before and had visions of Adam and Liz wandering in “airport limbo” for hours until we could locate them. However the airport staff was very helpful and we simply waited at the arrival gate for Delta for Adam and Liz to clear Customs and Passport control. Thirty minutes after their plane set down we saw their happy, jet-lagged faces.

There are many approaches to dealing with jet-lag. Adam and Liz wanted to power through the day. So back on the RER and Métro to the hotel to drop off bags and then back on the Métro to Île de la Cité, the island the River Seine, to explore Cathédrale Notre-Dame de Paris (Notre-Dame Cathedral).

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Notre-Dame is celebrating its 850 year anniversary. Cathédrale Notre-Dame de Paris (French for “Our Lady of Paris” – Notre-Dame Cathedral) is a historic Roman Catholic Marian cathedral located on the Île de la Cité. The cathedral is widely considered to be one of the finest examples of French Gothic architecture and is among the largest and well-known churches in the world. The cathedral’s treasury is notable for its reliquary which houses some of Catholicism’s most important relics including the purported Crown of Thorns, a fragment of the True Cross, and one of the Holy Nails.

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The Cathedral’s stained glass windows were amazing and the quality of the colors has to be experienced to be believed. The Flying Buttresses on the exterior walls were graceful and added to the beauty of the exterior. We could have spent days exploring the architecture and art inside Cathédrale Notre-Dame de Paris.

After a quick lunch and several glasses of wine to fortify ourselves, we started walking along the Left Bank of the Seine heading toward Les Invalides. In retrospect the Métro would have been faster and easier on our feet, but every block held amazing architecture or public art.

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Finally reaching L’Hôtel National des Invalides (The National Residence of the Invalids), informally known simply as Les Invalides, we find a large park and series of buildings dedicated to French Military history and veteran. The complex’s name comes from its original purpose as a hospital and retirement home for war veterans. There are three museums on the grounds, the Musée de l’Armée (Army Museum), Musée des Plans-Reliefs (museum with three-dimensional models of battles), and the Musée d’Histoire Contemporaine (Museum of Contemporary History which started as the Library-Museum of the War.) Located on the site are the graves for many of France’s war heroes, including Napoleon Bonaparte.

Alan, Tracy, Liz, and Adam in front of L'Hôtel National des Invalides — Alan, Tracy, Liz, and Adam in front of L’Hôtel National des Invalides

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From Les Invalides we could see La Tour Eiffel (the Eiffel Tower) through the surrounding buildings, our next stop. We had made reservations to go up into the tower for this evening as it was the only time available. Reservations fill very quickly to go to up to the observation areas.

Eiffel Tower seen from the 7th arrondissement

The wrought iron Eiffel Tower is named for engineer Gustave Eiffel who built the tower as an attraction to the 1889 World’s Fair. Originally intended to be a temporary attraction, but it quickly became the iconic symbol of France and Paris that remains today. The Tower is the tallest structure in Paris and the second tallest in France. At 1,063 feet it is taller that the Washington Monument (555 feet) and Space Needle (605 feet) and was the tallest structure in the world for 41 years until the Chrysler Building was completed in New York in 1930. (With its current communication antenna the Eiffel Tower is currently 17 feet taller than the Chrysler Building.) “Impressive” and “awe-inspiring” are perfect descriptions as the tower is much larger than we expected. We arrived at twilight to be able to watch night fall over the “City of Light” from the observation platform. At 11 pm we were also treated with light show of lights sparkling all over the Eiffel Tower.

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Adam and Liz had by now been awake about 48 hours straight, so it was now time to head to the Métro to get them some well deserved rest. Passing dozens of unlicensed souvenir hawkers, each offering the same wonderfully cheesy, glowing, blinking Eiffel Tower models, we finally made it back to our hotel in the Montmartre district. The “last chance to get a blinking Eiffel Tower” had already become the humorous theme to the kids’ trip. It would continue until they left, with a comment about maybe being able to get one of the most desired souvenirs in Paris before they got on the plane to return home.

Paris: Travel and Sacré-Cœur Basilica

July 25, 2013June 29, 2014 | Alan

Adam and Liz were flying into Aéroport Paris–Charles de Gaulle (Charles De Gaulle Airport – Paris) so we needed to travel to the other side of France to meet them. Tracy and I elected to not get a car when we moved to France and because we were traveling with Kiara the Chihuahua using RyanAir or EasyJet (the discount airlines) was not an option. So we made use of SNCF’s (Société Nationale des Chemins de fer Français – French National Railroad Company) regional trains and the newly available Ouigo high-speed train. The Ouigo is a subsidiary of SNCF and is basically a stripped TGV (Train à Grande Vitesse) high-speed train without a club car designed to compete with the discount airlines. The trains happily accept Kiara which made her and us very happy. The Ouigo was comfortable and quiet and we enjoyed a very rural view of France that reminded us of Kansas and Nebraska with lots of grain fields and vineyards.

Another reason for the Ouigo’s discount fare is its use of secondary train stations. We arrived at the train station at Marne-la-Vallée – Chessy outside Paris only to realize that Marne-la-Vallée is the station for Disneyland-Paris. We hadn’t realized that walking out the station door would put us immediately at the entrance to Disneyland. We caught the RER (Réseau Express Régional – Regional Express Network) commuter train from Marne-la-Vallée to Paris and then the famous Paris Métropolitain (subway) to our hotel in the Montmartre district of Paris in the 18th arrondissement, a Right Bank arts neighborhood.

We arrived a day earlier than Adam and Liz’s arrival, so we did an evening stroll to visit Sacré-Cœur Basilica. Located at the summit of the Butte Montmartre, the highest point in the Paris, the Basilica of the Sacred Heart of Paris, more commonly called Sacré-Cœur Basilica, is a Roman Catholic church and minor basilica, dedicated to the Sacred Heart of Jesus. Built of white travertine stone, the Basilica is brilliantly illuminated and stunning at night.

The Basilica complex has a large garden area and a fountain. There is an amazing panoramic view overlooking Paris from the Basilica and garden. The Basilica complex is a favorite meeting place for young people with more than a hundred on the grounds socializing as we explored. To reach the top of Butte Montmartre there is a steep series of stairs with over 300 steps or a funicular railway. The funicular has two parallel tracks with one car on each: one car going up counter-balancing the other car coming down. In a minute and a half the funicular travels 354 horizontal feet and climbs the 35% gradient 118 vertical feet to the top of Butte Montmartre. It is well worth the cost of one Métro ticket to enjoy a ride to the top. The funicular transports about two million passengers each year.

Tracy and Kiara on the Montmartre Funicular

With Sacré-Cœur Basilica around the corner from our hotel enjoyed the beauty of the Basilica on the hill above us and we later returned to share the sight with Adam and Liz.