Paris 3: walking and walking

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Day 2: Musee de Louvre, Notre Dame, Siene, Latin Quarter, Place St. Michelle, St. Chapelle, Conciergerie, Centre Pompidu (Museum of modern art).

We did not request a wake-up call, but we certainly got one from our next-door neighbors. They were slamming closet doors and moving stuff around and it did not help that the walls were paper-thin. It was time to get up anyways (8:30 AM). We got ready, all bundled up and headed for the Louvre (again) with a short stop at the corner bakery (conveniently placed in front of the metro stop).

We went back to the Louvre to finish looking at all that straight-from-the-art-history-books artwork. This time we had to go in through the side entrance using our Museum Pass. The glass pyramid at the Louvre was designed by I. M. Pei, the same architect that designed the IU art Museum (just throwing that out there for Bloomington folks, haha). We walked around for hours, and aided by the museum floor map and a Paris museum art book, we found most of the “must-sees” of the Louvre. Of course, the “must-sees” vary depending on who you ask, but hey! if they print it on the map and have special signage for it, it MUST be special. We had lunch at a museum café, and headed out towards the next thing on the list: Cathedrale Notre-Dame de Paris.

We walked along the Siene towards Notre-Dame, which sits on Ile de la Cite (an island on the river). Since that was the starting point of another one of Rick Steves’ audiowalks, we decided to give it a try. We looked at the outside of the cathedral and then went in. Inside it was very impressive, with huge walls and stained glass, and lots of people whispering in different languages. It was more “tower of Babel” than Notre-Dame. Outside, we thought about going up to the observation deck to get a view of Paris and photograph the gargoyles made famous by Victor Hugo’s Hunchback of Notre-Dame. But discouraged by the extremely long line to get in (we calculated at least 1.5 hrs. and the Museum Pass did not provide special treatment at this location), we headed to the next sight, thinking we would come back to it if there was time later. There wasn’t and we didn’t.

We walked a bit more on Ile de la Cite, to the Deportation Memorial behind Notre-Dame (to honor the 200,000 french victims of the Nazi concentration camps in WWII). Still following the audiowalk, we walked along the Siene to the Latin quarter (name that not because of the salsa sounds, but because way back in the day they spoke latin around here because of the university). There are a lot of little shops and little streets around here. Also lots of cafes. Walking and walking we ended up at Place St. Michelle, where in 1968 students took over the square declaring an independent state (they later caved in).

Following the audiowalk was pretty fun but having no specific map for the walk made it a bit difficult. We got disoriented a few times, specially around the Latin Quarter.

Next stop was St. Chapelle, a very old church located in the courtyard of France’s supreme court, so we had to pass through security to get it. The museum pass saved the day here as well, putting us in front of the line and keeping us out of the rain. Here’s a bit of history for you: this church was built in 1248 for Luis IX, and it took only 5 years to build (very quickly for the times). It has 2 floors, so we had to climb more stairs (we were alredy very tired at this point). On the inside of the top floor, the walls are full of stained glass windows depicting stories from the bible from the creation to the coming of Christ and the end of the world. It was quite impressive! It was a shame there was almost no light outside to get a proper view.

Right next to St. Michelle is the Conciergerie, a prison where people sentenced to the guillotine were kept, including Marie Antoniette. By the time we got there, they were not letting more people in (it closed in 1/2 hour), so we peeked through a window and decided to come back to it. We did, but again, it was closed, so it must have been fate.

The tour ended at Pont Neuf (the oldest bridge in Paris, and that is an accomplishment in a city where everything is old!). so we planned our next destination on our own (and based on what is open late). So the clear winner was Center Pompidu (funny name, haha). It houses the Museum of modern art, and a few other temporary exhibit galleries. Free entry with the museum pass. Great!. Getting there involved more walking, so after looking for it walking in the rain, we had to warm up and do another Paris “must”: sit down at a café and have, well, café (café au lait, to be precise). We did, and threw in some sweet crepes (by the way, the coffee was more expensive that the crepes). Armed with more energy and a bit warmer, we were ready to keep looking for the allusive Pompidu, which happened to be just around the corner. Part of the permanent collection area was closed, but we got to see a big amount of modern artwork. The building is huge and very modern itself, with glass walls, and the escalators running inside clear tubes through the outside front of the building. In the “museum timeline”, the Pompidu sits in the end (Louvre, d’Orsay, Pompidu).

We called it a day after Pompidu, headed back to the hotel and ate some carry out Chinese food (from around the corner near the hotel). We had big plans for the next day. the last day of 2006.