Paris, France

under the base of the tower

Thank you Paris - this is my calf - hurt while taking a photo of Notre Dame - which I will not even dignify with a posting it's photo.

Lollipops in the shape of the tower caught my eye for a photo.
The Louve - you walk into the glass pryamid to enter.
Tour De France fans - go go go
spectacular appitizers - oh my Lord how great they were!
Moroccan dinner - A vegetarian delight for me.

the Arc at night
T-Shirts everywhere
The whole world loves Bush
me - under the tower
us - away and in front of the tower



a great sketch artist
The white church on the hill an artists palate - i just liked it
The jam my mom used to buy - on the left
Tour De France 'chase cars' were everywhere

wanna buy a T-shirt? how bout' a scarf or a hat?
Lovely French perfume for sale
The artist community - this really went on for blocks
Part of the stairway we climbed
he looks unhappy - but played delightfully

Busted down and broken all in two (my calf)
But you never thought this would happen to you
Wake up, stumble, trip and fall
You had so much and now you've lost it all.
How could you do it
It's not like you
To be the one to lose
Why did you do it
it's not like you
But I'll be around for you.

(The Bangles)

PARIS FRANCE

A place you dream of going to right? Romance … ahhhh, love – crepes – perhaps you might have dreamt of sipping a coffee at a sidewalk café while people watching. Well – Paris could have been all of those things to me … but instead Paris kicked me and tossed me aside like unwanted piece gristle on a plate. It totally sucked for me– there was the Louvre which was a wonderful way to spend an afternoon –looking at the artwork was unsurpassed by nothing I have ever seen before - long corridors filled with paintings done hundreds of years ago – rooms of more art and golden trinkets – The Mona Lisa - and security guard sleeping with his mouth gaping open – breathtakingly awesome - , but I hobbled along looking at art because two days earlier I hurt myself – or Notre Dame hurt me – I’m not sure which to blame. Our sightseeing bus was right in front of Notre Dame – I (tourist woman of photography) wanted to stand up on my seat (bad move) and take a photo over the front wind shield so I could manage a snap without an unobstructed view. When I stood up I caught my calf on the back of the plastic bus seat and as I heaved my body to an upright standing position my leg in all of its humidity and stickiness was dragged in slow motion scraping against the back of the plastic bus seat. I felt it instantly – a welt was forming fast and hard – ICE ICE I needed some ice for my leg. The streets were jam packed with people and I knew I would not find ice before the bus took off. So I did what any self respecting woman would do – I bitched a little, then pushed my sun glasses up on my nose and I cried – long sad tears of pain. This my fellow readers really hurt badly – me the queen of bruises managed to get the biggest bruise of my life in romantic Paris. For a week – every step I took felt like someone was slapping my calf. What can you expect from traveling for so long? I was bound to get hurt a little bit and if this was as bad as it gets – then God bless me.
So, as for Paris – we had a hotel room with a view of the Eiffel Tower … and if you pressed your face to the window and crooked your neck to the left you could see the Arch De Tromphe. At night this was an awesome sight – the tower does this bizarre strobe light show in red, white and blue – a little obnoxious but in the same way cool – a quite bit over the top but when in France right? The city itself does not have any skyscrapers – the tower is the tallest. Outside of Paris there are tall buildings, but in the city they have kept the ambiance of old Paris – there are no “factories” just businesses. The Arc is not what I expected – it is situated in the center of a driving round about. To walk to the Arc you go underground through a tunnel and come up in the center of the street. The Arc was larger than I thought it would be, people were sitting on the steps, having a picnic, snapping photos and looking at the eternal flame that burns in the center of the Arc on the ground. There were red, white and blue banners fluttering in the breeze and it was had relief carvings all over the walls. We sat on at the base and ate cheese, bread and tomatoes – so we sort of picnicked at the Arc – oh how not Parisian.
Ahhh – the few days that we were in Paris was also coinciding with the ending of the “Tour De France” which ended right at the Arc, which was right down the street from our hotel. The streets were filled with people who had come just to see the race end. Vendors were selling the traditional yellow t-shirts – of course we bought two of them for Jennifer’s friends who are bike enthusiasts. But in having the race in Paris when we were there kind of put a semi damper on our plans – there were places we could not walk because it was taped off for the race – so going to the Louvre required a taxi ride because we could not walk there easily.
The architecture in Paris was outstanding – think old, grayish white washed old old buildings – most of which have crests over the doorways of winged angels, or tassels with bows and floral motifs. All of this is so old and so well preserved – Hello French people do you know how beautiful your city is or do you take it for granite? Winged gold horse statues lined a street – I could never ever see this in the USA – simply elegant and beautiful. Me, in all of this glorious beauty – walking around with a bruise on my calf as big as an eggplant and also the same color – what’s a woman to do? Oh, and as far as the French people go – you always hear stories on how they are stuck up and pretend to not speak English – this was not the case at all for us, the people were very nice to us, ultra helpful and tried to speak English whenever they could.
At our daughter Lyndsey’s request we walked up to the church where the movie “Amalie” was filmed. (she later confessed that she never made it as far as the church – but we are very happy that we did) The area is called Montmartre. It was totally an uphill hike, she said there was an awesome artist community up there and we could not miss it while in Paris – so we walked and walked and sweated and drank water and hiked up a huge enormously long and tall stairway all the way up to the tippy top of the area and we found this huge artist community. Once at the top we discovered we could have taken a funiculare (tram) to the top – oh well, we burned calories right? There were hundreds of aspiring artists all vying to draw a caricature of you for the mere price of 50 euro! Yikes! Some artists were really excellent, while others sketched a gross misrepresentation of the recipient. At a quaint café people were being serenaded by a Frenchman playing the accordion – I had to get a photo. From the top of the hill, by the church you could look out and see a panoramic view of the entire city of Paris – we stood there with our eyes scanning the horizon – finding the tower, the Arc – looking at all of the beauty that we had traveled so far to see. Wonderful – breathtaking, superb – this was Paris – my body was standing on French soil, my eyes were surveying the French countryside – how many others have seen this same view? How many others will never see this view? I was very happy in that moment – standing, not talking and just looking. We headed back downhill, passing a crepe stand – their griddle hot and waiting for a customer to order a Nutella crepe – a candy store displayed candies and jars of jelly that I remember my mother having in her pantry – she was always a woman with a good taste for sweets – I took a photo of the jams and thought of my mother for a moment.
The prices in France were so out of line expensive that after spending 10 euro for two cups of morning coffee we invested in a hot water boiler and made coffee in our room with our French press that we brought from home.
I tried my darndest to buy some French fashion – but it was either too expensive – I couldn’t figure out my size, or I didn’t like it. So I took many photos of the fancy pants designer items and perfumes – and window displays for my friend Lynn. I did wind up buying a camas bag in the airport that said “Paris and has the tower on it which I am currently using as a beach bag).
The COOLEST thing that happened to us was that one night we were very hungry for dinner – we were combing the streets looking at menus and nothing appealed to both of us – so we grumbled as we walked along and then it happened – we came upon a restaurant that had a large platter of appetizers that looked mouthwatering pleasing to both of us – we asked about it and were told it was a “complementary” appetizer to the Moroccan food which they served – SOLD! For the first time, we didn’t even look at prices – if a place is going to give you a platter of appetizers that’s all we needed to say yes! I will have to insert a photo of this bounty of flavorsome delights because I simply cannot find the words to describe how good it looked and tasted. Our waiter was gracious – we ordered a decanter of Moroccan wine and when it was completed – well he kept pouring us wine at no charge. Our dinner was served in a copper tandori oven - the weather was giving us a great show that night also – it was raining lightly but there was a lighting storm that lit up the sky in quick bold bright flashes. We sat and ate our Moroccan under a canvas awning while the rain was falling all around us. Dave had a variety of savory meats and I had the vegetarian wonder of yummiyness. Our gracious waiter poured Nora a oui oui bit too much wine – thankfully our hotel was right across the street. The next morning we packed up and took a bus to the airport – Look out Venice here we come! Paris was good, not excellent, but good. I think if it wasn’t for my leg getting battered and bruised I would have liked it far better – but all in all – It was a great adventure.

Bon Chance!