I have a problem. I have all these awesome pictures, and stories to go with them, and I want to share them with all of you. But I think I have a solution. Take, for example, the Arc de Triomphe. Alyson and I went here on our second day in Paris, our first full day of touring around. This was the day we went to the Louvre, walked through the Jardin des Tuileries, saw the Musee d'Orangerie, walked up the Champs Elysees, got really hungry in the most expensive part of Paris and found a pizza place that sold us cheese and pepperoni pizza for under $20 (each), and climbed the Arc de Triomphe. We also went to the Eiffel Tower, but you've already seen some of those pictures.
The point is, here are some of the pictures Alyson and I took:
http://picasaweb.google.com/max.f.brugger/ArcDeTriomphe?feat=directlink
The museum pass we bought got us to the top for free. There were some incredible views of the Eiffel Tower, the business sector of the city, the Tour Montparnasse, the Sacre Coeur in Montmartre, and the Champs-Elysees. The Champs-Elysees was the expensive street we walked up -- beautiful and clean, but lined with the priciest of the pricy Dolce & Gabbana & Gucci etc. We really kind of freaked out when we realized we'd be eating there. I never thought I'd be so happy to pay about $14 for a pizza!
Thursday, August 13, 2009
Wednesday, July 29, 2009
Travel Day!
Alyson is already on her flight home, and I'm about to get kicked off of the 1 hour Internet pass I got from our hotel. I just wanted to say thank you to everyone who's been following our blog; it's been great to share our adventures and pictures with you.
After this point, whenever Aly or I post pictures or stories it will be of course from our homes in Portland or Corvallis. However, there is a lot more to show, so I hope you'll keep reading. Some of the future highlights -- the Louvre, the Musee d'Orsay, Notre Dame, the Promenade Plantee, Paris from the streets and Paris from above, Food, the Gardens of Versailles, and the Jardin du Luxembourg.
Also, by midnight of the 31st, we will have uploaded many of our pictures to the Picasa Web Album that corresponds with this blog, so be sure to look at those pictures. I'll put a reminder here at that time, too.
Again, it's been a great trip and thank you for following us along!
After this point, whenever Aly or I post pictures or stories it will be of course from our homes in Portland or Corvallis. However, there is a lot more to show, so I hope you'll keep reading. Some of the future highlights -- the Louvre, the Musee d'Orsay, Notre Dame, the Promenade Plantee, Paris from the streets and Paris from above, Food, the Gardens of Versailles, and the Jardin du Luxembourg.
Also, by midnight of the 31st, we will have uploaded many of our pictures to the Picasa Web Album that corresponds with this blog, so be sure to look at those pictures. I'll put a reminder here at that time, too.
Again, it's been a great trip and thank you for following us along!
Musee de l'Orangerie
After we saw the Louvre, we were a little art-exhausted. We walked across the Jardin des Tuileries (the royal gardens) and sat for a while and decided we had just enough art-stamina in us for the Musee de l'Orangerie. We didn't regret it.
The top floor of the museum is made up of two white, oval rooms, with benches along the middle, and, in each, four of Monet's waterlily paintings stretching all around you. They progress through the seasons, showing the same scene in different lights; delicate hues of purple, orange, and greens playing across the water and the reeds.
On the lower level, there is some great impressionistic art, and even a modern exhibit. I think we will come back to that when we talk about the Musee d' Orsay. Instead, I'd like to include one of my favorite parts of the Spring waterlilies painting, with the tree.
The top floor of the museum is made up of two white, oval rooms, with benches along the middle, and, in each, four of Monet's waterlily paintings stretching all around you. They progress through the seasons, showing the same scene in different lights; delicate hues of purple, orange, and greens playing across the water and the reeds.
On the lower level, there is some great impressionistic art, and even a modern exhibit. I think we will come back to that when we talk about the Musee d' Orsay. Instead, I'd like to include one of my favorite parts of the Spring waterlilies painting, with the tree.
Montmartre, Sacre Coeur, and DALI
Montmartre reminded me heavily of Saint-Flour. The winding streets and sedate avenues where two could walk (mostly) away from the other tourists.
I could have curled up there for days.
But the reason we got up early that day was to see Sacre Coeur:
one of the most recently built basilicas in Paris. It was built as a sort of penance for the events of the Franco-Prussian war, and a group of monks and nuns serves here, perpetually observing the Blessed Sacrament. No pictures are allowed inside, and visitors are to remain completely silent. It was a much different experience than Notre Dame, which we'll post about soon, where the focus is firmly off of religion and onto the staggering history of the place.
Also in Montmartre: the DALI museum. We had to go, because it's, you know, Dali. Everybody's favorite mustachioed post-modernist! And quite the collection:
I could have curled up there for days.But the reason we got up early that day was to see Sacre Coeur:
one of the most recently built basilicas in Paris. It was built as a sort of penance for the events of the Franco-Prussian war, and a group of monks and nuns serves here, perpetually observing the Blessed Sacrament. No pictures are allowed inside, and visitors are to remain completely silent. It was a much different experience than Notre Dame, which we'll post about soon, where the focus is firmly off of religion and onto the staggering history of the place.Also in Montmartre: the DALI museum. We had to go, because it's, you know, Dali. Everybody's favorite mustachioed post-modernist! And quite the collection:
Le Tour Eiffel
We finally made it.
After one night of riding the Metro in circles, and another of fumbling our way around the stops that seemed nearest, we finally wound our way along the Seine and, there she was.
The view up the Eiffel Tower is incredible. The view from the Eiffel Tower is even more incredible.
The top isn't as romantic as everyone maybe thinks it should be because it's so crowded, even at night. But it certainly was beautiful. And lots of people are willing to take your picture!
It seemed more romantic on the first level, where there aren't so many people and you're free to look out at the Champs de Mars (the long lawns leading up to the Eiffel Tower) but we wanted to rush out for the twinkly light show at 11pm. Alyson took a nice picture of the white lights that sparkle the edifice; I just played with my camera. Enjoy!
After one night of riding the Metro in circles, and another of fumbling our way around the stops that seemed nearest, we finally wound our way along the Seine and, there she was.The view up the Eiffel Tower is incredible. The view from the Eiffel Tower is even more incredible.
The top isn't as romantic as everyone maybe thinks it should be because it's so crowded, even at night. But it certainly was beautiful. And lots of people are willing to take your picture!
It seemed more romantic on the first level, where there aren't so many people and you're free to look out at the Champs de Mars (the long lawns leading up to the Eiffel Tower) but we wanted to rush out for the twinkly light show at 11pm. Alyson took a nice picture of the white lights that sparkle the edifice; I just played with my camera. Enjoy!
Monday, July 27, 2009
Paris Traffic & Bordeaux
At last we arrived in Paris, the world's most romantic city. It rained on us. In my mind the best part of this trip has been the rain and the lightning and thunder.
After checking into our hotel we went to a restaurant named after our hotel. It was six PM. Silly Americans -- dinner doesn't start until 8 PM and you cannot enter until 8 PM. It was a wonderful authentic French dinner. We had a Bordeaux with dinner. I was thinking a lot about Bordeaux at dinner and decided it is the perfect wine to go with everything, sort of. Bordeaux is so smooth, it can take the spice out of Thai food, but if you pair it with something too bland it will overwhelm it. Bordeaux is definitely strong, but at the end of the day I don't think you can be disappointed.
Before dinner, to waste time, we wandered around and stopped at a traffic circle and I took far too many pictures of the monument in the center, but the traffic really amused me. If people drove the way they do in Paris in the US, they would be called aggressive drivers, but everyone here drives that way. Drivers in Paris drive with an incredible amount of faith -- faith in everyone around them, the motorcycles and mopeds that slide around cars, the bicyclists that have a separate lane until they cross intersections, and the other drivers who are likely to ignore lights and push through. There's order and beauty to this chaos.
There are no lanes and, after watching drivers for a while, I figured out the movement pattern. There's one line they stop at for some traffic, and then they pull forward while waiting for the next, and then even if the light is red, but no traffic, they go.
Faith... an interesting way to drive.
After checking into our hotel we went to a restaurant named after our hotel. It was six PM. Silly Americans -- dinner doesn't start until 8 PM and you cannot enter until 8 PM. It was a wonderful authentic French dinner. We had a Bordeaux with dinner. I was thinking a lot about Bordeaux at dinner and decided it is the perfect wine to go with everything, sort of. Bordeaux is so smooth, it can take the spice out of Thai food, but if you pair it with something too bland it will overwhelm it. Bordeaux is definitely strong, but at the end of the day I don't think you can be disappointed.
Before dinner, to waste time, we wandered around and stopped at a traffic circle and I took far too many pictures of the monument in the center, but the traffic really amused me. If people drove the way they do in Paris in the US, they would be called aggressive drivers, but everyone here drives that way. Drivers in Paris drive with an incredible amount of faith -- faith in everyone around them, the motorcycles and mopeds that slide around cars, the bicyclists that have a separate lane until they cross intersections, and the other drivers who are likely to ignore lights and push through. There's order and beauty to this chaos.
There are no lanes and, after watching drivers for a while, I figured out the movement pattern. There's one line they stop at for some traffic, and then they pull forward while waiting for the next, and then even if the light is red, but no traffic, they go.
Faith... an interesting way to drive.
Sunday, July 26, 2009
Surrender Museum in France
There's a joke there, somewhere. But really, on the tourist maps, it boldly proclaims "Surrender Museum." Now, of course, this actually denotes Eisenhower's headquarters in France and the historic room where the Nazi generals signed papers declaring the surrender of their armies, after mounting defeats from both the Russians and the West. Whew!
And Alyson has collected definitive proof that there are, in fact, French military heroes, or 31 pictures of honorable French men in uniform, or pictures of nicely-dressed mannequins that may have born some semblance to the dashing figures cut by those tiny little guys on the horizon, already running away. Anyway, the 31 photos of proof mysteriously disappeared. Only one remained, for the sakes of the vanity of the author:
And Alyson has collected definitive proof that there are, in fact, French military heroes, or 31 pictures of honorable French men in uniform, or pictures of nicely-dressed mannequins that may have born some semblance to the dashing figures cut by those tiny little guys on the horizon, already running away. Anyway, the 31 photos of proof mysteriously disappeared. Only one remained, for the sakes of the vanity of the author:
Subscribe to:
Comments (Atom)