Another early morning to try to beat the museum crowds. This morning’s expedition was to the Musée de l’Orangerie. Located in the gardens outside the Louvre, this building was once – as its name implies – the place where the Tullieres Palace (which was burned down by the Commune in 1871) grew citrus fruits. We started on the lowest level and saw many of the same artists as yesterday – Renior, Cezane, VanGogh, Picasso – before realizing we should probably scurry upstairs to see the main attraction before the crowds grew too large!

Behold! Monet’s Water Lillies. These gigantic paintings (6.5 feet tall and nearly 300 feet long each!) take up two large oval rooms. A sign at the entrance says that Monet himself designed the rooms (including the natural skylights) to be a meditative space enjoyed in silence. So we did. And it was lovely 🙂

After the L’Orangerie, we were feeling a little hungry, so we stopped at a cute little Boulangerie for a couple of sandwiches, a cappuccino, and a piece of a galette. Ray’d been eyeing these “King Galettes” for a couple of days – they are these huge, expensive cakes enjoyed specifically for Epiphany. We grabbed just a small one and it was delicious! We enjoyed our treats in a nearby park and were tickled that it happened to be a park just outside a church whose steeples we’d seen at the end of our street at our Airbnb for days and couldn’t figure out what it was!

Refreshed, we headed over to the Rodin Museum. This former mansion (which I just learned was the original destination for the Water Lilies paintings we’d just seen!) is dedicated to the sculptor Auguste Rodin. Inside the museum were a number of rooms looking at his process and showing early mockups and tests for final works. It was fascinating to see the process “in action” so to speak. There were a number of pieces where the didactics explained how one particular sculpture was adapted a bit to be turned into another one we would see later.

The outside of the museum was lovely as well and contained many full-size sculptures. We were even able to see a version of “The Gates of Hell” (inspired by Dante’s Inferno) which we should’ve been able to see at the Musee d’Orsay yesterday but it was out for cleaning.

After a rest at home for a bit, we ventured out once more. This time, to go SHOPPING! We had a couple of things we wanted to be sure to grab before we left the city, so tonight’s as good a time as any!

And that was pretty much our day! I have to say, I’m pretty impressed with how much we’ve been able to see, enjoy and do without wearing ourselves out too much – or contracting COVID, fingers crossed! We have to test tomorrow in order to make our flight home. We discovered that the pharmacy two doors down from our place does antigen testing with a quick turnaround, so fingers crossed that we test negative and that the test “works” for the airlines! More tomorrow!

Today we visited the Musée D’Orsay! The collection at this museum focuses on impressionist art, containing many pieces from Rodin, Monet, Manet, Rembrandt, Gauguin and Van Gogh.

The timeline for the works in this museum sit as the missing link between the earlier pieces at the Louvre and the later, modern art at the Pompidou. If you were trying to teach art history to an alien, and first showed them the Louvre, then showed them the Pompidou, they would have many questions.

The building itself is a former train station. Compared to the palatial hallways of the Louvre, the Musée D’Orsay is bright and airy. It’s much smaller, as well. The risk of getting lost here is non-existent, and it’s entirely possible to see everything in a day. There are a handful of galleries arranged linearly on different floors, surrounding an open air sculpture exhibit.

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We didn’t take a lot of photos (Jessie’s phone had died, and I must have been off my game), but just to mention a few stand outs:

• Their sculptures, especially those by Rodin. I really enjoyed the use of textures, motion, and negative space.
• The Van Gogh exhibit: There were so many iconic pieces stuffed into one room, including an earlier version of Starry Night
• The Gauguin exhibit: I didn’t know much about him, but it was fascinating to see his transformation from impressionism to his work in Tahiti and how that made way for cubism.
• The Art Nouveau furnishings / decorations exhibit had some cool chairs.

After the museum, we walked back, had a nap, then went out for dinner at the neighborhood brasserie, Le Roussillon. This was the first place we went to that could make an Old Fashioned!

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Today was a pretty low-key day, due mostly to me just not feeling super great (tummy stuff – no COVID, hopefully!). We started by going to Rue Cler to try some items from a traiteur we’d been “introduced to” by Rick Steves on our audio tour last night. A traiteur is essentially a deli. But, unfortunately, the one we’d been eyeing was closed today, so we did a hodgepodge of cheese, bread, bakery items and fruit. We met a nice family from Pittsburgh at the fruit stand – we were both eyeing a large tray of strawberries. Neither of us wanted the whole thing, so we bought the tray and offered them a couple 🙂

We headed back “home” to eat and let my stomach settle while watching movie, after which we intended to head over to the Rodin museum, but the gardens (the best part) were closed :/ At least it was a lovely night for a walk!

We decided to meander down towards where the boats take off for river tours. Once we got there, however, we learned that they only depart every 2.5 hours or so and we didn’t really want to wait around. I’d done one when I was here last time and Ray pointed out that the more we can avoid people leading up to our flight, the better. #NoCOVID! But again, a lovely night for a walk regardless!

So, we headed on back to our tiny AirBnb. I had some work stuff I needed to catch up on, so I did that. Ray ordered us some delicious ramen (and a very unique drink!) and we’re just taking it easy – despite that I am now feeling 100% 😉

We got up at the inconceivably early time of 7:30, which gave us enough time to hit the snooze button a few times, eat some breakfast, and a make the 30 minute walk to the Louvre. The sun wasn’t even up yet, and we were supposed to be? Inconceivable. On our walk, we saw children being walked to school by their parents. What kind of maniacs make their kids get up that early?

Our sacrifice paid off though. Getting to the Louvre at 9:00 made us some of the first people of the day. We were able to avoid most crowds. A Rick Steves’ audio guide brought us quickly around some of the more prominent exhibits, and we really had no problem seeing them.

First up was the Venus de Milo. From some research the night before, it sounded like there was scholarly debate around what year it was created, and who it’s supposed to depict. Either way, it’s understood to be at least 2100 years old. It was incredible to see the artistry and detail already present in something that old.

We continued through the museum, stopping at Winged Victory, which was one of Jessie’s favorites. From there, we went to see possibly the most famous resident, the Mona Lisa. With barely a line, we got to stand and enjoy the painting for a second.

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After a number of stops rounded out our guided audio tour, we set off to the Richeliue wing to see the Code of Hammurabi, notable as a very early codification of a legal code, written over 3500 years ago. It’s where we get such fun phrases as “An eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth” (from “If a man put out the eye of another man, his eye shall be put out.”, and “If a man knock out the teeth of his equal, his teeth shall be knocked out.”), as well as such classics as “If during a quarrel one man strike another and wound him, then he shall swear, “I did not injure him wittingly,” and pay the physicians.”.

We found a few different sphinxes too. The ancient Babylonian had better facial hair.

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After admiring the more contemporary works (1800s) by French sculptors, we decided that we had had enough. We walked back to our neighborhood, and found a place in our neighborhood for lunch. We ended up at a burger place, which was the first American restaurant we ate at on this trip!

To finish up the evening we did a small tour of Rue Cler, a pedestrian only market street right near our stay, stopping for a hot chocolate.

This morning was spent packing and tidying before hopping on the train to our final neighborhood. Had it not been raining, we likely would have walked, but that was not the case. I think at this point, so close to our flight home, we are both really worried about catching COVID and having to quarantine past our intended timeframe, so any close quarters with people makes us nervous. Thankfully the train was not too crowded at the time we went.

We arrived in our new neighborhood and were let into our new place without much hassle. Thankfully, this one is only on the third floor, so the stairs here feel easy-peasy by comparison! I would also say that the view may be the nicest.

After a small break to warm up and get our bearings, we decided to head out for a bite to eat and to see the Musée du quai Branly. Ever our intrepid navigator, Ray guided us to a nearby bakery for a pair of sandwiches. As usual, I was expecting we would take our grub to a nearby park, which was the plan. What I wasn’t expecting however, was the Eiffel Tower to pop out of nowhere!

In fact, our place is so close to the Tower that it almost serves as a beacon for where “home” is! Including at our next stop. The Musée du quai Branly – Jacques Chirac is a museum of art and artifacts from native peoples around the world, broken into sections on Oceania, Asia, Africa, and the Americas.

We had both read that this was a really interesting museum, but we also read that it has and continues to face a lot of controversy given that many of the artifacts were stolen from these places while they were under French Colonial rule. There are and continue to be movements to try and repatriate the pieces back to their original homes.

I think both Ray and I would say this was not one of our favorite museums. Firstly because of the ookiness around how many (all?) of the items were acquired (and the refusal of the museum and the French government to consider returning them), but also because most of the signage was in French making it really hard to understand what we were looking at or the context around it. Not to mention the people! There were SO MANY people there and a lot of folks coughing which, at this point just makes us want to jump out of our skin!

We made our way back to our AirBnb to determine our next steps and then remembered that tonight’s the last night the Champs Elysses would be lit up with Christmas lights! So we headed down that way. I have to say I was … underwhelmed. I had hoped for something a little more … elegant?

Regardless, it was a lovely night for a walk, so we scooted on down the Champs Elysses to see the Arc de Trimophe.

Once again, our fearless navigator navigated us towards home. To my surprise, he chose a route that led us straight to the Trocodero (the most famous viewpoint of the Eiffel Tower) and then under said tower to get home. We’re hitting all the big sites in one night!

We stopped at a grocery store on the way home. The cashier gave us our bread for free because it was over a week old – they really take their bread seriously here! Then we ordered some Poke for delivery for a late-night dinner (how is it already 10PM?!). We’ve got an early morning tomorrow, so I should sign off and get some sleep!

So, I asked Ray to do the post yesterday since he knows and understands more about music stuff than I do with the promise that I’d do the next two. Little did I know how easy my job would be!

Today we had planned to visit the last item on our list for this area – an Avant-Garde Museum called Le Musée d’Art Naïf – but once we got there we realized they were between exhibitions (for the only time in the whole year!). So as we stood outside in the rain we wondered what else we could possibly do. So we decided to take a vacation from our vacation and spend this wet and rainy day inside our cozy little apartment watching movies and eating good food (shhhh … don’t tell anyone!)

We grabbed some donuts from a place nearby and then headed upstairs to listen to the rain, eat good food, and binge Station Eleven. Ray even ordered us some Lebanese food for delivery – we’re really starting to feel like locals now, LOL! Ray remarked the other day that the more comfortable we get the more our calorie intake and output shifts and today seems to be a perfect example of this!

For the record, we have been watching a movie nearly every evening with the theme (for the most part) being French history or French films. So far, we’ve watched:

• Midnight in Paris
• Paris Je T’aime
• Ratatouille
• Les Miserables (The one with Liam Neeson)
• Marie Antoinette
• Hunchback of Notre Dame
• La Vie En Rose
• Alphaville
• Taken
• As Above So Below
• Davinci Code
• Inferno
• Angels & Demons
• Love Actually
• Schmiggadoon
• Station Eleven

Tomorrow we move on to our final neighborhood – close to the Eiffel Tower, the Invalides and more. The adventure continues!

Today started out pretty typically– a stroll to the boulangerie for a baguette to eat with breakfast. Jessie had given up on the smelly cheese from yesterday, so I also picked up some Camembert for her. With our bellies full, we headed to the PHONO Museum.

This museum had been on our must-see list, but was open only on Fridays and Sundays. When we got there, we almost walked right past it. It is a very small space— little more than one large open room and perhaps an office and bathroom.

Once inside, the staff kindly walked us through their various artifacts. I’m tempted to use the word “relic” here, but with something so recent as the development of recording technology, I’m not sure what the best word is. Despite my interest in music and recording, it’s history and development is not something I was terribly familiar with.

DISCLAIMER: I’m not an expert, and this is my understanding based on what I was told by somebody whose first language is not English, cross referenced with what I can find online… I could certainly be mistaken about some of the details.

First, we were shown a model of a Phonautograph, which was a one of the first ways of recording audio. A membrane, functioning as a microphone, would vibrate from soundwaves in the air, vibrating a stylus against a rotating piece of smoked paper, which would etch the audio waveform into the paper.

The second model was the next stage, swapping out the smoked paper for foil. Foil was soon replaced by wax cylinders, wax cylinders turned into wax discs. Over time, the wax discs were replaced by the standardized vinyl records that we know today.

The staff showed us many different types home phonographs. I guess I had never seen one up close until now, but was amazed to see the whole bell moving (video) as the needle moved across the wax cylinder. I was also impressed by how loud these could be, powered only by a hand crank. In some cases, more than one needle and bell were attached to double the audio output (albeit with a noticeable delay between the two bells) (video).

The museum ended with a hallway full of electrical record players, without the hand crank, and now with volume control! They had a few different experimental concepts, including a record that could function as a zoetrope (video) (if you have the right piece, though many have been lost over the years), as well as one that worked with a makeshift TV which projected images, à la a projected viewfinder (video).

After our time at the museum, we wanted to hit up a few things that we had so far missed. The first stop was the obligatory Wall of Love, a wall containing the phrase “I Love You” written in many languages. Generally, the goal is to find your language and take a selfy in front of it. We had been told by a tour guide on our first night, “You’d think English would be easy to find, like right in the center, but it’s surprisingly difficult”. After scouring the wall, we found it almost exactly in the center. I think we were intentionally mislead!

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From there, we stopped at a tiny crêperie to get what had been told was the best crêpe in town. I can’t say for certain if it was the best, but it was very good! Jessie got a Nutella and coconut, I got ham, cheese, and mushroom. Pretty good eats!

The next stop was to visit the Montmartre cemetery. After walking around a wall for a while with no sign of how to get in, we gave up our quest. It was starting to get cold out, so we wandered back to our block.

For dinner, we went to the pizzeria down the street from us, recommended by our AirBNB host. Apparently, it had won some awards as the best pizza in Paris in 2020, though I don’t know by whom. The pizza itself was great. No complaints, but their Mezcal Negroni cocktail was life changing. The menu said the sweet vermouth they used was infused with cajun spices. That could mean a lot of things, but I may be getting out the Old Bay when I get home.

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Today we decided to hit up an out-of-the-way part of Paris, so as to free up some of our busy schedule next week. Before we could do that, however, we had to have some breakfast. I grabbed a few things from nearby shops.

From Le Grenier à Pain Abbesses, I picked up a lemon meringue eclair, a coffee eclair, and a baguette montmartroise, which as far as I can tell, is a house specialty, and not a known style of baguette. From Butte Fromagère, I found a pasteurized A Fileta cheese, and from the grocery store, some fruits and veggies. Not a bad way to start the day.

After breakfast… or lunch, however you want to call it… we took the metro to Port Dauphine on the western edge of the city. It was another sunny day, after, all, so why not enjoy some time at another park?

From the metro stop, we ventured out to Bois de Boulogne, the second largest park in Paris. It is about two and half times larger than central park, but much more sparse. The park itself is lined with dirt paths and an occasional road or two. It is a much wilder space than any other city space we have been to thus far.

The woods has served many functions over the years, notably a hunting space, a military encampment, and a racetrack for horses. To me, by far the most interesting, is that it is the site of the first manned, free (not tethered to the ground) flight- A hot air balloon in 1783. I didn’t see this commemorated anywhere nearby, but it certainly is a big deal in my book.

The park had a lovely pond, and what would have likely been a number of beautiful gardens, had it not been January. From there, we walked through a neighborhood full of embassies to the Musée Marmottan Monet, snapping a selfie at the site of the balloon flight before we entered.

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The Musée Marmottan Monet has a focused collection, not nearly as big as some places we’d been to, but definitely worth the time, money, and effort to get there. They house a large collection of early impressionist paintings, including Monet’s Impression, Sunrise credited for the name of the Impressionist movement, as well as number of Monet’s Water Lilies.

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After the museum, we headed back home, stopping at a nearby Croque Monsieur place, for some tasty sandwiches and french fries!

Another sunny day today so we took advantage of another walk. Unfortunately, we found that sun does not necessarily mean warm!

Whereas yesterday we headed west out of our neighborhood, today we headed east toward the neighborhood of Belleville. We ended up calling our tour today a “Wikipedia Tour” because Ray graciously looked up spots along the route as we went so we could get a bit more of the history behind the place.

Our first stop along the way was the Saint Joan of Arc Basilica which was built in the 1930s next to the Church of Saint Denys (the martyr for whom MontMARTRE is named). Built in 1204, legend says this is one of the places Joan of Arc visited in her lifetime. That said, the Joan of Arc Basilica looked much older than Saint Denys and so we got them mixed up in our photo!

Our next stop was Le Centquatre which was a very unique space. I guess it’s normally a gallery with a big open middle, but none of the exhibits were open when we were there, so unfortunately we didn’t get to experience it first hand.

The next stop on our tour of the 19th Arrondissement was La Villette, the third biggest park in the city. This was a very unique space, surrounded by many cultural venues including the Museum of Science and Industry (the largest in Europe), an IMAX theater inside a huge reflective dome, the Paris Philharmonic, venues for modern music and more. The park itself contained multiple gardens (such as a Trellis Garden and a Bamboo Garden) and lots of sculptures that Wikipedia says are “meant to be a place inspired by the post-modernist architectural ideas of deconstructivism.”

In pretty wild contrast to Parc de la Villette which was built in the late ’80s and was still very much under construction when we were there, our next stops, just a few block from this park was Parc des Buttes-Chaumont. The site itself – named for the fact that the soil composition discouraged plant growth so that it was bald – has a pretty dark past. From the 13th to the 18th century, it was where bodies of hanged criminals were displayed after their executions. Following the Revolution it became a dump, followed by a place fo cutting up horses and for sewage. Another part of the area was a gypsum and limestone quarry.

You’ll remember our friend Haussmann who rebuilt the city in the mid 1800’s to give it the “look” it has today. He was the one who chose this site to become what I consider one of the prettiest parks in Paris.

By this time, I was feeling pretty exhausted from the (8 miles!) of walking – and we’d both caught a chill as the sun was setting, so we made our way toward home. We stopped for dinner at Le Progres, just across the street from our AirBnb for some Squid Ink Pasta and some Truffle Parmesean Risotto. Before officially calling it a day, we made an obligatory stop for elclairs at the bakery. When in Paris …!

Spending a week in Montmartre is different than spending a week in Marais. Instead of a historic downtown area, you have a historic smaller neighborhood. The main tourist attractions in the area seem to be Sacre Cœur and the various cabarets. There’s some great food, and lots of art history here too, if you know where to look.

We’re choosing to keep our activities as covid safe as possible. We’re trying to to limit our time spent in crowds, inside, or with our masks off, which means that, sadly, we can’t just eat delicious food at neighborhood restaurants all day long. The up side of this, is that there are plenty of neighborhoods around to explore. Today, we wanted to see Batignolles.

On our way to Batignolles, we walked through Rue des Abbesses, a nearby road named for the benedictine nuns who had a chapel in Montmartre. Things look different in the daylight, as many shops shutter their doors at different times in the day.

Continuing on, we walked down to Villa Leandre, a picturesque dead end road. The three story houses have a different feel than the rest of Paris’s uniform Haussmann architecture.

From there, we walked through a busy neighborhood center of the 18th arrondissement, Rue de Poteau, then across Rue Championnet.

Jessie stumbled upon a pedestrian only street: Cité des Fleurs. For those of us who could see over the fences, the backyards were clearly well taken care of, and the houses clearly out of our price range. We’ve since learned that it was the birthplace of Catherine Deneuve, as well as home to resistance members during World War II before being found by the Gestapo.

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After our slight deviation, we made it to Parc Clichy-Batignolles – Martin Luther King, a large multi-purpose public space, full of gardens, waterfowl habitat, a skate park, and space for other sports. Surrounding it was an eclectic collection of apartments.

Like many other things we’ve seen today, these buildings were in direct contrast to the standard Parisian Haussmann style buildings. I’m sure some locals are offended to look at them, but they appeared to be well thought out, and something new to look at.

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After sitting still long enough for the chill to set in, we continued to our final stop, the nearby Square des Batignolles. This park was much smaller… cozy even. It was full of small paths winding around a pond. There were several small areas reserved for kids, and a space for dogs too.

We exited the park, grabbing a quick drink and snacks at a nearby restaurant. I had the Kir Royal, (upgraded from the standard Kir, by swapping white wine for Champagne), and Jessie grabbed a drink called a Red Sombrero (Pineapple juice, Orange juice, Lemon juice, Grenadine, and ginger beer). We snacked on some egg rolls and french fries. From there we headed home and ended our day.

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