State Apartments

Mesdames' Aparments

King's Chambers

Versailles

We headed out to Chateau Versailles last Sunday. The grand residence of Louis XIV and XV it lies in nice wooded countryside south west of Paris. The chateau is enormous and the complex spreads across several large buildings and a massive park (with a 7km circumference lake). The interiors were interesting and we found the audio guides very useful. It was the first time I had used these but they were included in a day pass and I would recommend them. They included not only commentry but some very nice music to accompany your wanderings.

The whole experience was somewhat affected by the hordes of people - interestingly most people just go to the king's apartment and ignore the other buildings on the site. The other appartments are similarly fitted out and have the advantage that they are not crammed with people. The place reeks of the studied extravagance of people who lived in a self-indulgent bubble. One can only wonder how the starving revolutionaries felt when they stormed into the chateau and saw the opulence.

All in all it was worth seeing - the gardens are stunning and the due to careful restoration and sensitive use of period furniture there is a palpable sense of history despite the crowds.

Paris Sales

I went for my first long ride in Paris on Friday lunch. The traffic is not too bad and quite polite to cyclists. There isn't much of a bikeway network so it is often a case of using the footpath and some rather busy "shared lanes".

At the start of every summer the "Soldes" signs appear in the stores signalling the start of the famed Paris sales. All the clothing stores (and many others) offer large discounts and the Parisians descend upon the stores. On Saturday we looked at a couple but didn't have the energy to track down the bargains. In particular, the womens shoe section of the large Au Printemps store was close to a riot.

Afterwards we wandered the 1st arrondisment (inner city suburb) and visited one our favourite parks. The Palais Royal is a lush coutyard hidden from the street. Once you enter it is an oasis from the heat and bustle of the city outside. We ate a picnic lunch and recovered our energy.

We then caught the metro to buy some chain lube then headed back to the river and visited the islands in the Seine. The larger one has the Notre Dame cathedral and was crazy busy with tourists. The queue to get in was long and there were literally thousands of tourist milling in the square in front of the church. We avoided the
whole pace and miraclously just a couple of streets away it was very quite and we soon crossed over to the smaller island. This was much nicer and has many nice old streets. It also boasts the home of Paris' famed Berthillion ice cream. They are very richly flavoured and didn't dissapoint.

Opera Garnier

Arc de Triomphe

Louvre

Tuesday was "Fete de Musique" - the day of the music. This celebrates the longest day of the year by encouraging small music concerts across France. This extended to Kath's lecturers at Uni who brought in their instruments and played a small concert at lunchtime for the students.

We went into central Paris in the evening and saw a small group present Italian baroque music in a passage at the Louvre. It was a small concert with only room to stand but its impromptu nature seemed to characterise the spirit of the day - people making free music for normal people.

We also had a look around the outside of the Louvre. This was formerly a palace and is certainly an impressive set of buildings topped off by the modern "pyramid" in the centre square.

Rue de Rivoli

Louvre Cafe

Louvre

Louvre Pyramid

Cour Carree

Musee d'Orsay

Sunday is half price museum day so we headed off to the Musee d'Orsay. This covers art from 1848 to 1914 so it includes some of my favourite artists (the Impressionists and Art Nouveau). The art didn't dissapoint - many well known pictures were there. Also several rooms showed private collections that had been donated and kept as a set. These were a highlight as they showed lesser known works and artists that you don't always see when an exhibition comes to Australia.

Another benefit of spending 4 hours in the museum was the air conditioning - it was another very hot day.

Sleeping Sun, Mesdag

La Pie, Monet

Musee d'Orsay Hall

Art Nouveau Desk

Starry Night, Van Gogh

First day in Paris

On our first day in Paris we looked around a few different areas using food shops as our goal. We started at the Rue Lepic market in Montmartre and sampled some nice bakery goods there. We took a few photos of the beautiful streets here before realising that most of central Paris looks as good.
We then headed south towards the river to Rue Montorgueil (a nice strip of shops mentioned in a book called Almost French). We grabbed some rasberries, cherries and some Brie de Meaux(cheese) and then headed across the river to Rue du Cherche Midi. He we hit another bakery and took all our goodies and feasted in a nearby park. Very tasty!

One thing we have found is that Parisians have been very polite to us, despite the stories everyone had told us. My French classes stressed that you had to follow certain formalities and I think that this helps. My French itself has been good too, I have been able to say everything I need to and everyone seems to understand and they all reply to me in French (which I can also understand fine). Fingers crossed this good experience continues....

Jardin de Luxembourg

Rue Lepic, Montmartre, Paris

Roses, Montmarte

Grand Arch Building at La Defense, Paris

Long journey to Paris

After a long trip we finally go to Paris on Friday. Three flights (1 + 8 + 12 hours) got us to Heathrow at 6 in the morning. The only good thing about the flights was the ace check in lady at Qantas domestic in Melbourne, she made sure we had spare seats beside us for the long flights. This meant that I could lie on the spare seats and save my sore back some of the pain of airport seats.
Once at Heathrow the fun with the bike began. We loaded all the heavy stuff into the bike bag, plonked the duffel on top and preceeded to drag it across London. It went in and out of trains, up escaltors and around railway stations. We had 2 hours to look around London near Waterloo while waiting for the Eurostar.
The Eurostar was great, very quick and only 20 minutes of the trip was in the tunnel. The rest of the time the train whips through nice countryside. We soon arrived in Paris and began the next bike epic. We managed to get to our stop okay, at La Defense but then had to find the hotel. In a confusing split level street system we took the long way around dragging the bike bag through roadworks, down more escalators and off curbs. Finally we were there and we soon collapsed for a nice long sleep in a real bed.

Making our way through the Undergound with the bike box

Admiralty Arch, London

Bike Bag