Wednesday 6/30/2010
Today is Nathan's 18th birthday, and he got served breakfast in bed, and got the remote control for the TV at the same time. (French television is not much fun for me,as I don't understand it).
The family went to Notre Dame Cathedral yesterday, and the Arch de Triumph. It was hot and we were really on “survival mode”, trying to maintain liquid intake, heat, nutrition, energy, patience, communication, respect, karma … Travel like this as a family can magnify our strengths and weaknesses in challenging environments.
Notre Dame Cathedral was very crowded as we toured the inside of this historical, beautiful chapel. We considered climbing 400 steps up to the towers of the cathedral, and while eating ice cream and figuring the time standing and waiting in line in the sun, we didn’t figure it was worth it. (More on Notre Dame later when I make the trip back to it by myself).
We made our way back from Notre Dame in the open-air, double-decker tour bus, plugged in our English translating headphones again, and made our way towards the Arch de Triumph, which was only 284 steps to the top. The French started to build the 165 foot tall Arc de Triumph in 1809 to celebrate Napoleon as the emperor of a “New Rome”. It was not finished before his death, but “it was finished in time for his 1840 funeral procession to pass underneath, carrying his remains (19 years dead) from exile in St. Helena to Paris” (from Rick Steves’ book “Paris 2010”). It was a beautiful view of the Champs-d’Elysees and all of Paris, and I took a series of panoramic photos all around.
It's hard to get around Paris, and the heat and lack of air conditioning in public places make it difficult.
We saw the Pere La Chaise Cemetery today where many famous people are buried and we found many headstones, among them Oscar Wilde, Gertrude Stein, and Jim Morrison (from the Doors). We did not find Fredrick Chopin’s marker. At Oscar Wilde’s marker, there was a brief resume for him on the back, and there was lipstick mark all over it as he was a “writer and martyr to homosexuality who is mourned by outcast men and by wearers of heavy lipstick …” There was a class tour of high school age kids there at the time we were there, and girls were posing for their photo by friends while kissing the marker, leaving their lipstick.
After the cemetery, we could only get reservations at 3 pm to go up the elevator in the Eiffel Tower, at Nathan's request. (We wanted to go up after dark to see the lights, but there were no openings at that time). It was very cool! The elevator stopped at two lower floors before going all the way to the top. Interesting that it was more windy on the ground, while the air was very calm on the top, just under the 1,063 ft. peak. This was built in 1889 for the World’s Fair there by Gustav Eiffel. He had an apartment at the top where he entertained guests, and this had a model displayed at the top posing Gustav with his daughter and Thomas Edison, who had visited there.
This is our last full day in Paris, as we get on a plane tomorrow afternoon for London.
Todd
No comments:
Post a Comment