Art and The Other Notre Dame

Day one in Paris began with a surprisingly large (ish) breakfast in the hotel. There was a bit more than just the roll and hot coffee than I was expecting. Cheese, ham, cereal, variety of breads and yogurt – with coffee machine and orange juicer that of course had to be tried by Aidan. I’m sure I could write tomes on the subject of food in Europe, but I’ll limit myself to a few thoughts on what countries do best. The French do bread the best. Hands down. The croissants and baguettes in France compare to no others. The coffee? Not so great.
We decided to let each of the older 3 kids pick one day in Paris and plan the whole day for the family. Colin took the planning part very seriously down to times, schedules, metro stops and a chunk of time set aside for him to go to the internet café “while everyone else went back and stayed in the hotel.”
Julia’s day was Tuesday. She didn’t do much planning until the night before, and even then it was a bit sketchy. She got stuck with planning the things that Colin’s list didn’t get to. So off we went to “The Other Notre Dame” bright and early (ish) Tuesday AM. After figuring out how to buy tickets for the Metro and finding the right lines (a bit more tricky in Paris as they have a few more lines than Roma’s *3*) we made our way to Ile de la Cite. The day was lovely: a cooler change for us than most over here. We were met with lines to get in, but they moved very quickly – too quickly, in fact, to listen to the whole narrative about the front of the building provided by the guide book. Once inside, we noticed the difference between it and St. Peter’s in Rome: it’s darker and they don’t enforce the silence. We walked around – well, some of us did. Ed preferred to play hopscotch on the marble tiles. The side chapels looked a little like a basement or attic to me: places you put all the extra furniture and art that doesn’t quite fit in to the rest of the house. There were some small scale models at the back of the sanctuary that the kids enjoyed – but mostly, it’s just another church. Upon exiting the cathedral, we looked for the line to hike up the towers but found it to be way too long for antsy kids. And the number of tourists in the square in front of Notre Dame had doubled since we entered. There are way more tourists in Paris than we found in Roma: on the scale of Disneyland on a summer’s day. Paris was *packed.* So we missed going to the top of Notre Dame and seeing the gargoyles. They turned out to be the only stairs we did miss.
Julia’s next stop was Montmartre. She wanted to sit for a charcoal portrait and pay for it with her own money. We hiked (more stairs) our way up to the top of the hill (so named originally for the pagan “Mount of Mars” and then historically/politically/christianically spun to mean “Mount of Martyrs”) and after a pass by the Sacre Coure, found the wandering sketch artists accosting all means of tourists. It was now about 25 minutes after Ed declared that he had to go to the bathroom “right now,” so Brian found a bathroom in a pub/café for him- thereby necessitating a purchase at said pub/café. It was the most expensive potty break we have had so far. While all the boys sat and enjoyed their shared sodas, Julia went in search of a sketch artist. We found one and she sat (very prettily) for about 15 or 20 minutes while he sketched her in color charcoals (can charcoal be colored? Maybe it was pastels…) At one point it started to rain, so they quickly ran for cover so he could finish her picture – all done in the shade of the Sacre Coure. She was pleased with the result. We needed to buy a tube to put the portrait in – and of course there was a guy wandering around selling the tubes – what a corner on the market *that* guy has.
We walked a little farther on to where the “real” artists have little stands set up around a square surrounding café’s. After strolling through and looking at the portraits being sketched (very touristy, we know) Brian hinted that he would like to get one done of the two of us. A little background on this: over 10 years ago, Brian was in Paris on business and had a sketch done of himself and me (from a picture of me from our wedding.) It took a long time for the artist to do, but came out really well. That picture now graces the lost and found (probably trash) of some train station as it was mistakenly left on a train. A few years later, another portrait was done (using a different picture) and a different artist on a different trip to Paris by Brian. It was not as good as the first Brian says. So on THIS trip, he had his chance to rectify the situation by having both of us sit for a portrait. But what to do with the kids while we sat? Answer: Hot dogs and soda. We directed them to a café, got them a table for 4, and let them order and pay for themselves while we went and found an artist. We could keep an eye on them while we looked, as everything was in that small square. Brian found the woman he wanted, but as she was (arguably) the best, there was a line of people waiting for her. As our time was limited – even with French service, lunch only takes so long and then what to do with the kids? – we (I) chose someone else: a Frenchman who was very kind and kept telling me that it looked beautiful... not bad to listen to for half an hour of uncomfortable posing. He ended up sketching us one at a time, so we were able to switch off with the kids who finished their hot dogs lickity split as Junie B. would say.
Portrait done – I was pleased, Brian not as much – we continued walking around Montmarte a bit then down more stairs to check out the odiferous wonder “Sewer Tour.” Julia did not pick this, but we didn’t have another chance to do it, so she got stuck with it. It’s actually a pretty cool place, but there are parts that aren’t pleasant to smell. The coolest part of the tour (other than standing on grates over rushing drainage water and then actually using the bathroom *in* the Paris sewers) was watching the short video (in English) about different aspects of sewer history and maintenance. I would not want to live in Paris before about 1850; talk about your disgusting smells! Also we learned (because there were buttons involved on the video display, and it’s hard to keep a young boy away from pushing buttons…) that there is a special team of workers who are on call to retrieve lost items dropped down sewer drains and manholes. 911 sewer detail! FYI, they make about 3000 retrievals a year.
Off to the Tuileres Garden next to ride the Ferris Wheel. Sadly, we miscalculated the metro (this was actually an RER train line we were on) stop and had to walk quite a bit farther than tired legs wanted to go. We found the ginormous Ferris Wheel and Brian took the younger 3 kids up and around. Those of us who are tall height enjoyment challenged enjoyed cool beverages below in the shade. I actually stole away for a few quiet minutes to a café in the middle of the gardens for an over-priced (not as good as in Italy) cappuccino. (Side note: I have tried to get an answer from some Italians regarding the “you can’t drink a cappuccino in the afternoon” rule. The Jury is still out on the protocol of this. It could be that I keep asking the barristas and café owners who probably don’t care *what* I order, as long as I order something…) So I stick to my cappuccinos because they are tasty AND pretty.
After the Ferrris Wheel, the very tired kids suddenly got bursts of energy which they demonstrated by having races through the gardens. They had to race between the games of ball (bocci? boule?) being played all around them. We used the Louvre metro stop to get back to the hotel and this was the closest we got to the most famous museum in the world. We opted to have a relatively museum free trip to Paris. Since the kids did most of the planning, spending hours in art museums was not high on the list of priorities.
We went back to the hotel area because we had to pay for the car at the lot (safer than on the street, we figured, but silly since parking on the street is free in the month of August=when all of France and the rest of Europe are on vacation.) We found a kebab house around the Republique metro stop and had really yummy, fairly inexpensive large dinners in the diner. After we ate, we got back on the metro to head down to the Seine for the evening boat tour. The kids didn’t want to go, but this was the part of the trip that *I* wanted to do, so we found ourselves on a boat. We left at twilight (9:20) and got to watch the sun go down beyond the river and see Paris light up. The highlight (pun intended) was coming around the bend to see the Eiffel Tower sparkling in the dark. The city re-did the lighting of the Eiffel Tower for the millennium celebration, and it is truly spectacular. We all loved it. A sparkily (a word I used to try and describe the word “bling” to some Italians in the Cinque Terra) end to a long day.