Day 6, Tuesday August 31st
Death
by walking - again
It was back to the Musee D’Orsay today to see the
rest of the impressionists we missed last time around. Did I mention that the Musee was the ONLY
place we visited in Paris that did not allow ANY picture taking? Boo hiss.
So we are, therefore, not able to show you our favorite items.
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| The camera-averse Musee |
Chris can tell you, however (and recall she
is not a big impressionism fan) that the Musee’s pieces by Lucien Levy-Dhurmer
were among those she found particularly impressive (pun intended). Of
particular note are ones called Silence, Autumn and Gold Medallion. Google the name and see if you agree.
Life’s
short, eat desert first – or Excuse me, did you drop this ring?
After our visit to the D’Orsay we continued our trek
to la Tour Eiffel, a sight we did not take in during our last visit. It was a fair ways away, but we girded ourselves by
stopping for wine on the way and by having desert for lunch. Chris enjoyed a fabulous flan type desert and
Jane a strawberry shortcake type. Sugar
and alcohol are best for making sure you have the staying power you need for a
long day of walking.
We had decided we needed to use up some of the, by
now, vast quantities of left over bread we’d been collecting from our
breakfasts and dinners, so we began carrying a bag of it wherever we went and
feeding the birds of Paris. We found
some willing takers on our way to the tower.
We no sooner got to the park where the fabled tower
resides then we were once again accosted by someone asking if we’d dropped the
golden ring they appear to have picked up from the ground under our feet. By this time Chris was becoming a bit testy
about the whole sham and started letting the sincere looking con artists know that
they are now the 4th, or 5th, or etc, person to have
found said golden ring from under her feet, and looking at them with her best 'admonishing-Sunday-school-teacher' impression.
The tower is big, that’s for sure. And like a few other things we visited this
trip, it was undergoing some repairs. There
was painting being done and a huge blanket was draped under the tower to keep
visitors from being splattered. So we
weren’t able to stand underneath and look up into the metal lattice, which
would have been fun.
Alors, I’m afraid Chris, for one, was a bit
under-wowed overall, and we soon decided we’d seen all that we needed to see of
the fabled tower. And so to Eglise du
Dome.
What’s
the opposite of Mini-Me? Mighty-me?
Eglise du Dome is an impressive structure that
houses, among other things, Napoleon Bonaparte’s mortal remains. History marks him as a man of smallish
stature, but let me tell you, there is nothing small about anything having to
do with his memorial. His actual tomb is
large enough to house an entire family of four and is surrounded by 12
stunning, Amazonian scaled female statues.
I must say the little fellow had a high opinion of himself. Nevertheless, his tomb and its accoutrements
are absolutely worth a visit.
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| Jane en face Eglise du Dome |
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| Chris en face Eglise du Dome |
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| Eglise du Dome's dome |
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| The little fellow's very large tomb with the Amazonian scaled beauties surrounding |
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| Some of the amazing ceilings they had in Paris back in the day |
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| Foch's tomb in Eglise du Dome |
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| Everything is super sized. |
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| I tried to capture some of the really beautiful statues surrounding the tomb. |
If you are
militarily minded, you’ll want to see the adjoining Musee de l’Armee, which we
understand is very interesting. But Jane
and Chris took a pass on that.
Unexpected
Gifts
Our next stop was the Rodin Museum and Gardens which
were – you guessed it – undergoing renovation.
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| The Three Shades |
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| The Thinker |
We were able to tour the house and immediate surroundings, but the
majority of the gardens were closed, alas.
Or maybe not alas……
This was another of those lucky happenstances that
we encountered during our trip. Because
if we had lingered (or dawdled, as Jane would say) in the gardens, we would
have missed one of the nicest gifts and unexpected highlights of the entire
trip.
As we left the Rodin Museum we walked past a
cathedral and wondered whether we should check it out. We couldn’t find it listed on our street map,
but our feet were telling us that it might be a nice place to sit for a bit
anyway, so we decided to go inside.
As
we approached the door we began to hear music playing. When we went inside we realized their
organist (whose name, we learned, is Jacques Taddei and who has been their
organist since 1987) was practicing.
Well let me tell you - it was darned impressive. The tres grande organ is located in the upper
level of the cathedral at the back of the nave.
It’s huge pipes were awe inspiring, but not as awe inspiring as his
playing. When he hit those base notes,
the whole place literally vibrated. What
a treat!
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| Jacques Taddei practicing the organ in Ste-Clotilde |
After the final vibrations of his last thundering,
skin prickling chord had died away, Chris was compelled to holler out an
“AMEN!’”, which echoed throughout the cathedral, and to which the organist
turned around and smiled.
I’m telling you, it was a true and unexpected blessing. And I think there might have been one other
person in the whole place besides the two of us.
By the way, turns out this was the Basilique
Sainte-Clotilde, which besides having a fabulous organ and organist, sports a
sanctuary full of beautiful statuary, paintings and stained glass windows of
their own.
Their link, en Francais: http://www.sainte-clotilde.com/
Wikipedia and Sacred Destinations, in English:
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| Inside Ste Clotilde, next several pictures, many showing their stations of the cross |
Next stop, Brussels!
