Paris Day 9

Day 9 – Friday, September 3^rd – The Penultimate Day

No rest for the weary, or, A day for the birds

We were pretty beat after getting back to our hotel the evening before, so we found a place to eat dinner in Les Halles, not too far away, and headed for bed. 

This morning, as we looked around our room, we thought we’d capture a few shots of our digs so we’d remember it when we get old and our brains start to become leaky.

La salle avec les deux steps

Les Gear

Les Shoes

Les Petit Dejeuner

We decided Friday would be a take-it-easy day for us with a ‘little walk to the Paris Opera House’, officially named Opera de Paris Garnier after the architect who designed it, Charles Garnier.  Turns out it was not so take-it-easy a day after all, but it was worth the exertion.

On our way to the Opera House we fed our abundant excess breakfast bread to the sparrows in the Jardin des Tuileries.  I’m sure they were all sorry to see us go back to the states.  They loved Jane.  I think it was the bling....

Make room for me!

Oh, thank you, Janie!

I'm full now.

OK, My turn.

A Cezanne in the Tuileries

And this is how Chris's feet looked after 9 days of walking around Paris and Brussels

Tuileries Heron and - well, what IS that mythical creature, anyway?

One of my favorite statues in the Tuileries

A bird in the hand.....

View from courtyard of the Louvre - notice the archway at the right....

Here's a view of the archway's ceiling.  See the birdnest?  There were several, and they are swallow nests.

And here are some of the little critters peeking out of the nest at me.  It was hard to capture them, because they are always on the move.  Very busy birdees.

  

We stopped in at the cathedral right next to our hotel, Saint Germain L’Auxerrois (pronounced, I finally learned, Loo-zher-wah).  We were glad we did, because there has been significant restoration to the interior since we visited 7 years prior.  We were happy to see such a refresh of the place.   

Above and below, their beautiful organ

The painting on these 3 windows has a pre-Raphaelite look to me.

Tired as we were, we made frequent stops along our trip to the Opera, including a wonderful candy shop where we bought fancy caramels to bring back, and a fun, funky bus stop that was so Jane - FANCY!

A walk through the Jardin du Palais Royal allowed us to unload more leftover bread by feeding their none-too-shy pigeons.  

One at a time now.

Hmmm, bread or fingernail - decisions, decisions

Practicing for falconry 

They seem a lot bigger sitting on your arm than they do on the ground.

And suddenly – there it was!  I could almost have closed my eyes and imagined the Phantom peeking out from behind the huge angels on the rooftop!  

aaaaaaand, queue music!

I tell you, there aren’t enough cameras to handle the picture potential of this beautiful place, but I did my darnedest.  Here are a few of the pictures I took - trust me, it's only a few considering how many I took!

The ceilings were splendid!

I especially liked this one with the bat motif

Can anything be more ornate than this hallway?

Looking from the main hallway into one of the salons

This is a promenade outside the ornate hallway

Even the floors were amazingly decorous

Self portrait in the mirrors

Look at the ceiling beyond the urn.

This entire floor is mosaic tile.  I want that in MY house!

A very interesting part of the Opera House was this library/museum.  What I loved most - besides the fabulous wooden cases - was the miniature scenes housed in the small glass cases on either side of this room.  Jane is standing in front of one.  Examples of the scenes are shown below.

These were made of paper meticulously cut and painted.  They were working 3D scale models of what the final scenery would be for a given opera or theater piece.  Outstanding!

Jane looking into box 5 - the Phantom's personal seat.  Alas, we didn't see him.  But!......

I did see a shadow, and I think we might have just missed him escaping up the staircase! 

One of the large statues flanking the entrance to the main auditorium

There were several of these beautiful bronzes all around the outside of the Opera House.

Opera Garnier tidbit

Almost as fabulous as the Opera House itself is the scale model of it housed at the Musee D’Orsay.  The model was built by Richard Peduzzi between 1984 and 1986 and is roughly 8’ H x 19’ W x 3.5’ D.  It is fantastically detailed down to the painted ceilings and string simulating the intricate roping used to manage the staging.  Truly a wonder and a must see if you visit Paris!

Here is the Wikipedia web page about it, and there are other pictures available should you want to check them out.

http://it.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Scale_model_of_L'Opera_Garnier.jpg

After all the magnificence of the Opera House, we needed to gird ourselves for the long walk home.

On our way back from the Opera House, we stopped by the Comedy Francais which was founded by Louis XIV in 1680.  The interior was closed, but we did manage to see the lobby and outside of the building.

Just one corner of the ceiling.  The other corners were equally ornate.

We headed back to Les Halles again for dinner and at at a place called Café Indiana.  Chris almost unwittingly ordered steak tartar.  Yikes!  Jane had a great chicken curry.  On the walk home we enjoyed seeing Notre Dame at night where there were folks performing various street dances.    

Jane was too tired to join the street dancers, so she decided to  strike a Parisian night pose.

Continuing on, we saw the Tango People - a whole group of folks with a music box and speakers playing tangos.  It seemed folks would choose partners and just dance in the Paris moonlight.  Tres romantique! 

Farther along, the Eiffel Towers lights were doing their hourly camera bulb flash show as we strolled by.

Flash on.....

Flash off.

We decided we’d walk down some steps by the bridge to get closer to the Seine, but the steps smelled WAY like pee, so we abandoned that idea STAT!

Instead, we just enjoyed one last look at the Pont Neuf at night before retiring for our last sleep in Paris.

Last time we visited Paris, the city was in the process of steam cleaning all the faces on this bridge.  Can you imagine what it costs to keep all the many architectural edifices in the city clean and in good repair?  Sheesh!