Rodin, Rue Cler, Army, Eiffel, and Orsay

A little medicine, a touch of wine, a closed window and we both had a good night's sleep. We awoke both ready and primed for a full day with some catching up to do. After getting ready, we took advantage of the washing machine to clean our used Paris hiking fatigues. 

And then we were off! We caught a Metro to our first stop, the Rodin museum. 

This was the house where Auguste Rodin lived (amongst other artists, his wife, his muses, and lovers) and sculpted some of the most proliferous works in Paris and beyond. Having read Rick Steves' intro, there were certain works Chris was seeking to see (Mer got hot inside and relaxed in the garden until Chris' exit). First was The Man with the Broken Nose. 

Around there was the Hand of God.

His protege, muse, and sometime lover, Camille Claudel also displayed her Maturity. 

Then it was to the garden to see his work of The Gates of Hell. 

And, Rodin's most famous, The Thinker. 

From Rodin's hot museum, we shot over to nearby Rue Cler for lunch. After strolling up and down the straight lane, we settled on a Greek cafe. Only after we were reading through Rick Steves did we find this shop used to sell horse meat. 

Thankfully, the meat choices were more contemporary and delicious. 

From there we routed back to the Army Museum beginning with Napoleon's tomb. 

From the golden dome outside, to the giant casket (in a casket, in a casket) is apparently the way to go. Napoleon's brothers and best generals were laid to rest nearby too. 

We then went into the war museum that had pretty good layout of WWI and WWII, with many things in English. We were crunched for time and both Mer and I are pretty well read on the histories of these two wars. So we raced through. 

We also raced because we had a date with a certain Tower. 

There was a line just to get underneath the Tower, and then another to go up the elevator. But the scenes were picturesque all around. 

Finally, it was our turn on the elevator. It was cool to see the city as we climbed higher. We went past the first level onto the second. 

And then, voila! Picturesque Paris below. We found the gold dome of the military museum. 

There was the Arc de Triomphe. 

Even a few great ones of the both of us. 

Going up just one level (where an elevator to the summit awaited) was a less intrusive fence with all the wonderful views. 

We then walked down a great many stairs to get to the first level of the Tower. There, we saw a great many displays on the history of the Tower and its comparison to others around the world. There was a kids' play area with a nod to the 2024 Olympics. And a crazy glass floor to able to see the ground below. 

We then continued our stair climb to the bottom and took a few pictures from below. 

So far, our day was zipping along, so we decided to fit in a nearby museum, and the Orsay fit the bill. 

Formerly a train station (Gare d'Orsay) it was saved from bulldozing when it was decided to put scattered art post-Louvre in one spot. Thus it housed a great many pre-Impressionist artists leading into and beyond that era. Thus we saw a lot of Manet. 

There was Renoir

And, of course, Monet. 

With some Van Gogh. 

And more of the same sculptures from the morning's Rodin. 

After this, our tiredness from the day's frantic travel was setting in. It was time to eat. So we set back toward Rue Cler, but found an affordable Chinese place on the way. 

We also found a Carrefour to buy the details for our evening wine picnic with our friends before their own summit of the Eiffel Tower. (And thanks for the wifi at the closed Starbucks to communicate with Austin and Ashley as to where to meet us!)

We found an open spot on the Champ du Mars. It was chilly as the sun descended, but our blanket was there for wrapping. And the views couldn't be beat!

We had our wine as the sun set on a glorious evening. Before too long, we walked them up to the base of the Tower and departed them to await security. Mer and I made our way back to the Metro and our familiar red windmill. 

Marais Neighborhood Walk

This morning revealed two downsides to our apartment location: 1) a motion-sensor light just outside our one window that obviously is illuminated after each passing person and 2) the neighbors next door are aspiring Parisian musicians, which means they're not that good (or quiet), but at least it goes on into the night. 

So lack of quality sleep became an issue by the morning of Day 3. Chris, naturally, slept through most of it. But Meredith, despite Chris' downloading of a white noise app, wasn't as lucky. 

So Chris went out into the neighborhood the next morning for croissants and coffee while Meredith caught up on sleep. There was also a morning stop at the neighborhood Carrefour, the grocery chain we've both shopped elsewhere in the world, where there was some pretty great fruit for sale. 

Chris then returned and roused Meredith to set about our day. Today's adventure revolved around the Marais neighborhood that started at Place de la Bastille and the start of the French Revolution. It was here that a fortress and prison once stood that beleaguered and hungry Parisians stormed and took the first steps that sparked the rest of the country to rise against the monarchy. Only the July Column with a Statue of Liberty stands here now. 

Our walk continued down Rue St. Antoine past a statue of Beaumarchais (pigeon not included).

And the smallest gas station ever. 

We then continued to a former mansion of a noble in Hôtel de Sully, with a beautiful courtyard. 

And a gothic window (as Rick Steves suggests to use for Madonna-like posing)

Then there was a tiny entrance door to Place des Vosges, the royal plaza built by Henry IV as a new royal haven built in the swamp (Marais), and he succeeded. All the nobles followed and built their city residences nearby (to be visited when their countryside chateaux became a bore).

Inside the Place des Vosges was the place Victor Hugo rented when writing Les Miserables. 

We then continued on the trek through Marais until we got to Rue des Rosiers, or the Jewish quarter. While there was a lot of history here (swelling in the early 1900's and again in the 1930's before the Nazi's hauled off a majority of the population) it was the place we decided to pause for lunch. 

It was in line for a ham and cheese crepe, that Chris noticed someone he knew. She, too, had the look of "Don't I know you?" It was Ms. Brown whom he had taught summer school with in Manor. She was a bilingual teacher originally from Colombia. We met her husband too who was maybe from the south of France. We were next up to order and as Chris turned to order, they departed before photo proof could be taken. As Walt Disney said, "It's a small world after all."

We ate our crepes as we moved along toward the Pompidou Center. It was a color coordinated building a to identify water, electric, air ducts, etc. 

Then our walk ended at the large Hôtel de Ville, now serving as a City Hall. Besides being picturesque, it had a nice relaxation area that we took advantage of later. 

From here, the Holocaust Museum was right around the corner. It showed the history of Jews in France, the Nazi invasion, and the puppet Vichy government that complied with Nazi demands (and even superseded). It was also an apology of the later French "amnesia" in the 1990's when then-president Jaques Chirac turned over all French records of the Jews to this museum. 

We returned to the Hôtel de Ville for a quick rest before heading to the nearby Deportation Memorial, again commemorating the Jews deported from France during WWII. It was a much quicker and simplistic reverence to the French Jews that were mostly unsympathetically taken away to camps across Europe. 

We exited the memorial near that dinner hour. So we made our way to the nearby Latin Quarter, where we ended up near where we ate that first night, in fact, across the street. We were at an Italian place where we were both drawn to the ravioli. 

It was then that we were both tired. We hopped on the metro for an easy ride home. Tomorrow, was the big day at Versailles where we wanted to meet our friends. It would take a bit of coordination and we didn't want to be too tired for it.