Traveling Disers are lost and adrift somewhere?

[deadheadbelle]

Originally posted by edcrbnsoul
After Breakfast what is first on our Paris adventure? Louvre? Eiffle tower? Notre Dame?

sounds good to me!

 

[goofy4tink]

Terrific bread, aged cheeses, wonderful wine and chocolate mousse?? What's not to love. I may have to stay home from WDW now. NOT! I'm off folks. Taking the dog to the Cape and hoping that when I get back tomorrow I find that both the tropical storms are passing right by Orlando!! I'm flying on Friday the 13th and there are two storms!!! Maybe Ed will turn the boat around and take me right to Florida?? Be good kids and see ya all in a week or so. Oh, and Karen...we're gonna try to do Jellyrolls this trip. If I do, I'll say hi to the 'boys' from you.

 

[deadheadbelle]

Have fun goofy4tink!!!

 

[castlegazer]

While we are here in Paris - by the way YEAH! - I highly recommend the following web sites:

for the Eiffel Tower: http://www.tour-eiffel.fr/teiffel/uk/#

http://www.paris.fr/EN

 

[deadheadbelle]

Hey Castlegazer, this is OT, but did you watch Last Comic Standing last night? (I may be confused, but I thought you said you watched it). I thought John Heffron was by far the best. He had me in tears.

 

[castlegazer]

My vote is to go to the Jardin du Tuilleries and visit Notre Dame and then walk on the banks of the Seine prior to lunch.

Since we are here in the summer I have been dying to go and try and understand Mayor Delanoe's Paris-Plage (Paris Beach) idea that he implemented the last few years. Its kindof wierd but it seems like a nice way to stroll along the Seine. Here's some info on it:

In was back in 2002 that this brave project was launched to turn two miles of the Right Bank of the Seine (near the Pont Neuf and Hotel de Ville) into a beach, complete with white sand, palm trees, sunbeds and parasols, for the summer season. It has returned every year since - welcome to the Paris Plage.

The €1 million initiative, branded by the Socialist mayor Bertrand Delanoe, as "a bit crazy", has become a permanent annual event. The Parisians literally took to the beach and showed what a good idea they thought it was! In addition to lounging on the sunbeds, visitors can take part in a range of free sporting activities, including petanque and volleyball, and dance in the old-time dance cafes, known as ginguettes.

One word of warning - don't get carried away. You're not in Saint Tropez! The Seine river is not fit for swimming in. According to project designer Jean-Christophe Choblet, the aim of this beach is lazing and strolling by the water. Bet you never thought you'd have to pack your bucket and spade for a weekend in Paris!

As well as providing a great place to lie down and absorb the calming atmosphere of the riverside, the Paris Plage plays host to numerous concerts throughout the summer. From comedy to trip-hop and choreographed dance routines, the bizarrely located beach offers a variety of entertainment for everyone.
This year, its 3rd, Paris-Plage
offers its visitors 3 beaches

the first (500 m²), with wooden flooring, opposite the pont Neuf
the second (600 m²), planted with grass, at the pont au Change
the third (700 m²), made of sand, between the pont Notre-Dame and the pont d'Arcole

200 deckchairs will be set out over these three sites along with 40 hammocks for relaxing in the shade of the age-old plane trees. 40 beach attendants will be there to welcome visitors and look after the site.

New: a 220 m² swimming pool between pont Marie and pont de Sully.

musical shows (pop, rock, popular songs, jazz and classical) by the Fnac Indétendances festival to the west of the pont de Sully

an area for light gymnastics near to the pont Neuf

climbing wall at the foot of the pont Neuf

boulodrome (petanque) pont Louis-Philippe

trampolines near the pont de Sully

rollerblades

beach volley, badminton, frisbee, marbles tournament (14 and 15 August), in the square in front of the Hôtel de Ville (N.B. these activities end on the evening of 15 August to make way for the ceremonies for the 60th anniversary of the Liberation of Paris)

Sand castle area opposite the Conciergerie (divided into 2 parts: one just for children, the other for the building of Paris monuments by a professional sculptor)

A labyrinth of greenery between the pont-Neuf and the pont au Change: a place to stroll for big and small, dotted with giant potted plants and "parasprays" (water-spraying parasols).






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[suzannen]

goofy4tink - have a great trip! I'll keep my fingers crossed that those pesky storms blow away and not mess up either your flight plans or strolling around WDW.

As far as what to do - I want to do ALL of it! I've got my walking shoes, sunglasses, extra baguette in purse in case I get hungry. This will be a great day.

I can't wait until my DD gets a few years older and we can take her to Paris! She's been interested in going ever since she first discovered Madeleine.

Vite! Vite! Let's start our tour!

 

[castlegazer]

Off topic schmocic, whatever, we can chit chat about whatever we like here.

Hell yeah I watched it! He was soooooo sooooo soooo the best! He seemed to also get the most applause too, prior to his act an afterwards, but maybe it was my imagination. I remarked to my husband that I thought it was sweet that both he and Gary seemed to change their acts and gear them to honor the people most important to them - Gary his Dad, and John his wife. I thought that was sweet, and for a comedian it IS sweet to make fun of your wife.

I have a funny story about this - I just have not had time to search to see if the thread is back up top and being posted on. I am still buried - in fact my CFO just popped his head in to my office as I was writing this asking where something was - YIKES! Anyways (yeah whatever, this is more important - um, I'm just kidding), I fell asleep after the show and after finding out I couldn't get through to the lines. It started raining at about 11 pm and it woke me up because I am a light sleep, yada yada yada. So I look at the clock, think, hey the voting's still open. I call and make my three votes for John - so yay! I finally got to vote. I then proceed to fall back asleep.

I can't wait for Thursday!

Here's a neat aerial of the Jardins:

 

[castlegazer]

These are my favorite sites that evoke Paris to me (and they are not the typical sites you think of, but its true Paris to me):

The looming shadow of the Eiffel Tower over the Trocadero:

The Marais District is my favorite area:

 

[castlegazer]

Ok, who's going to join me - I'm starving (by the way, these are escargots)

If you're not as adventuresome - we can just grab stuff as we go by:

 

[deadheadbelle]

I'm back. Sorry it took so long to catch up, I went to buy Kill Bill, Vol. 2 on DVD. Do you know how hard it is to find a Circuit City in Paris?

 

[castlegazer]

It should be in my mailbox tonight from Netflix!

OK, everyone. I sill don't have time to run us around Paris and be your tourguide, but since we seem to be faltering this afternoon, how about a trip to the Louvre - that will take you all quite some time and probably bring us to our dinner on board the boats down the Seine looking at the lights of Paris and then our nightime trek to the top of the Eiffel Tower - no other way to do it.

Venus de Milo

Homage to Dan Brown (who my eternal bookworm husband hates I might add - but no accounting for my tastes, plus I'm not Catholic so I don't get as ticked off by him)

 

[castlegazer]

The Bateaux Mouche we will be taking for our dinner down the Seine (I'll get this over with now so I can get some work done):

Experience the magic of dinner on the Seine while taking in the sights of Paris. The Bateaux Mouches dinner cruise offers a three-hour tour of the city of lights, accompanied by a traditionally French dinner, prepared to perfection by thirty master chefs, all of whom are devoted to traditional French cuisine. Sparkling white wine served as an aperitif, and a wide range of specially selected wines are offered with your dinner. This is how Paris was meant to be.

 

[deadheadbelle]

Le Louvre is amazing & the dinner cruise looks perfect.

 

[suzannen]

Castlegazer, I also wanted to see the Louvre again after reading Da Vinci Code. We can discuss it over our dinner cruise.

 

[castlegazer]

I almost fell over backwards when I found that photo today. I actually didn't get to spend much time in the Louvre when I was in Paris - the whole traveling with a 16 year old thing again (hint, if you're thinking of going, take your kids prior to the insolent years) - so I didn't remember seeing that the pyramids intersected like he said they did in the book. This photo kind of proves that its there - whether it means what he says it means is a different story. I just like the story and read it like I would any other story - as a work of fiction - so I enjoy reading his books immensely. My husband on the other hand, who is litterally the most voracious reader I have ever met and is a spead reader to boot - will not read his books.

I just finished my huge project so I think I will show you all some of the other museums we did go into. I'll be back in a few.

 

[castlegazer]

This was one I enjoyed a lot - it was over by the Sorbonne.

Musée de Cluny - Medieval Museum

Where to find the Musée de Cluny
Not far from the Seine and the Sorbonne, and at the crossing of the Boulevard St. Michel and the Boulevard St. Germain, stands the Hotel de Cluny. This is a particulary fine example of a large private dwelling, built in the 15th century.


History
Built on the site of the Roman thermal baths of Lutetia, dating from the second or third century, the west side still stands and is one of the most remarkable Gallo-Roman monuments. In the Middle Ages, houses were built into the partially ruined building. At the end of the fifteenth century the present edifice was erected on the Roman foundations and walls. In the nineteenth century the interior was reworked and windows were put into the main body of the building.


The Collection
The collection was put together by Alexandre du Sommerard and his exhibits of armour, chests, ivories, mirrors and hangings became a pilgramage for those interested in the cultish assemblage of the medieval and Renaissance. This collection was later added to by another one of stone work. It was, however, Sommerard's son who was the real founder of the museum, not only as curator but also as collector. The most internationally renowned pieces were gathered together under his stewardship. Several beauties in the former Musée de Cluny include a marvellous depiction of the grape harvest a Resurrection embroidered in gold and silver, with sleeping guards in medieval armour and a whole room of sixteenth-century Dutch tapestries, full of flowes and birds, a woman spinning while a cat plays with the end of the thread, a lover making advances, and a pretty woman in her bath, overflowing into a duck pond.


"A Must"
But most of all, not to miss the the " La Dame à la Licorne "- The Lady with the Unicorn : six enigmatic scenes featuring a beautiful woman flanked by a lion and a unicorn. Dating from the late fifteenth century, it is quite simply the most amazing piece of art you are likely to see. The ground of each panel is a delicate red worked with a thousand tiny flowers, birds and animals. In the centre, on a green island, equally flowery and framed by stylized trees, the young woman plays a ponable organ, takes a sweet from a proffered box, makes a necklace of camations, while a pet monkey, perched on the rim of a basket of flowers, holds one to his nose.

 

[castlegazer]

Here's another whacky thing we did while in Paris. It was pretty Cool, though, and a bit creepy. You may see the influence of a 16 yo in this next stop:

Paris Catacombs
This unique bone collection of 5 to 6 million people covers a surface of 11.000 square meters, a tiny portion of the 300 km of old mine corridors. Galleries are an average of 2.30 meters high, and the temperature is a constant 11.C, during summer and winter. 148.970 visitors visited the place in 1993.

Paris is a shockingly large city. There are many fine vantage points from which to view the panorama, including the Montparnasse Tower, Sacré Coeur, the Eiffel Tower, or the bell towers of Notre Dame. I’m sure everyone who looks out over the vast expanse of Paris has a different impression; mine has been, overwhelmingly, “Gosh, that’s a lot of limestone.” With very few exceptions, the buildings of Paris are uniformly beige, limestone being the preferred building material—and not just for the buildings either, but for bridges, sidewalks, and monuments. As far as the eye can see in every direction, the earth is covered with stone. A splash of green, like a park, or gray, like the Seine, seems strangely out of place. All that stone had to come from somewhere, but it never occurs to most people to wonder where that might have been. Most of it was quarried locally, and what’s particularly interesting about this is that the empty spaces left when the limestone was removed—mind-bogglingly huge volumes of space—are largely still vacant, hidden beneath the city streets.

The Other French Empire
On visits to France, I’ve spent a good bit of time underground in Paris. There have been countless trips on the Paris Métro, of course, and last spring I spent an enjoyable afternoon exploring the public portion of the vast Paris sewer system, not to mention visiting the archeological crypts near Notre Dame. But these are merely the tip of the iceberg. Underneath Paris the real action—so to speak—is in the hundreds of kilometers of abandoned limestone quarries, part of which have been turned into a depository for the bones of millions of former citizens. As with all the underground attractions in Paris, only a portion of the catacombs is officially open to the public; this visitor-friendly section is known as the Denfert-Rochereau Ossuary, or simply the Catacombs.

Unlike the many lavish museums, cathedrals, and tombs in Paris, the entrance to the catacombs is a simple black door in a small building that you could easily miss if you blinked while walking by it. The clerk pretended not to understand my request for “deux billets” (two tickets) in order to reinforce the well-known meme that no foreigner can possibly speak French properly, but she eventually consented to take my money and let us in. We passed a sign reminding visitors that flash photography is strictly forbidden, then descended a long spiral staircase and entered a small gallery of photographs and drawings. Leaving the gallery, we began walking through long, dark, damp tunnels whose only significant features were signs at intervals stating when they had been built. Tourists zipped past us, talking loudly and snapping flash photos. I began to feel like the day would have been better spent sitting in a café drinking coffee and eating croissants. But then we passed through a larger chamber with a sign over the entrance to a dark hallway that said: “Arrête! C’est ici l’empire de la mort.” (“Stop! This is the empire of death.”).

Dem Bones, Dem Bones, Dem Dry Bones
Beyond that sign was another world—and one of the creepiest things I’ve ever seen. What at first appeared to be walls built of small stones were in fact huge, orderly piles of human bones. Tibias and femurs by the thousands were stacked neatly, interspersed with rows of skulls, which were sometimes arranged very artistically in a cross or other pattern. There were no intact skeletons; the goal of the arrangement had clearly been maximum compactness. I could only assume that the ribs, spines, and other bones filled in the spaces behind the walls of large leg bones. Most of the stacks of bones rose to a height of about 5 ft. (1.5m), and while some were just a couple of yards deep, there was at least one area where the bones stretched back for a good 20 yards (18m), as you could see from the narrow gap left on top. The tunnels of bones stretched on and on; many side passages were blocked with locked gates, but even the path designated for tourists was about a mile (1.5km) long.

The bones began accumulating in the catacombs in 1786, just as momentum for the Revolution was building in Paris. Real estate was scarce while the cemeteries were becoming severely overcrowded. The government decided to reclaim the large swaths of land used for cemeteries by relocating the remains of the departed citizens to the empty limestone quarries, whose tunnels were at that time on the outskirts of town. The process of disinterring the bones from the cemeteries, moving them solemnly into the quarries, and arranging them there took several decades. No attempt was made to identify or separate individual bodies, but each set of bones was marked with a plaque signifying the cemetery they came from and the year in which they were moved. By the time the relocation was finished in 1860, an estimated five to six million skeletons had been moved to the catacombs.

The Outer Limits of the Twilight Zone
Even so, the bones filled only a tiny percentage of the empty quarries. Although no exhaustive modern map is known to exist, explorers have estimated that there are at least 185 miles (300km) of tunnels in the entire network of catacombs—that’s in addition to the 1,300 miles (2,100km) of sewer tunnels and 124 miles (199km) of subway tracks in the Métro system, though the three systems crisscross and interconnect at various points. Among a certain Paris subculture, exploring these forgotten tunnels is considered a sport. Despite the best efforts of maintenance workers to seal off illicit entrances and police patrols that slap heavy fines on trespassers, the maze of tunnels is so extensive that it is simply not possible to keep ahead of the so-called cataphiles.

The catacombs are eerie—quiet (except for the sounds of water dripping from the ceiling and tourists chatting), dark (except for the dim floodlights and camera flashes), and in many ways, downright depressing. It’s hard not to notice that the bones of these millions of people are all pretty much the same. The skull of a revolutionary may be resting on the leg of an aristocrat; noble and corrupt, young and old, wealthy and poor, all are indistinguishable now. It can give you an entirely new perspective on the concept of human equality. It also, needless to say, gives visitors a very keen sense of their own mortality. It made me wonder fleetingly whether, centuries from now, someone might walk by my bones among millions of others and think, “Gosh, that’s a lot of calcium.”—JK

 

[castlegazer]

The Jardin du Luxembourg is probably the most popular park in Paris. It is located in the 6e arrondissement, near the Sorbonne University.

The park, 224,500 square meters large, was designed in 1612 in French style. In the 19th century, the private park was opened for the public.

At the center of the park is an octagonal pond, known as the Grand Bassin. Here, children can rent small remote-controlled boats. Another attraction for children is the puppet theater.
Around the pond are nice lawns and alleys, all laid out in a geometrical pattern. Numerous statues, including the Statue of Saint-Geneviève - patroness of Paris - adorn the park. This is also one of the parks where you can simply get hold of one of the many chairs and take it to the exact spot where you want to sit. The park is also popular with chess players and Jeux de Boules players.

The Jardin du Luxembourg features two noteworthy fountains. The most famous one is the Fontaine de Medicis, a baroque fountain designed in 1624. It is located at the end of a small pond at the northeastern side of the park.
At the southern end of the park is another fountain, the Fontaine de l'Observatoire designed by Davioud, Carpaux and Frémiet in 1873. The fountain includes a statue of a globe supported by four women, each representing a continent. To maintain symmetry, Oceania was left out.

Between 1615 and 1627 the Palais du Luxembourg was constructed at the northern end of the Jardin du Luxembourg. It was built for Marie de Medicis, mother of Louis XIII. She was of Italian descent, so the architect, Salomon de Brosse designed the palace in a Florentine style. In 1794, during the French Revolution, the palace served as a prison. It also served as the headquarters of the Luftwaffe during the Second World War. It currently houses the French Senate.

 

[castlegazer]

Finally for me tonight, but by no means finally for touring Paris, which can take days, one must always stand on the Pont-Neuf and have their picture taken with L'ile-de-la-cite in the background.

OK, see you all on the Bateaux Mouche tonight for dinner!