After failing to sleep in on Saturday morning, I went back to the flower market near Notre Dame. It's becoming one of my favorite places in Paris. Here is the result of a Google image search; that should give some idea of why I appreciate it. (Most of the shops there don't allow pictures, so I'll profit from the Internet's lack of scruples instead.) It's a street divided into small shops or stalls on either side, which mostly sell potted plants arranged lovingly outside and garden ornaments inside. It reminds me of a combination of the Botanical Garden and the Bug Store from home, two places which I enjoy visiting. So I whiled away a very pleasant hour amongst the roses and columbines, eventually briefly making friends with a shopkeeper when I bought a set of lovely wind-chimes shaped like hanging flowers. I think she was pleased that I could understand her directions in French as she asked me to wait while she wrapped them. In any case, I was happy to have had a positive interaction with a merchant (sometimes things get a bit strained) and happy with the flower-stench of the rose sachet she had thrown in free for me. So the morning was off to a good start.
My next stop was the National Museum of the Middle Ages, nearby in the Latin Quarter. Through the magic of vague ID cards, I got in for free here as well. I found the exhibits interesting, though the medieval artists weren't much for variety, at least among the works that are well-preserved: I admit to getting slightly tired after the sixth or so room full of crucifixes. Even occasional appearance of Mary or some saints didn't quite spice things up enough for me. But the range of materials in which these objects were worked was fascinating, and there were a few rooms at the end of the tour that featured "common" objects and artwork. The museum is housed in a medieval abbey, and the abbey itself lies atop the remains of some Roman baths. I found that the coolest part of the visit (Ha. Ha.) was the frigidarium, the best-preserved room of the baths. Romans. Wow.
On my way back to Cité U for lunch, I walked around a building belonging to the Sorbonne, and stumbled upon a cheerful square with fountains and cafés and people lingering. I lingered there myself for a few minutes.
After lunch and some regrouping, Mir and I set off to explore Montmartre, an area of Paris once known for its bohemian atmosphere, which attracted many artists, including names such as Picasso, Renoir, Monet, and van Gogh. We began with a walk up the hill to the Sacre-Coeur, a cathedral which commands an impressive view of the city. Though I was not at all pleased with the aggressive scammers guarding the gates to the hill, once past them things got better.
From the basilica, we attempted to follow the route suggested in Mir's handy guidebook of walks in Paris. Though we didn't quite manage all of it (I hope to visit again sometime soon), we saw two different houses in which Renoir lived at different times, a few small restaurants famous as gathering places for well-known artists, Picasso's studio, and the actual Moulin de la Galette, a windmill where dances and such were hosted, one of which was portrayed in Renoir's painting of the same name. (The observant reader will recall that I've already waxed poetic about the painting, and about finding it in the Musée d'Orsay.) The neighborhood is pretty heavily tourist-ized, and contains a surprising mix of atmospheres. I suppose that a "bohemian" area when left to itself can settle out fairly easily into its separate constituents of artistic charm and seedy quasi-poverty. I took pictures of the nice bits! Narrow cobbled streets winding their ways down the steep hill, ivy and wisteria overhanging the fences on either side, warming in the afternoon sunshine...
Eventually giving up on locating Toulouse-Lautrec's or Van Gogh's house that evening, we returned to a metro station via a long street containing almost exclusively food shops, which held Mir's interest better than the Impressionists had. I bought a baguette, and dined happily back in my room.
Now for today. Linda and I had been planning on visiting both Sainte-Chapelle and the Pantheon, but she wasn't feeling well, so I rearranged things a bit. In the morning, I went to the Père Lachaise cemetery, wherein reside a lot of old dead Parisians. It was a nice morning, and I enjoyed my stroll. I located several of the many, many well-known residents, including Proust, Edith Piaf, and Oscar Wilde, whose tomb has to be protected from pilgrims with ugly sheets of Plexiglass (the tomb has the Plexiglass, not the pilgrims). The style was much like that of the Montparnasse Cemetery I visited on my second weekend in the city, but a bit more organized and better-kept.
After a quick lunch, I grabbed Mir from Cite U and we went to the Musée Carnevalet, located in the old neighborhood Le Marais and dedicated to the history of Paris. Once there, we ran into Margaret and her visiting friend, and wandered through the exhibits with them. It's a nice museum, and piqued my interest in the various revolutions, restorations, and uprisings that Paris has experienced over the centuries. There are rooms filled with paintings depicting battles at locations I've visited in their present-day incarnation - weird. Paris is an old, old city, with the sort of history that simply can't be found in America.
At 4:30 I left the museum and walked a few blocks to the church Notre-Dame de Blanc Manteau, the venue for Clément's orchestra concert. He plays oboe and English horn in a sort of youth orchestra, which turned out to be excellent. They performed Beethoven's Pastoral Symphony, and the Sorcerer's Apprentice. I'd never heard a concert in a cathedral before. They just set up right in front of the altar.
When the concert was over, I had intended to head back to the dorms, but the beautiful sunny evening convinced me to stay out a bit longer. So I popped over to the Place de la Bastille, one metro stop down the line, a plaza that I've been meaning to visit for a while now. It's got a very tall monument at the center, commemorating one of the many revolutions mentioned above. The plaza is the former site of the Bastille prison, though the building was demolished during the "big" Revolution. I wandered the nearby streets for a time and treated myself to a crepe with Nutella from a street-side creperie. It was a pleasant ending to a full weekend.
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