The Woods: "April in Paris, chestnuts in blossom ..."

Once upon a time, just a few days after getting back from Regensburg Hayley popped the inevitable question?
“So where do you think we should go next?”
My standard response is the one where I am simultaneously amazed that she’s ready to go again, and not surprised in the least...
When in the land of real dreams who waits?
So I replied, “Why not grab a baguette in Paris?”
“Why not?”, “lets”
And so we did.

Paris in the spring time... now there is something special.
After finding a great deal on airfares and some touristy type passes on Expedia, and having proceeded to the check-out, we found (on stroke 99) that the carrier we’ve booked doesn’t use e-tickets yet and Expedia will only deliver to a UK address! Bummer...
Thank heavens for our good mates Pieter and Mariette who graciously allowed us to use their UK address to gippo the silly system and then very efficiently posted off the tickets to us here in CZ. Thanks guys!!

All well and good, we arrived at the dodgiest Ibis we have been to, normally these are great little hotels and have excellent rates (thanks again to Pieter and Mariette for the pointer), we’ve used them all over Europe so far. This one was, minute (12 M2), not air-conditioned and the management was unwilling to cut us the usual deal, letting the kids stay in our room! Long story short, we just booked another room and the babies very bravely slept in the room next door to us.
How to double your accommodation bill in a split second! We’ll be calling for sure the next time!
I must say, that I was surprised overall by the friendliness of the frog-eaters. They are an incredibly hospitable bunch and not once did we come across the expected arrogance we’d been warned to expect if one spoke to them in English.

Paris was hot and busy and we had great clear weather for all but about an hour of the 4 or 5 days we were there. Couldn’t have asked for more.
Having arrived very late on the Friday nite we were a bit slow out of the blocks on Saturday, and, having gotten the remainder of our passes and what-have-you issued in town set off for the Eiffel Tower. We walked through the amazing Jardin des Tuileries on the way to the tower. Very similar to the sculptured gardens we saw in Vienna, but now all bedecked in their spring attire. Very, very pretty.
2 babies pointing out the Tower (Notice the small pink and purple Eiffel Towers used to point out the original), visible over the trees in the distance. We bought the girls these miniatures while Hayley was stocking up on her regular fix of city guides, maps and info leaflets. One usually considers the ET a scerene monument, but in the hands of our 2 they were "baby horsie" ET's capable of talking, galloping and profuse neighing. They were "mommy and daddy" ET's concerned for the babies and rescuing them from the "bad man" (ZA hangover), imaginary crocodiles that live in the Paris underground under the seats in the coaches, baby T-Rex's... and other oddities of their combined and unhindered imaginations.

Some of the sculpted trees lining the many wide, sandy pathways. In the middle of any city, space like this is liberating. For lovers of wide open places like me - this is some part of heaven.

From the fountain in the garden... this view of the Champs-Élysées, the Obelisk (from Luxor - gift to the people of France) and the Arc de Triomphe

The queues for the tower were hours long, and so, the day was spent waiting, then visiting...

...then lying around on the even lawns eating a dinner straight from the shopping bag! It was a day well spent I think – I don’t know that there would have been enough depth in any of us for a day on the run.

Check out these q’s! This one is from the first floor at 16:00, its a little less busy, but you’re still looking at a good 2 hour wait. This lot goes on until midnight!

The shot below is for anyone who doubted any phallic allusions... :s

Still pretty though...

Next day we set out a bit earlier for the Louvre and a run on our sight-seeing bus.

There’s a reasonably low limit to how much good art and sculpture two small girls can handle, so the stay at the Louvre was kinda abbreviated. We did make it a point to see the Mona Lisa though, and I was amazed at how many people were taking pictures despite the signs all over the place and the presence of security literally shouting for people not to take photos!

The gallery with Mona in it was packed to the brim and, even though we got a good view of her, we didn’t push all the way to the front – we’ll do that and the rest of the museum when we do the non-tourist return trip. It will be in the middle of winter and in the middle of the week with babies under supervision somewhere else! No q’s for us this time, thanks to some preferential passes... Yeehaw!

I don’t know what this place used to look like before the pyramids were added, but the contrast with the rest of the building is massive. Quite nice I think... Hayley and the girls inside.

Amber wanting to know which old dead guy is in this sarcophagus, but it all being coded in frog I can’t even tell her. Odd ne? The largest museum in the world, and one of Paris’ foremost tourist attractions in the height of tourist season when French is seldom heard, kinda like English in London... and all the plaques are in French... Oi! Some people are a bit slow.

This place used to be a palace. Man, the way some people have lived! It’s scarcely believable. In 2003 the Louvre burnt approaching 150 Million Euro! Ok, so with acquisitions, restoration and so on... that’s still a lot of dosh

Sitting atop the place where the Holy Grail is buried... according to Dan Brown – the inverse pyramid.

Sigh... so close and yet so far.

Next up is the fabled abode of a certain hunchback – I looked for him inside, but he was being a bit secretive for some reason.

Here the babies strike a pose in front of the famous cathedral. Did you know that Notre Dame was never completed? It is supposed to have steeples atop its towers. I didn’t notice it until Hayley pointed it out – I knew we bought those guide books for something – and now I can’t see anything else except the missing steeples!

I can’t bring myself to show you the naked tops of the towers... just imagine that they have beautiful steeples rising high into the sky and you can die happy.

I loved this old building – the intricacy and detail of every aspect of it is, as with so many other places like this, completely amazing. What I’ve seen of European architecture to date only makes me think of excellence. There is nothing done here that isn’t of the greatest care and attention – even ancient ruined sites bear proof that they were built by people who were excellent. I suppose I appreciate it more because of our friend George and his singular ability to believe we’d be happy with windows skew in walls.

There is simply no way to capture the presence of a place like this, you have to experience it in person. The other thing I’ve noticed is that I tend to look at our tours, and many parts of life through a camera lens, just loving it so much that I can’t help trying to capture it in megapixels incase it gets forgotten. But this is of course completely impossible.

I think the trick is to sit there and, almost not looking at it just absorb the whole place.
Many sites don’t allow any photography at all, and these provide the opportunity for just this kind of experience. It’s a significant adjustment not being able to click through the tour and makes one focus on other things.

Have a look at this...

Surreal aint it?

We were in the subway going to the Arc de Triomphe, cloud overhead, and when we came out it was raining good 'n hard. The subway exit was all congested with tourists taking shelter, but we braved it, clad the babies in their rain gear and head straight on out... fortunately, apart from having to wipe a raindrop off the lens a few times it was clearing up, and we had almost no rain for the remainder of the afternoon.

Napoleon was a proud old guy, he loved his Grand Army, and thought they were such splendid fellows for winning all the time he had this big old arch built for them. All carved about with nekkid French lads fighting off armoured enemy.
Still an impressive sight, and over 200 stairs to the top – no elevator. Tight spiral staircase too, so you’re dizzy and beat by the time you get to the top. But it’s what tourists do, and being tourists we felt instinctively compelled to comply. Not a word of complaint or step of slowness came from the girls who tackled the entire flight up and down without once asking for a ride!

This is what Paris looks like from the top if you can see past the Woods...
After this it was time to call it a day and head home.

Paris has the most complex (and probably most complete) public transportation systems we have ever seen. When plotting a route from here to there you need to consult a minimum of 3 maps, often 4 to see what is available for busses, tram, train and tube. I don’t know how they could simplify it coz there is just so much of it, but dang they oughta try! Any frustration though is more than made up for by the completeness.

After falling asleep on the girls bed (I had to stay with them each nite until they fell asleep, or else they would wail and moan) I eventually got to our room after midnight and after a high speed shower etc was very glad to be horizontal. Zzz

As it happens, we were staying in the west of Paris about 5km’s or so from La Defence, which one can see in the distance on the same road that runs through the Arc de Triomphe but on the opposite side. You actually look right down the throat of the Grand Arch.
It’s definitely a unique building – offices on 2 sides and a jolly great platform across the top with this massive space between. Watching the video of the building being made – when they pre-tensioned the side structures the building shrunk about 15cm in height. How the heck do you squash a concrete building?? And with draad no less?

Check it out...

Here, on the steps of the Grande Arch the babies are pretending to be the Arc de Triomphe - and you can see it waaaaaaaay down on the horizon through their arch.

Will you look at all them spires! This is Place de la Concorde. Looks like an interesting place now a days, but man it’s had a dodgy history.
It’s had a few different names, and was once on the outskirts of the city, but has been the place of many a thousand deaths. This is where the revolutionaries set up their Guillotine and chopped of the heads of the deposed ruling class.

According to tour notes, at one point the stench of death was so bad here that a team of oxen pulling a cart refused to pass through it. The Guillotine was pretty much a fixture for a long period of time. Eeeew!

La Madeleine is a Roman-Style church dedicated to Mary Magdalene, very pretty inside.
It’s one of the places you’re not allowed to take pictures inside – here’s proof...
Apart from being a truly beautiful place to look at there is not much ado about it and we were soon aboard our topless bus trawling through the sights in gay Paree...

I even slumped to the level of taking pictures of passing building while the bus was moving! I am ashamed to admit it... and I’m not even Japanese!

Speaking of Japanese... Amber and Sarah are a knock-out hit with the Orientals and there have been a number of occasions where they have come up to us and asked if they can take a photo with the girls. They all hurry and pose around them for the photo. Weird – we’re in Paris, lots of sights to see and so on and we have Asians wanting photos with our babies. The woman standing in line in front of me at the Eiffel Tower did it and a team of youngsters walking through the park on the way to the Louvre did too... Maybe they look like celebs...

Next stop after the shameful drive-by photography was the Sacré-Cœur Basilica (Basilica of the Sacred Heart). Style wise one of the very sticky-outy bits of architecture. It almost looks like a mosque from a distance, just without all the gold and what have you adorning the dome...

There are 2 types of cons we came across in Paris. The first is someone coming up to you asking if you speak English. If you admit you do, they use the opening to try and get money out of you. Towards the end someone would ask me “Do you speak English?” I’d say “No” (in English) and they’d just keep walking...

The second was at this basilica – in the foreground above you’ll see two guys, one in a yellow shirt and the other in a kinda beige, blue shirt – these are two of the conners, of which there were dozens at this place. They walk up to you with a little looped bit of colourful thread and ask you to put your finger into it. Telling you its for the church and so on, if you do, they proceed to weave a reasonably pretty bangle for you with this thread and then the kicker... you now owe them 10 Euro! Thanks for coming R 100 for a cotton thread bracelet. Not a bad living if you can make it. They’re persistent little buggers too – like flies on a hot African afternoon.

Another no-photo inside situation, but this time they had a security guard with teeth so I kept me camera holstered!

The last stop for the day was the Pantheon. An absolutely stunning place. It was completed in the late 1700’s but looks like it’s fresh out the box. The art on the walls is incredible, and most all of the walls from roof to floor are covered with different scenes.

It’s cavernous inside, and for a building of this type is remarkably well lit. There is a Foucault Pendulum in the main arch which is just fascinating. Apparently it was first demonstrated here by Leon himself in 1851. Got him into some trouble with the church back then too - something about the earth not being the center of the universe...
An example of the wall frescos. The building is about 80M tall, and the paintings go all the way to the top.
The Pantheon is also famous for it’s enormous crypts below where a great number of famous frog ancestors are at final rest. Included in the line up are Voltaire, Rousseau, Victor Hugo, and Marie Curie. I think Pierre made it too. We didn’t spend too much time in the crypts though coz the girls were making so much noise we weren’t sure how long all those dead people would stay sleeping before they graciously showed us the way out.

We made our way back home, dropped off the back-pack and all the other extraneous necessities we cart around all day and headed off for an authentic French dinner. Unfortunately our targeted restaurant turned out to be closed so we sat down for a nice Parisian beer, the most expensive I’ve ever had, and waited for the scheduled opening of the restaurant.
You won’t believe how good a €7.70 beer tastes. R140 and then some for 2 beers!
In the end our authentic French restaurant failed to open at all so din dins turned to Pizza. Sigh, well, at least it was authentic Italian...
The dinner was graced by Princess Diana, who has been a staple with the kids since our visit to Buckingham Palace in Feb.

Sarah adorned herself with the restaurants paper serviette, and when asked who she was, “Princess Diana” was the instant and confident reply.

Tuesday rolls around and the thing the babies have been waiting for the entire trip is about to happen... Well, once the small matter of an R1800 entrance fee has been dealt with... (I promise to stop whining about prices now!)

A day at Disney Land for the kids. They were in the throws of their 15th anniversary and they made a lot out of it.

Amber and Sarah went nuts as you can imagine especially when they saw their heroes in real life. What was difficult to deal with though, as far as the character appearances go was that, as soon as they arrived they were swamped by autograph and photograph seekers making it close to impossible to get anything quality done.
I’d urge Amber for instance to head into the crowd and stand with Belle so I could take a picture, and then see the little girl staring at her idol standing still; paralysed by the prospect of getting through so many people. It broke my heart. The second problem is that the characters all have these chaperones that bring them out and lead them away – they are only out for a literally a few minutes at a time and then are swept away again, only to appear some hours later somewhere else in the park at an unknowable (to us) place and time.

My personal learning from this whole thing is that Dad needs to get much more bold when asking for photos with princesses!

This is a great one that Hayley managed to secure for the girls, and they LOVED it!

See the crowd... they miraculously parted for me to get this shot.

Although the girls were very disappointed not to have met all the princesses, they did sight Belle (beauty and the Beast) and a few others. Sarah went nuts when she saw Winnie the Pooh, but as we got to him he was whisked away. :'(
Goofy and some of the other characters were more readily found and these provided some entertainment.

As for the rest of the park... well, it was one queue (I mean ride...) after the other until just before 8pm when we went shopping and bought the girls some nice Disney clothes and things to remember the place by.

This one was the mad hatters tea party where you get spun around in a tea cup – it was great having to go with the girls on all the rides – all children under 7 had to be accompanied by an adult and so we got to be kids again for the day. It was great!

Just before the stirring began...

Does this look like fun?!
The “It’s a small world” exhibition was really amazing, we did it twice. A boat ride takes you through a huge undercover labyrinth that details countries of the world all singing the song “It’s a small world”. All the cultural dolls and symbols were all animated and gave their own character to the song. By the time you come out the other end you are really psyched about how cool it is to be alive.

In the boat and ready to go!
One of the singing, moving, dancing exhibits
Then there was Cinderella’s castle, Captain Hook’s pirate ship, the Swiss Family Robinson’s tree house (enormous!) and... and... and...

This cute dramatisation had Merlin doing his number looking for King Arthur (Wart) to remove the sword from the stone (Anvil).

Merlin cheers as the sword is freed...
Amber can’t take the tension!
Wart is crowned king...
It was a packed day and the girls, who would never consider sleeping during even a boring day were completely trashed by about 2pm. We found a restaurant and they fell asleep on the benches!