Long weekend in Paris--Nov. 17-20

I took a quick weekend to Paris to visit friends--Brigitte, who I stayed with, and Christiane and Jean-Michel who had me over for dinner Saturday evening. Some highlights:

Brigitte lives in Montmartre, a neighborhood north of the center of Paris. She lives in a very lively, but also very touristy neighborhood, just up from the Moulin Rouge and down from Sacré Coeur.

Just up her street is the grocery store from the movie, The Fabulous Destiny of Amelie Poulain.

Across from her apartment, a plaque on the wall indicates where Van Gogh lived for a couple of years. Plastic sunflowers on the shutters of the windows indicate the exact apartment. Brigitte says that bus loads of Japanese tourists stop here to take pictures.

Visiting the newly renovated Orsay Museum (a former train station, transformed into a museum in 1986 and now a renovation 25 yrs. later)--4 hours of winding our way through the museum . . . .

. . . with a final rest in the restaurant/café at tea time.

Friday evening we went to see a play followed by a light dinner on a péniche-- a river boat on the Seine. The boat was docked but would begin to rock whenever the larger tourist boats went by. On the main level of the boat you could buy wine, oysters, foie gras, charcuterie, chocolates, and cookies directly from the producer--sort of like a market on a boat. The upper level served as restaurant where you could sample all that was sold below. We were fortunate to get the final two places on the boat. Brigitte loves oysters, something I still have to develop a taste for.

Saturday morning we went to the top level (7th floor) of Galeries Lafayette, a large department store, to get a view of Paris that almost rivals that of the Eiffel tour. The advantage to not being as high as the Eiffel is that you get a better idea of how the city is organized.

We had lunch in an 19th century house, now museum housing 18th century art and furniture, the personal collections of Mr. André and Mrs. Jacquemart who got married and consolidated their fortunes. Although I had been there more than 20 years ago I had completely forgotten the interior. The picture above shows the "back door" of the museum.

Brigitte and myself, trying to capture a view.

Just one picture here of one of the rooms, this one being the "music room".

Before leaving Paris, Brigitte took me on a quick tour of areas in her neighborhood where tourists never go-- for example, the back side of Sacré-Coeur.


The trip back to Grenoble is a fast 3-hour train trip. In no time I am back to mountains and the calm of a smaller city.