Paris: Saturday

Wow it's been a while since I've posted!  We had two vacations back-to-back (I know, tough life) where we first visited some Swiss and French highlights with my dad and step-mom, and then jetted off to Paris for the 4th of July weekend after they left.  My dad has posted all about our trip with them on his blog, so I'm still deciding if I'm going to post about that, too, but in the meantime I will share our trip to Paris.

Darren is still on the US holiday schedule for some reason, so we decided to use his extra day off this past weekend to go to Paris.  Since Paris is only a one-hour flight away, we just left early Saturday morning from Zürich.  As with any new city, it took us some time to get train tickets, figure out the transit system, and drop off our luggage before we got to any sightseeing.  With all that out of the way, we finally arrived at our first stop, Notre-Dame, around noon.  Now that we are in prime tourist season, there were tourists all over the place and lines for everything.  So we took some pictures outside of the cathedral and then went to wait in line to go inside the cathedral.

Me in front of the famous Notre-Dame

Notre-Dame really is a beautiful and unique cathedral, which we enjoyed touring.  The first stone was laid in 1163, but it took 200 years to finish.  It's interesting to reflect that all these pre-modern structures always took so long to build, and that many generations of workers would pass before it was ever finished.  Most people would never see their work come to fruition, but we are lucky enough to enjoy it now.

Inside of the Notre-Dame

Another view of the beautiful interior of Notre-Dame

Unfortunately most of the statues and detail work had to be extensively restored in the 1840s after the French Revolution.  The cathedral was ransacked, renamed the Temple of Reason, and used as a storage space during that time.  Strangely, Napoleon I was crowned Emperor here in 1804, though the building must have not looked its best at the time.

The North Rose Window from the outside

The back of the cathedral, featuring the flying buttresses

The South Rose Window

Darren in front of Notre-Dame

One last shot as we were walking away

You can actually climb up a very long staircase to walk around the towers and the bridge that connects them.  We were interested in doing this, but unfortunately the line was always really long and we didn't have time to wait.  Instead, we headed over to another French Gothic masterpiece just a block away from Notre-Dame called Sainte-Chapelle or Holy Chapel.  This was built in the 13th century for Louis IX who was a pious ruler and wanted his own place of worship.  The result is one of the most beautiful chapels I've ever seen.  There are fifteen 50-ft. stained-glass windows surrounding three sides of the chapel.  Each window is only supported by thin columns that transfer the weight to the ceiling.  The design leaves the effect that you are surrounded by a room full of color.  The stained-glass depicts 1,000 biblical scenes beginning in Genesis and ending with scenes from Revelation.

The upper chapel of Sainte-Chapelle

The altar and the beautiful stained-glass windows

Sainte-Chapelle standing out from behind the Palais de Justice

Sainte Chapelle is in the same complex as the Palais de Justice, where the courts of Paris reside.  So as we exited the chapel grounds, we walked by the front facade of the justice building.  I think you can tour the inside of the court building, but it was a Saturday, so it wasn't open.  After that, we left the little island (Ile de la Cité) where these sites above were located and walked across the Seine River to the Latin Quarter.  This area is named so not because there is a huge Spanish-speaking population here, but because this area used to be dominated by the famous French school, the Sorbonne, where students spoke Latin.  It seems today, though, that it is mostly an area with lots of shops and inexpensive restaurants that tourists flock to.

A busy street in the Latin Quarter

 The St-Etienne-du-Mont church on the left

While in the Latin quarter we stopped in another church where someone was giving an impromptu organ concert.  So we sat down to listen while the organist played through some pieces he selected from the sheet music in front of him.  It was fantastic.  We also learned that this church houses the shrine to the patron saint of Paris, Genevieve.  Who knew every city and country had a patron saint?  Guess I have a lot to learn about Catholicism.

The interior of St-Etienne-du-Mont

We then walked across the street to see the Panthéon.  Again, this is another building that was affected by the French Revolution because it originally was supposed to be a church to honor Saint Genevieve commissioned by Louis XV, but was turned into a resting place for the revolution's great heroes.  The most famous people buried here are Voltaire and Rousseau.  For some reason Pierre and Marie Curie's ashes reside here, but I don't know why.

The outside of the Panthéon

The beautiful interior of the Panthéon

Just outside of the Panthéon, with the Eiffel Tower in the background

We then walked over to check out the Musée d'Orsay in the late afternoon.  This museum houses French works of art from the 19th century, which includes the famous Impressionist period.  We only had an hour or two to explore the museum before it closed, though the museum is undergoing extensive renovation and so only some of its galleries are open.  I was already aware of this because, as some blog readers might remember, I saw some of the Musée de Orsay masterpieces in San Francisco with my grandparents last August as the collection was touring.  Even though some of the famous works are off touring, there are still plenty of great pieces to see that make it worth a visit.  We couldn't take pictures inside, but we can say that we enjoyed the paintings as well as the interior architecture.  The building used to be a major train station before being turned into a museum, and so the interior design is really interesting.

The outside of the Musée d'Orsay

After visiting the museum, it was time for dinner (well, for me anyway).  So what did I pick for us to eat?  Japanese food.  Yes, I am a bit tired of European food and needed a break and Paris had a great solution.  Just down from the Paris Opera House are several blocks of Japanese restaurants.  For this homesick West Coaster, it was heaven on Earth.  We ate at this restaurant below and even though it was Japanese food, all the staff were speaking good old mainland Mandarin.  I was back with my people!  Sorry to all the Paris purists out there, but I'll take Japanese food over French food any day.

The Japanese restaurant

Delicious Katsu Don and Gyoza

After that delicious, delicious dinner we walked around the area and stopped by the Paris Opera House and the Ritz before heading back to our hotel.

The Paris Opera house that was built in the 19th century

The opulent exterior with busts of Beethoven and Mozart among other famous composers

The very expensive Ritz Hotel with fancy cars in the front

After a very long day, we were ready to go to sleep around 10:30 pm, but it was still a bit light out!  Since France is on the western edge of the Central European Time Zone, it stays light out very late.  We went to sleep soon after and that covers our first day in Paris!