Final Post

For the last post: the link to my web photo album. À bientôt!

http://picasaweb.google.com/KeithKnippa

made it to Houston we made it to Houston!

waiting for customs

Trying on sunglasses. Melissa just can't seem to get into Paris fashions. I don't know why?

La BnF

It's our last day in Paris and it occurred to me that I hadn't posted anything about the BnF (Bibliotheque Nationale de France), which was the whole point of the trip. These photos are of the branch on Rue de Richelieu. They didn't really have what I was looking for, so I mostly hung out at the BnF Mitterrand.
I enjoyed Mitterrand, although I have no pictures. It's pretty ugly on the outside anyway. At Mitterand, I spent time in the Rare Books area. I got to read issues of the Cabinet des modes, which were published in 1785. The Cabinet des modes was an 18th-century fashion magazine. They were bound into a single volume. It was pretty cool handling a 225-year-old book! On the downside, the staff at both libraries were less fluent in English than I expected they would be. It was hard to communicate what I needed in broken French, and they found it difficult to respond. But we managed. I'm looking forward to another visit, but when my French improves.
I ordered lots of documents for reproduction. They should get to Lubbock sometime this summer. I had several documents digitized, and I ordered some microfilm. Also, from the Richelieu branch, I had reproductions made of some 18th-century engravings featuring the latest styles of the day. I'm very excited about those. All in all, a successful trip and I'm looking forward to starting my thesis.

Today we went to the National Museum of the Middle Ages. It was very interesting and had a great garden outside the 15th century building that used the same plants that were featured in the tapestries inside the Museum.
Next we got some take out food and headed for the Luxembourg Gardens. We ate our lunch under some shade trees and this being a holiday for France, everyone else had the same idea. We managed to find a good spot nonetheless.
The Luxembourg Gardens has all that is charming, unique, and befuddling about Parisian parks: cookie-cutter trees, ironed-and-pressed walkways, sculpted flower beds, and immaculate emerald lawns meant for admiring, not for lounging.
Next, we stumbled upon Eglise Saint-Sulpice. We just walked in and it was amazing. It was hot today and we enjoyed the coolness inside the church. Pictures do not do it justice.

We found a metro station and got off at Rue Mouffetard; a winding market street with more affordable shopping, but nonetheless charming. We had been at it all day and it was very hot today. The metro trains were all packed because of the holiday and good weather. We made our way back to our apartment and opened up all the great windows and enjoyed a French beer with a hoppiness not usually found in European beers. Another full day and tired legs. We wouldn't have it any other way!

Bordeaux

We had a great trip to Bordeaux and a very nice visit with my cousin Claudette and her husband Patrick. We arrived from Paris on the TGV which stands for Train à Grande Vitesse, meaning high-speed train.
Claudette made a wonderful lunch and Patrick started pouring the wine.
This being wine country we went to Saint Emilion, a World Heritage site, with fascinating Romanesque churches and ruins stretching all along steep and narrow streets. The Romans planted grapes here in the 2nd Century and wine country was born. We sat and sipped some very good sparkling wine under the shade trees bought some wines to take home. Patrick took us out to a delicious dinner with the best white wine I have ever had. I got some strange looks from the restaurant staff for being a vegetarian (the French just can't wrap their heads around this concept) but in the end, they provided me with an excellent meal. We had croissants for breakfast served the French way: Hot milk poured in a bowl, pour hot coffee in and dunk the croissants in the cafe ou lait. With a very nice bottle of Moët et Chandon given to us from Patrick (THANK YOU!) we were back on the train and back to Paris. Wow. . . What a great trip.

The Gardens of Versailles

The gardens of Versailles were amazing. The formality of the gardens were, one way by which Louis XIV displayed his supremacy as a leader. The gardens were sculpted in such a way that they would show, to outside observers, that he had the power to command even nature. Designed by landscape architect Andre Le Notre, the gardens were geometric in form and were intended to suggest that reason and order trumps all, for Enlightenment thought and the Age of Reason were in their ascendancy. Trees were imported and rivers were diverted to create this show at the king's command. Six hundred fountains and countless statues punctuate the 250 acres that the gardens entail. This photo is of the L'Orangerie, an unheard of orange grove created in northern France.
This is a photo of the Latona Fountain and Parterre. Beyond this is the Grand Canal. While the gardens were under construction, there were many complaints from French courtiers, and especially foreign courtiers, because they failed to see Louis XIV's vision. They had to put up with fetid water and muddy grounds. The whole enterprise was unimpressive and ridiculous in their view, but it turned out beautifully in the end.
The largest fountain on the grounds, the Bassin de Neptune. Another homage that Louis XIV paid to himself. We're glad he did. Unfortunately it costs a fortune to run the fountains all the time, so they're only functioning on the weekends and at certain times.
The green preceeding the mile-long Grand Canal. This photo is taken with the Palace in the distance. This gives a sense of the scale on which the gardens were constructed.

The Palace of Versailles

Today we went to Versailles. All we can say is, "Wow". The place is huge and an edifice to the glory of France. Originally a small-ish hunting lodge, Louis XIV expanded it and made into a great palace. We didn't get to see the whole place--just what was available to the public. However, what we did see was magnificent.
Melissa loves all things Marie Antoinette. After reading Antonia Frasier's biography, we've learned that she was a mere child when she married into the French royal family. She was thrown into a life that she didn't want, and didn't ask for and she eventually became the most hated woman in France. Nevertheless, she was a kind and loving mother to her four children, Les Enfants de France, and she was loyal to France. She never told anyone to eat cake.
Melissa told me the sad story that this painting was made after her fourth child was born. Then the child died and they painted her baby out of the picture. You can see her son pointing to the missing child. The Dauphin, Louis Joseph Xavier Charles, who points at the deceased Sophie, also died. He succumbed to tuberculosis at the age of seven.
Despite Antionette's sad story, Versailles is a testament to France's political and cultural supremacy in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries--and even the nineteenth. The decor was incredible, and reflected the importance of kings Louis XIV, XV, and XVI; madame du Pompadour and Marie-Antoinette. Even Napoleon I and Josephine made Versailles home.

Melissa

Hops, and malt and water and yeast.

Keith says: I found the best little beer store in Paris!
The owner of la cave à bulles, Simon, was very nice and spoke english with a
beer geek accent (which means I could understand him on many diffent levels).
What a great place, and now. . . . . so many French and Belgium beers to taste.
Hurray!

Marais and Montmartre

Today we hopped on the Metro and headed over to the Marais district. It's the home of the
Hotel de Ville, the seat of Paris's administration, and we hear that's where the mayor's digs are. It's just across the river from the Ile de Cite, the island on which Notre Dame sits.











After checking out the Marais, we hopped over to the Latin Quarter for a bit (which is where we were last night), and then took the Metro (the Metro is a great way to get around) up to Montmartre to see Basilica Sacre Coeur. Built in the 19th century, it sits on a hill above Montmartre and overlooks the Parisian cityscape. And we climbed about a million steps to get there.













This is me with the city behind me.


















After seeing Sacre Coeur, we headed for lunch. We stopped at a creperie and had crepes. This is Keith enjoying his first crepe. They were huge and delicious, and the owner of the place got a kick out of us being from Texas.

Vespa A Go Go

Two-wheeled transportation is popular in Paris: Motorcycles, bicycles, rent-a-bikes, fold-up bickes, scooters. They're everywhere. The streets are narrow and crowded, so traveling on two wheels is a handy way to get around. For the last few days I've been photographing my scooter of choice: the Vespa. They're everywhere. All ages, all colors, all decible levels. I took a pile of pictures of Vespas around town and put some of them together in a collage. This post is specially dedicated to my friends and mentors (and Vespa owners) Stefano and Aliza. Vespas!

Gyros!
We really were there.
Much bigger than we thought it would be. Very very tall.

Macarons!
Rue de Montorgueil.
Finally!
Notre-Dame

Everyone knows by now that my luggage didn't make it to Paris. When we reported it missing, the kind lady at Baggage Services suspected it was still in Houston, and assured us it would be on the next plane to Paris, but she needed a phone number to call us at so the delivery guy could bring my bag when it arrived. Neither of our phones would work, so we had to buy a cheapie at the airport newsstand. We couldn't figure out how to find the number on the phone (to give to the lady at Baggage Services), so I asked the man at the information desk, in broken French, if he could help. He dialed his phone from our phone and captured our number. Success! He wrote down the number for us and we were on our way. Except that he wrote down the wrong number. Perhaps he misread the number, or perhaps he was having fun at the expense of a couple of American tourists. In any case we gave the (wrong) number to Baggage, and expected to hear back right away. But we didn't. Air France found my bag immediately, and tried in vain to contact me, but since they had the wrong number (unbeknownst to us), I was unreachable. We spent ALL AFTERNOON yesterday trying to figure out why we weren't getting a call from Air France. I even called them, and that's when I found out that they hade made five attempts to reach us. Finally, we got desperate and bought a Skype number that we could call from our cell with hopes that the number would show up, and it did. One. Number. Off. The guy at the airport wrote down a 9 instead of a 2. A call to Air France to give them the correct number, and our new Skype number solved the problem. When I called them this morning, they said my bag would be here between 2 and 6. It got here at 4. I finally have my stuff.

And when I opened my bag, there was a note from US Customs that stated that my bag had been randomly searched. I guess that's why Keith's bag made it and mine didn't.

We've had a busy morning walking around Montorgueil. It's a great neighborhood, and
the weather could not be any better.













Eglise St. Eustache. An absolutely beautiful church constructed between 1532 and 1640 (with foundations dating to 1200). When we arrived, we could hear the organ inside.










Centre Pompidou. It's not beautiful, but it does house a huge public library and the largest modern art museum in Europe.











Melissa not using a knife and fork to eat her pizza. Ha!