May 5, 2017

After breakfast at Carette, our new favorite breakfast cafe at the Trocadero, we headed to the Metro to travel to the Notre Dame Cathedral for a Discover Walk, a tour given in English by a native French person, the cost of which is a tip, usually 10-20 euros. Found our way to the Charlemagne statue and waited for the guide. BTW the lines of tourists going into the Cathedral were quite long!  Our guide Simon arrived promptly at 11 for the walk. Simon is in his 20s, a native Parisienne who spent an exchange year at NYU and is very fluent in English....AND is charming!  

He led our walk of 9 people through the Latin Quarter and engaged us with history and story. We saw the oldest living thing in Paris, an acacia tree planted in 1602. At the bookstore Shakespeare and Co. Simon told us that any aspiring writer could live upstairs by promising to read a book a day and help in the store a few hours a day!  Along a very old, narrow street, we saw houses with "belly walls,"  houses built in the Middle Ages with first floor walls that protruded so that they wouldn't sink straight down into the mud!  He showed us where university professors in the Middle Ages would give lectures to students out of their windows while the students sat on bales of hay on the dirt street! We saw a very narrow medieval street slanted to the middle from each side to create a gutter for garbage, trash and sewerage thrown from windows. 

We walked by the College of Paris which does not give degrees but the best professors (think Jean Paul Sartre) give lectures for free to stimulate intellectualism!  Across the street, is a statue of Montaigne, who started the concept of the essay and we touched his toe as do most students before exams!  Then we strolled along side students in the  streets outside of the Sorbonne where we stopped for a group picture. Our walk ended at the Pantheon on the highest hill of the Latin Quarter originally built by Louis XV in his own honor but converted from a church to a mausoleum honoring the "Champions of French liberty!"  Voltaire and Rousseau who HATED each other are side by side!!  Our tour was over and we all clapped for Simon. 

After a cappuccino, we headed back to Notre Dame, walked through the cathedral, sat for some reflection and prayer, and then headed for a walk through Ile St. Louis, one of the ritziest areas in Paris. Along the way we saw a poster for a concert tomorrow night of Vivaldi's Four Seasons at a local church. Using GPS, we found the church and bought tickets and scoped out the Place du Marche St. Catherine for a restaurant for dinner before the concert. 

Our last stop before heading back to our apartment,  was to the Institut du Monde Arabe, suggested last night by Jeff. There is a lovely rooftop with views of the Seine and Notre Dame across the river. Also a very interesting exhibit of the history of Islam in Africa. Lots of African Islamic artifacts, photos and writings in Arabic, some very creatively done. By this time we were "done in!"  So we found our Metro station, reversed our route and arrived back at Trocadero at 6:30 with 16,000 steps each!

Back in the apartment by 7, we literally collapsed. Another day of 17,000 steps!  We've walked 28 miles in 4 days!  Our dinner was another indoor picnic!  The weather today was the best all week!  No rain!  It may have even climbed into the low 69s at one point!

Two more tidbits from Simon: If you want to eat at a place frequented  by locals, there are three things to look for. The menu should be only in French, no English and it should be short, indicating all items served will be fresh!  Lastly,  look at the sidewalk outside the restaurant; If there are lots of cigarette butts there, the locals like the restaurant. Also, there are two different types of baguettes: one is crispy or "bien cuite;" the other is fluffy and lighter, bien blanche". The French argue over the merits of each kind!  Peter loves both!