A Sunday Spent Strolling Like Royalty

Jet-Lagged Toddler Update

Dang, I hate having this heading in all our posts...

With Max's single hour of wakefulness in the middle the Friday/Saturday night we were so hopeful that the end was in sight...but alas he was up again twice last night.  The single benefit of this current situation is that it makes me really, really thankful for years of good sleep we've always had with toddlers before, and again I say God bless the Ezzos because I think I would go insane if this was my "normal" life.  This, too, shall pass!

 A Taste of Home

Our destination this morning was Versailles.  It is nearly an hour outside Paris so you have to take one of the RER trains, which is like a commuter train.  They run through the city of Paris but are more like full-sized trains with an upstairs and downstairs in each car.  When we came out of the RER station in Versailles we saw, straight across from us (great placement, by the way), a welcoming-ly familiar sign.  And yes, we went in, and yes, we had our "usual" order.  And yes, it was good.  Don't judge.

Les Grandes Eaux Musicales

We started the day in the gardens behind the palace.  We picked this particular day to head to Versailles because it was a day for Les Grandes Eaux Musicales (The Great Musical Waters), which only happens on weekends from March to October so this was the last one of the year!  On those days, for a few hours, they actually run all the fountains in the vast gardens (I think there are over 30 of them) and have music playing, etc.  The gardens are huge and beautiful and the fountains are amazing.  Long ago, whenever the royalty wanted to stroll through their gardens there were servants whose job it was to operate the fountains using these big handpumps that were hidden off to the side (think the old railroad car 2-sided handpumps from cartoons).  As the king or queen would walk by a fountain the servants would be pumping away and as soon as s/he passed by they would take off running down the side of the gardens toward the pumps for the next fountain so that by the time the royalty arrived it, too, was spouting in all its glory.

The grounds are also full of statues everywhere you look.  And most of them have been broken and repaired; you can see the places where they were put back together.  Many are still missing small pieces, especially fingers or toes.  When the revolutionaries made it out to Versailles to try to capture Louis XVI and Marie Antoinette, and then later during the Revolution, Versailles was pillaged and trashed - the statues in the gardens were almost all broken into pieces.  Later, the government of France spent a lot of effort restoring them, as well as tracking down original furnishings of the palace, artwork that had been taken, etc.  Really crazy.

You can see statues in the background.They also line most of the path to that large body of water waaaaay back behind us.

BTW, if you haven't noticed, Josie is really into posing right now.  :p

Feeding the ducks at the Grand Canal

Loving playing in the leaves while walking around the grounds

Me and my honey in "The Temple of Love" - taken by Nicole!

Random gigantic faux-ancient rock construction that the royalty built for some reason

The Trianons and "The Queen's Hamlet"

The big palace is not the only building on the grounds.  There are also some smaller buildings (The Grand Trianon and The Petit Trianon) used as living quarters for various kings' mistresses, for other members of the royal family or by the king or queen to 'get away' from the stress of being at court.  Rough life, huh?  Here you can see how fancy even these secondary buildings are.  You can also see how Max did much of Versailles.  Hey Nicole Twedt - you're right - the Ergo carrier rocks!

Nicole found the entrance hall of the Grand Trianon (and the chandelier) to be quite impressive!

Quick stop for lunch in a cafe in the gardens

We also visited The Queen's Hamlet, something neither Scott nor I had seen before.  Apparently Marie Antoinette, who it should be noted was only 15 when she came to France to be queen, wanted a place that was just her own, so she had a fake little peasant village built on the grounds of Versailles.  It has a few houses and other buildings, a well and a farm.  She would go there to "play peasant" occasionally, milking a cow and feeding chickens, etc.  Of course there was a cadre of actual servants who had to do the work there, but when she was there no servant was to be seen.  In "her house" in the town she even had a dining table that raised and lowered through the floor so servants below could prepare and serve her food without her ever having to see them <insert eye roll here.>  Here is what part of the hamlet looks like

I had to show you these two pictures because Max's favorite part of the whole visit was the animals we saw at the farm.  LOL!  I have no idea what kind of cows these were - they were crazy looking!

The Palace

Finally we made it back up to the palace itself.  As beautiful as the fountains, gardens and other building are, nothing really compares with the splendor of the palace itself.  We reminded the girls to try to think of it as a house - can you imagine living here everyday, just walking these hallways and having it be "home"?  When you think of the poverty and hunger that was going on in Paris at the start of the French Revolution and contrast it with the incredible excess that you see at the palace it is easy to see how things ended the way they did for the monarchy.

This is the chapel in which Scott and I got to attend an organ concert at the end of our last visit to Versailles.  It was awesome!

This is the ceiling of the chapel.  Ceilings are painted like this all over the palace.

Just a door.  Oh, your doors don't look like this?  Poor you, because here they all do!

Getting ready to go into The Hall of Mirrors

Seriously the most beautiful room I have ever been in.  And so much history...

Family self-portrait in one of the centuries-old mirrors!

The King's Bedchamber

The Queen's Bedchamber

And now I am off to bed myself, in a bed which looks nothing like either of those.  More on that later, though, as I think in a couple days I'll be posting a virtual tour of the neighborhood and apartment where we are staying!

We Find a Jack o' Lantern! Oh, and visit L'Arc de Triomphe! (Saturday)

Update on the Jet-lagged Toddler

Another early morning, another 2:00am visit with Mr. Max.  At least this time he was only up from 2:00-3:00 then slept the rest of the night.  Maybe we're moving in the right direction?

A Little Rendez-Vous and a Few Words on the Stereotype of the Rude French Person

Our day started earlier today (as well it should have since we slept until 11am yesterday!)  We started the day with another batch of yummy goodness from the bakery across the street. Oh how I love starting the morning picking out delicious things for my family and sitting around the table eating and laughing together. This is bliss!

We had made arragements with the owner of the apartment we're staying in for her to come this morning to collect the rest of the payment we owed her, having only done a deposit via international wire transfer from the US.  She showed up about 9:30 bringing linens and towels for the next people who will have the apartement when we leave.  While putting them away she chatted with us, then made sure we knew how to run the washing machine, microwave/convection oven and various heaters in the apartment.  She also said "I didn't think of it before, but I should have left toys for your children to play with!  I can come back next Saturday with anything you need, just send an email.  I can bring games, movies, stuffed animals, whatever they would like!"  And before leaving she asked us if we could use a 2nd key to the apartment.  We said yes, that might come in handy she proceeded to take her key off her keyring and asked us to just be careful with it because it is her only other key, so now she doesn't have one at all.  We said "Is that really ok?  We can do without one..." but she insisted, saying, "No, no, it is fine, I trust you.  I just trust people."  She could not have been nicer in any way.

Which is just further proof of my statement that the stereotype of the rude French person, and especially the rude Parisian, is just bunk.  This is my 3rd time here, and Scott's 2nd, and we have consistently been treated so nicely by everyone we have met (except one snooty clerk in a FNAC store 14 years ago whose derisive nose-in-the-air "Non" responses to my two questions are the exception that proves our rule)!  While I realize the fact that I am fluent in French certainly helps matters, Scott says that even when we have been apart in the city and he has done something alone with his very broken French he has always been treated well.  If you are kind, always say "Bonjour" when you enter somewhere, at least attempt to speak a little French instead of assuming they will just speak English to you and use "s'il vous plait" and "merci" liberally you will find yourself treated well.
Ok, off the soapbox.  LOL!

L'Arc de Triomphe

Our big sightseeing goal today was L'Arc de Triomphe!  The closest Metro station to the monument lets you off on Les Champs-Elysees, right in front of it.  It is an amazing sight to be riding the escalator up from underground and suddenly have this massive monument loom up right before you.  Most impressive!

It was SO cold and windy while we were there that the girls barely wanted to be outside on the top of the monument!  

Les Champs-Elysees

Luckily we brought them hats and gloves because we saw it was supposed to be pretty cold at night a few days during our trip, but this is earlier, colder and in the daytime.  Brrr!  Scott has gloves too, but I'm thinking Max and I need a trip to my favorite Tati store to get wintered up if this weather is going to continue!

Halloween, Expat-Style

The other big item on the agenda today was the Halloween Party at The American Library in Paris.  When the girls realized we would be in Paris for Halloween, and that this would mean they wouldn't get to trick or treat in our neighborhood they were sad.  Once they found out that Halloween isn't really something they do at all in France they were really, really sad!  Expat community to the rescue!

Running through the leaves (a favorite activity) on the way to the party

The girls got to dress up and we spent a couple hours at the party where they had crafts, candy, snacks, a costume contest and a showing of It's the Great Pumpkin Charlie Brown.

We even found what may be the only jack o' lantern on public display in the city of Paris and got to take a picture with it.

And so our strange and somewhat pointless American holiday of Halloween was saved.  Whew.  Max had a cute little costume and was to attend the party to, but his nap was late so we let him sleep instead and Daddy hung out at the apartment and had a nice nap.  Max didn't seem to mind that he missed celebrating his cultural heritage, or whatever.

Dinner in an Actual Restaurant

Yes, you read that right.  Those of you who are very astute and have poured over every word of our blog entries mulitple times (every does that, right?) have probably noticed that we only thusfar ventured into one actual French restaurant to eat, and then only at lunchtime.  What a change from our last trip of hours spent lingering over lunch and dinner every day.  Oh well, c'est la vie familiale!
After L'Arc de Triomphe and before the party we had had a fantastic lunch of fresh baguette and leftover delicious cheeses, meats, etc from last night, so we thought tonight was the nice to head out!  We wandered a bit checking out the menus outside a few restaurants near out apartment (all French restaurants have their menus posted outside so you can always check it out before going in) and chose one called Cafe Flores.

Nicole, who seems to be branching out, food-wise, ordered Esalope du Saumon (a big piece of salmon baked with a lemony sauce) and at the whole thing by the time we were finished with our appetizers!  Josie (who was falling asleep at the table before the food came) and Max split a Pesto Pasta dish, but Josie's favorite thing actually ended up being my dinner!  Scott had Escargots, which were amazing, and Entrecote Frites (steak and fries).  I had Crostillante de Chevre which was oustanding and Confit de Canard (Duck Confit).  Can I just say again how fabulous French food is?  Sigh... 

Notre Dame, Orangina and Ice Cream!

Life With a Jet-Setting Toddler

Thursday night after our très française pizza we all settled happily into bed.  Until about midnight when Max woke up.  We got him settled back down, then returned to bed.  Until 2am, when Max woke up crying.  Then he was wide awake wanting to play.  Ahhh, jet-lag.  We brought him into bed with us where he continued to fuss and try to get us to play, then finally fell asleep where he kicked and twisted and turned and rolled over keeping us all 3 in a state of half-sleep until we finally got up at 11:00am.  Again I say ahhh, jet-lag!

After a quick trip to the boulangérie (bakery) across the street we fueled up with croissants, pain au chocolat, mini beignets and chouquettes.  Yum!  Then it was off to Notre Dame!

While waiting for the Metro, however, we made the girls’ day and bought a bottle of Orangina from the vending machine.  They are both seriously in love with this classic French drink!

Notre Dame de Paris

One thing Scott and I had been really looking forward to was seeing Notre Dame without the front being covered by scaffolding.  For many years in the 90s Notre Dame underwent a major renovation and cleaning on the outside, so there was literally scaffolding covering parts of its front for years.  It was there on part when I came to Paris alone in 1996, and there was even more of it when we came together in 1998.  So we came up the stairs from the Metro, turned the corner and were greeted with this sight

So yes, the front of the church is clear, but the lovely little plaza in front of it, filled with plants, benches and open space which usually houses various street performers and musicians is no more!  Apparently next year is Notre Dame’s 850^th anniversary and one of the projects they are doing to mark it is re-doing the plaza and adding a “Jubilee Path,” (whatever that is).  Oh well, perhaps someday we will come here and actually get a clear frontal view of the entire cathedral.  It’s a good excuse to come back, anyhow!

The girls liked the cathedral and all the stained glass and couldn’t believe how old it is! 

While we were inside we purchased lit candles in memory of my mom and Scott’s grandma who passed away this summer.
 

Nicole's candle for Grandma Beth

Josie's candle for Meemie

We didn’t make it into the towers of the church today, since the line to do so was very long and we had 3 hungry little tummies with us, having gotten such a late start!  However we did take time to play at the little playground right next to the church.  Check out Max hanging out on a bouncer with the Notre Dame in the background.  How cool is that?

We Finally Eat Some Real French Food

After our chilly, windy play session we strolled along the Seine (oh, how I LOVE the sound of that) reading menus from bistros and cafes we passed until we found one that sounded irresistible and popped in for lunch.  Max charmed the heck out of the 2 older French women sitting at the table next to us with a dog and we had a nice conversation with them before leaving.  After escargot, paté, boeuf bourguignon and penne au basilic we were ready for ice cream!  Yes, it was less than 50 degrees, windy and threatening rain and we went for ice cream!  There is a world-famous ice cream place called Berthillon which is near Notre Dame and we had promised our small traveling companions a post-cathedral stop there so we had to deliver!  It was delicious, but we were all so busy eating that there are no pictures for you to salivate over.  Too bad, too, because Max couldn’t stop taking big messy baby bites of my dark chocolate ice cream and was the cutest, most chocolate-faced little guy you have ever seen!

We headed home so Max could take a nap, let the girls put on a movie then I did a bunch of running around on little errands, including getting French SIM cards for our phones, so we can now call and text each other while here and we now have mobile data again – boy is that annoying to live without when you’re used to having it!  That also means that if you need or want to call us in Paris we each have a phone number you can reach us at.  If you’d like it just send me an email and I’ll give it to you!

One of my errands took me to the grocery store so I stocked up on cheeses, meats and other goodies and brought it all home for a delicious, truly français dinner at home (so much better than that pizza…)