It's so quintessential Paris wandering over the Seine on one of the many bridges and taking in the city skyline.
We check out all the love locks on the balustrades at the end of the island before strolling through a cute little triangular park, called Daulphine before finding ourselves in the plaza in front of the Palais de Justice and Sainte Chapelle. These are two beautiful old buildings. It's very pretty the island of Cité, the original Paris you could say. We head up to Notre Dame and line up to get in. There's another Chinese bride getting her wedding photos taken in the forecourt and surrounds. It seems everyday we've walked past here there's been a Chinese bride getting photos. I ring it really strange, although I guess I'm from Sydney which is beautiful itself and we don't have smog.
The line doesn't take too long. We came to Notre Dame Saint Michel twice on our last trip and really enjoyed it. Entering today and we both really enjoyed it again. The length of the space is what impresses me the most I think, as well as the intricacies of the stained glass windows. I particularly like the 3 large round rose like ones. For me it's up there as one of my favourite cathedrals/basilicas. I feel I can say that with some authority now after this trip. We've seen a few! I like the proportions of the space as well as how the upper parts step in from he outer line of walls and allow another layer of stained glass and light to enter. I guess I also like the medieval older character too. The Renaissance churches are amazing and beautiful for their elaborate decoration and finesse, but here the beauty is in the expressed structure of the building itself.
Internally it has a great quality of light. Very atmospheric, particularly with the candle chandeliers that hang internally too. For me this character of light from the stained glass gives me a greater appreciation for the flying buttress utilised in this building. I think externally, the eastern (rear) facade is more impressive than the front because of the flying buttresses.
We head out and down to the modern memorial for French victims of the Nazi occupation of France in the 1940s. It's an interesting sunken space into the Rock of the island. You can see the cuts into the limestone bedrock. Quite a solemn space.
We stroll back over into the Marais for lunch, but stop first at a cafe which looks from the outside like it would do good coffee as it looks like an Aussie run cafe and also mentions Ethiopian beans (when a coffee shop mentions where their beans are from you assume they take themselves serious).
Sure enough it's good and the barista turns out to be a kiwi. He's been in Paris for 16 years now after chasing a French girl here when he was 21. Cool guy. She dumped him but he met a nice American girl and they now have 3 kids. We chatted to him for 10-15 minutes as I drank my coffee at the bar before we headed to our favourite food outlet in Paris, L'as du Falafel for one last pita bread pocket of goodness. I get a SHAWARMA, which has lamb meat rather than falafel in it. It's tasty but I think I mainly got it as i love saying SHAWARMA!
Love this area of the Marais. One of the best cheap eat places ever! Sims not overly hungry but gets some fries and a can of her new favourite drink, Orangina. Kind of like orange juice mixed with soda water. Not as sugary as Fanta. It's good. Seems to be a French only Coca Cola product though.
After lunch we crossed back over the river into Ile Saint Louis for one last scoop of Berthillon ice cream. Figure it's going to be a while until our next visit to Paris so got to get our fix of roasted pineapple and basil sorbet one last time.
Walking over the Pont, sim and I bust out singing Daft Punks 'One More Time' and I start dancing like an idiot. Very funny, but very on topic. Love this city and its great to have one last day to enjoy a few of our favourite parts.
We stroll over the river and back into the Latin quarter, at the start of boulevard Saint Germain. We pass the university and make our way to the botanic gardens. Rather fittingly this day has seen us visit many of the sights we saw on our first day in Paris on our first trip. We really liked the Jardin des Plantes. It's great to see it in the summer now too. After wandering the parks and looking at the interesting old steel glasshouses and the natural history museum building we head back to Jussieu and get the metro back to the hotel. We pick up our luggage and lug it to Gare de Nord.
Aurevoir France. Amazing once again!
After just under four hours playing the Ticket to Ride board game in real life, (training it from Paris to Bruxelles and then onto Amsterdam) we arrive at our hotel at 8pm.
After freshening up we head out for evening stroll. We wander into the town centre crossing a few canals as we go as well as walking past a few "coffee shops" that have bleary eyed customers walking out. At one point nearly everyone we walked past you could tell was doped up. After a good 45 minute stroll we can already tell it's a pretty place and we're going to enjoy it here. Everything feels so walkable and close. That is if we don't get run over by a someone on a bike. Crazy.
Despite the sun setting even later here, things seem to be quiet and shutting up around 10pm. I guess it's a Tuesday. We get a burger at apparently the best burger place in town according to the shop window. It's not bad. It's cold now so we head back to the hotel. Looking forward to exploring this place, or fun stop on this Western Europe wandering adventure.
mat + sim
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