We checked out of the hotel this morning and left our luggage. Mary had a fun conversation in French with the gentleman who handles the breakfast at the hotel. It was great to be able to have a real conversation in French. It was about our upcoming trip around France, which made it a lot easier, but still…it was a conversation.
Tanguy showed
up at 9:00 and we caught our Uber over to the Latin Quarter where we were met
by Claire, our guide for the morning tour.
After a bit of discussion, we headed over to our first stop Shakespeare
and Company. The story is that during
World War II, the original owner refused to sell a book to a Nazi officer. Upset, the officer said he would be back the
next day, with reinforcements, to take all of her inventory. That night her friends came to the store, and
they moved all of the books into hiding their attics and storage areas. When the Nazi’s returned the next day the
store was empty.
The current
Shakespeare and Co. is newer and owned by another company but they named if
after the original company in honor of the woman who exercised that small
resistance to the Nazi’s. There was a
line waiting for the business to open.
There are still a lot of flowering trees and shrubs around Paris.
Early in the walk she pointed out a medallion on the street that showed a see shell or scallop. It was part of the Saint Jacques walk, which was part of the pilgrimage route we saw in Portugal, the Santiago de Compostela route. While the routes in Spain and Portugal are the most well-known, there are actually routes from all over Europe that lead to Santiago de Compostela, Spain.
We also stopped in front of a small theater, Theatre de la Huchette. The theater shows various movies, but they always show two musicals that have been playing there continuously since 1957.
The nearby, famous and very narrow Rue du Chat-qui-Pêche (Street of the Fishing Cat).
We've seen some very small cars while here in Paris but this must be the smallest one yet.
From there we moved to the small Rene-Viviani Square. The statue in the center is in memory of the children who lost their lives in the Holocaust.
In one corner of the square’s garden was a gnarled old tree. The tree, an acacia, was planted in 1601 and is the oldest tree in Paris.
From there we visited the Saint Julien the Poor Church. It is a catholic church but was given to the Greek community so the interior had a lot of icons and other features of Greek Orthodox churches.
Next, it was a short walk to the Saint Severin Church.
We visited this small Chapel of the Sacrament.
There were lovely, traditional stained-glass windows...
and a number of very new and very modern and beautiful stained-glass windows.
A sundial on the side of a building. This one is the work of Salvador Dali, the surrealist painter known for his melting clocks.
Next stop was the gardens of the Cluny Museum. The Cluny is home of the famous unicorn and the lady tapestries dating from the Middle Ages. The signs in the garden reflect the unicorns.
Another short walk took us to the Samuel Paty Square. It is a small square with lots of flowering trees and flower beds and great views of the back of the Cluny Museum…
the Sorbonne.
Just outside the square was a seated statue of Michel de Montaigne, a 16th century French essayist. The feet on the bronze statue were rubbed shiny. The students of the nearby Sorbonne come to rub his feet for good luck on their exams.
From there we said our good-byes to Claire and caught an uber back to our hotel. We headed to the nearby Le Chalet for a last lunch in Paris…galettes (savory crepes).
The place was packed. Tanguy said that in general, Parisians eat out at lunch instead of taking lunch to work. And they must make reservations for most of the restaurants and cafes. And Tanguy always had reservations for us.
Some last photos from our time in Paris.
We walked back to the hotel, got our luggage and our ride to the airport rental car showed up right on time. We made it to the rental company and got the car with no trouble. We were on the road to Lille by about 3:30pm.
There were a
lot of rape fields (also called Canola) in full bloom along the way. The drive was only about 2 hours. We did stop for gas along the way. The rental was empty tank to empty tank.
We found our hotel with minimal trouble and got checked in. Fortunately we had made reservations for parking as well. Parking appeared to be generally hard to find in the area. The hotel’s parking garage was very close but required two different codes…one to get onto the street and one to get into the garage itself.
We settled into our corner room and then headed out to find someplace for dinner. We settled for a place that serves Flammekuecken. It is a bit like pizza but with a very thin, almost cracker like crust and a variety of toppings. Mary got the goat cheese, honey and bacon.
Paul had a bowl of spaetzle (sort of a pasta/noodle dish from Germany) with vegetables and cheese.
We walked a bit and found the Grand Place (now called the Place de Charles de Gaulle because Charles de Gaulle was born in Lille). Lovely square.
And this edifice was nearby.
Then we headed back to the hotel for the night.
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