The traffic around the Arc d' Triumphe is crazy. I made a huge sacrifice standing in the middle of it all to bring back these pictures.
The traffic around the Arc d' Triumphe is crazy. I made a huge sacrifice standing in the middle of it all to bring back these pictures.
Once we got settled into our hotel room, we hopped back on the Metro and started our sightseeing at the Arc d'Triumphe. After taking in the view from the top, we strolled down the historic Champs Elysee and had lunch at Pizza Pino (recommended by Jessica Smith). It was here that we experienced the only bad weather on the trip, about 15 minutes worth of thunderstorms and hail. While we never did try any strawberries with crème fraishe (recommended by Mr. Lightfoot), we did see another couple with a place and they did look pretty damn tasty.
We then continued our walk to Place de la Concorde (the place of chopping off heads) to the grounds of the Louvre to look around then took the Metro back to the hotel. Our first day ended with a late snack at the hotel.
Susana and Michael without his daily pre-8:00 AM dose of coffee
Note: This has been an interesting trip for a person who is used to 40-50 oz of coffee a day. In neither Paris nor Amsterdam did we find any cafés that served the equivalent to the Starbucks venti. Instead, we had "little" cups of café au lait and we thought that it would be rude and uncivilized to order 8-10 coffees. The only place where I really got my caffeine fix was at the Renaissance Hotel in Paris because they had complementary coffee... so, each morning I would dutifully trot downstairs, make myself 3 cups of coffee (since each one was small) and bring them back up to the room where I would enjoy them over daily newspaper.
I guess that you either love the Picasso Museum or you don't. I for one, enjoyed some of his earlier works but don't get the later abstract pieces. However, if you like Picasso... and get it, this is the place to go.
The Louvre was pretty amazing even though we restricted our tour to a few areas, namely the ancient Greek sculpture (Venus de Milo), the Italian renaissance painters (Da Vinci, Raphael, Titian), and much more. While the works themselves are pretty neat, like actually seeing the Mona Lisa, it's amazing to realize how much of the world's greatest art is collected under one roof. I think that this is what Susana liked so much about the Louvre.
Since we had extra time on our hands, we thought we try to take in Ste. Chapelle and Notre Dame. Unfortunately, the line at Notre Dame was too long so we thought we'd come back the next day when the lines were shorter - NOT. Ste. Chapelle is a small cathedral in the middle of the Palace of Justice. The amazing thing about this cathedral is the stained glass, which basically recounts the Bible in stained glass (14 windows at ~20 scenes per window = 280 scenes). If you know where to look, you can see such popular stories like Cain applying the beat down on Abel and the parables of Jesus.
We then went back to our hotel for a short nap then headed out to La Fontaine de Mars (in the Rue Cler neighborhood) for dinner. I had the rabbit (thought I should try the meats that Americans don't often eat) stuffed with duck foie gras
Note to David: I will watch my feet for signs that they might fall off), which was excellent. After a most filling dinner, we waddled across the Champs du Mars to the Eiffel Tower (which by now was all lit up) and had our first crepe.
Note: We noticed today that we haven't seen any obese Parisians. I think there are too damn many stairs (see notes from day 1).
By the way, Susana doesn't get to pick water anymore. We got a bottle of orange flavored water, which tasted like the left over water after washing a jug of orange juice.
Here is Susana standing in line to climb the stairs into the bell tower at Notre Dame, as if we wouldn't climb enough stairs over the next couple of days. However, all lines go faster with a tasty French sandwich for breakfast.
Today started at Notre Dame Cathedral. Unfortunately, we didn't wake up early enough and had to wait for 2 1/2 hours to get into the bell towers. They only let 15 people up at a time and as you can imagine a lot of them either take their time up top or take a lot of time to get up top. The view of Paris from the top is pretty nice but the best part is seeing how Ile de Cite is situated in the middle of the Seine and the architecture of Notre Dame. The inside is pretty impressive too with all the statuary and stained glass. If you're a fan of stained glass however, you're better off visiting Ste. Chapelle or Chartres.
While the stained glass inside of Notre Dame is nice, what makes the other cathedrals so nice is the detailed storytelling that is captured in glass. In the case of Ste. Chapelle, it's the entire Bible, in the case of Chartres, it's a more limited but equally impressive set of stories.
Notre Dame and Ste. Chapelle are located on the Ile de Cite, in the middle of the Seine. The bell tower at Notre Dame is one of the best places to get a view of this spectacular location.
Next stop, the Musee d'Orsay. This museum is housed in the former Gare (train station) d'Orsay and contains works by such artists like Monet, Cézanne, Sisley, and their peers. If you're into Impressionists and Post Impressionists, this is the place to go. In addition to the artwork, we thought it was laid out nicely to really enable the full appreciation of the exhibits.
Due to the long wait at Notre Dame (should have gone earlier), we didn't make the Rodin Museum. Instead, we headed back to Rue Cler, which was mostly closed up the previous day, to wander amongst the food stalls then camped out at a corner café for an early dinner (roasted chicken, café au lait, and a crepe). After all this walking, we retired to the hotel for a well-earned feet soaking and rest.
Hmmmmm, still can't get Internet access. Turns out, this was a good thing, except for the 10-days worth of e-mails that I lost. Oh well, the sacrifices we make.
Enjoying the simple pleasures of people watching at a sidewalk café.... and hunting the for freshly-made crepes.
On the Metro, on the way back from dinner, we (I) sat next to an old homeless woman who was asleep (thank God). For a while, I though she was dead since I couldn't detect and life signs and she showed absolutely no reactions to all of the bumps, turns, stops, etc made by the Metro. I guess Susana found it pretty amusing that I kept trying to look at her nonchalantly throughout our journey home. I remember that two thoughts kept going through my head, 1) is she dead? and 2) should I move to a different seat? Finally, to my great relief, she woke up
This was supposed to be the night we went to bed early but we blew the agenda by staying up late to write post cards and journal our adventures.
In addition to housing one of the finest examples of stained glass in the world, Chartres is the home of the veil of Mary.
I've always wanted to go to Chartres to visit the cathedral but didn't have enough time. The train ride out is pretty short (about 45 minutes from Montparnasse station). This time we took the time to try to understand the work and stories that are carved into the cathedral. We bought a couple of guidebooks and walked around Chartres cathedral and tried to identify all of the carvings in the archways, etc. It was pretty neat to see how everything in the cathedral; stained glass, carvings, statuary, etc all weaves a cohesive story. In this respect, the stained glass at Chartres is more magnificent than that at Notre Dame. The stained glass there is nice but there is not story to the artwork. The stained glass at Chartres is more in the league of Ste. Chapelle. Chartres was also a great place to have a nice picnic lunch (yup, more cheese and crackers) in the garden under the shadow of a 900-year old church. By the time we got back, my neck was sore from looking up at so many carvings.
Paris has a lot of dogs and every now and then you bring home a souvenir - on the bottom of your shoes.
A couple of trivial points: This was Susana's first ride on a train. Three Korean girls in our car missed their stop (Versailles) and had to pay the extra cost to Chartres. They were quite bummed but will never forget to watch the stops from now on. At the train station on our return from Chartres, we ran into an old French lady who reminded Susana of Ang Gong, her grandfather, in that she struck up a fine conversation with us out of the blue. She chatted on about her trip to China and asked us a bunch of questions, not more than 2 of which we were able to answer. In any case, she was fun.
Susana got her experience with the Paris homeless on the way back to the hotel. This time, it was a bad-smelling person who talked to himself. Luckily, I have a poor sense of smell and did not suffer this or her Versailles experience in quite the same fashion she did.
Going to Chez Omar (43 Rue du Bretegne) in the Marias neighborhood for some North African food, namely couscous and meat. It was a great meal. We shared a big plate of couscous, a bowl of vegetable stew, skewered lamb and roasted chicken. Note: next time, order one dish for both of us. There was enough for a whole other meal.
The best part of Versailles was walking though the gardens outside, away from the smelly people.
Versailles was the palace of King Louis XIV, the Sun King. We tried to get there early but apparently did not arrive early enough. In addition to it being hot, we got trapped behind a lot of large tour groups for the walkthrough of the chateau. As can be imagined, it was especially tough on Susana, given her height relative to all the smelly men, to get sandwiched in between a bunch of sweating tourists who were over packed into small, hot, airless rooms. As a result, we made it through the rooms pretty fast and tried to take in what we could on the move.
The outside gardens were a whole other story. Considering that it was 8 miles long, had a 1-mile long canal dug out in addition to all the gardens, fountains, and other stuff, it was as impressive as the interior. It was interesting to contrast the cathedrals we had seen (all built to the glory of God) vs. Versailles (built to entertain one man, King Louis XIV)
Our last major site in Paris was the Musee d'Rodin, which provided a neat opportunity to contrast sculpture with all the paintings we had seen up to now. The museum and gardens were nicely laid out and really gave the viewer a great chance to appreciate everything
Of course we made sure to take some time to write postcards to everyone at home and document our adventures.
Since we had some time to kill before our train to Amsterdam... and we wanted to stay out of the sun... and we didn't want to walk around any more, we decided to visit the La Marche department store. Our goal was to find souvenirs but we ended up pretty much camping out in the school supplies section deciding on stuff for the kids. Susana was quite jazzed about all the stuff she discovered there (can we say nerd?) but surprisingly we didn't buy anything for ourselves.
This was the day we had to say goodbye to Paris. Our ticket out of the City of Lights was the 2315 train to Amsterdam. We got to ride in first class but the seats didn't recline and the armrests didn't move which made it really hard to sleep without falling off the seat. Luckily, there was enough room where everyone could get their own row and sleep with their heads and arms in on set, while the body curved around the armrest to allow the legs to be curled up into the window seat. Still didn't get much sleep since the last train from Paris makes a lot of stops and the other passengers were kind of noisy.
Our first mission was finding a place to stash our luggage for the day. This was an adventure in itself. First, the change machine was out of money - we needed 16 guilders for two lockers. I made the first attempt at finding change and came back with 2 x 21/2 and 1 x 5 guilder coins, and 1) realized it wasn't sufficient for both lockers and 2) didn't want to lose the extra 2 guilders since the darn machines didn't give change. Next attempt went to Susana who unwittingly went to the same place I went and came back with the same change. OK, now we have enough to store both bags but would leave 4 guilders on the table - can't do that. Third attempt is the charm - hooray Susana. She came back with a croissant, a waffle, and the correct change.
Amsterdam has a nice tram (#20) that will take you all the way around the city starting from the train station. We started here and zoned until we got to the Museumplein (place of museums) stop. There we wandered around in the wet grass until we found the Van Gogh museum.
From what I remember, the museum was nice and well laid out to really facilitate appreciation for the art and learning about the works of Van Gogh. I'm sure we also enjoyed his work but our attention spans were really starting to fade. We'll make it back one of these days.
The walk back from the museum yielded a real treasure in a little corner store - Stroopwafels, waffle cookies with a maple-honey like syrup spread in between (I finally found them after all these years). Up until now, Susana had thought they were a figment of my imagination since I had been talking about them ever since she's known me, yet we hadn't been able to find them anywhere in the US (not for lack of looking).
En route to the train station, we passed through the Red Light district. OK, I admit we made a slight detour. This to say the least was underwhelming. I guess Amsterdam's red light district is going the same way as Bangkok's Pat Pong Road. Do not think for a moment that I am becoming a connoisseur of the world's red light districts.
The walk along the canals was nice. Highly recommended.
Susana thought that Amsterdam was a lot like a European Haight-Ashbury.
The town hall outside of our hotel room held 3 weddings in the space of an hour. That's efficiency.
Finally, we hopped on the train to Haarlem, where our hotel was located. Getting to our hotel, the Hotel Amadeus, meant a 15-minute drag of our luggage over the cobblestones to the main church, another drag up a set up stairs you would not believe, then to our room. If you stay here, ask for room 3 in the annex. It's a nice room which overlooks the main plaza and from which you get a grand view of everything that happens there. The town hall on our left was in the process of conducting 3 weddings when we arrived and it was fun watching the parties go in one after the other. We finished our first day in Holland with a simple dinner of pancakes and soup at one of the cafes in the square.
After the adventures and travel during the previous 36 hours, we had earned ourselves some time to kick back and relax.
We had a fun time getting used to the names of everything, especially money. Question for Susana, the Dutch monetary unit is called the:
The farmer's market in the town square was selling everything: flowers, cheese, pastries, art, ... and even smoked fish. Mmmmm, smoked fish.
We woke up in the morning to the sounds of the farmer's market being set up in the main plaza. The day consisted of a leisurely breakfast provided by our hotel (including cereal and milk for Susana) then a lazy day of strolling in and out of clothing and furniture stores. The hardest part of the day was wandering the farmer's market looking for candy and stroopwafels (yeah baby, brought home 5 bags) to bring home. Yeah, The Dentist feels guilty for buying all this candy but she overcame the training to ensure we brought back enough for everyone. Along the way, I got to introduce Susana to frites mit mayo, another of my favorite snack foods.
A nice Indonesian rijkstafel, consisting of rice and 13 other dishes such as traditional meats, salads, vegetables, and deserts (including rice for Susana), and shared café au laits in the 400-year old town square finished off our day.
Note: There are a lot of bicycles here. The cities (both Haarlem and Amsterdam) are small enough to get around easily on a bike and a lot of the streets have designated bike lanes, which I thought was really neat. We never did rent any bikes since as Susana said, "We were so tired, we would have just lost our balance and fallen over".
I wasn't kidding when I said the Hotel Amadeus had a steep flight of stairs. Here I am, ~7 stairs higher than Susana. I'm not sure that she should have been following me up the stairs.
Our adventure draws to a close. First we say goodbye to Haarlem with a relaxing breakfast at the Hotel Amadeus followed by a cab ride to the bus terminal. It finally rained and we decided that we were not going to drag our bags back down the cobblestones in the rain. The cab driver was pretty funny, "it is open... hee hee".
Now we're hanging out in the Ogden lounge at Schiphol airport sucking down tea and orange juice (no pulp) in preparation for our 14-hour (ugh) flight back to San Francisco. We have an exit row in business class for the 12 hours from London-San Francisco (Danny, your reputation as master of seat assignments is well deserved).
Susana demonstrates the beauty of exit rows.
During our various layovers we availed ourselves of the free food sections in the airport lounges for "gifts" to bring back to the family. Hey, the shortbreads are just as good from the lounge as they are from Harrods of London, just packaged for individual servings. We're just kidding. We're not quite that cheap.
Flying over the Greenland ice.
The flight back was uneventful if not long. However, flying back from Europe usually gives you the opportunity to fly over Iceland and Greenland which is a great opportunity to appreciate the glaciers and all the snow on top of these two islands.
Question for Susana: "Do you have anything to declare? No, just a purse full of candy, cookies and other snacks collected during our travels and at various airport lounges.
If you plan on bringing a laptop for business or just to keep track of your notes, here are a couple of common sense but sometimes overlooked tips:
This is what happens when you don't specify that you want a single large bed and have to push two singles together.