Planning a London/Paris museum hopping trip (1 Viewer)

[Francois Caron]

You'd rather see my ass?

Phone problem is solved. I found the Virgin Megastore on the Champs Elysées. 30 Euro card with 30 Euro credit. The international call rate is 89 cents. Ouch! But it's no worse than TalkMobile's roaming charges.

I'll have to stop at the Carphone Warehouse once back in London and see what they have in unlocked quad band phones. I might just get a SIM card once I'm back in Canada.

 

[Holadem]

Eh I have fond memories of that Virgin Megastore. It was my first time in Europe, I was 13 ('91.) I could finally see and touch and BUUUYYYYYY all these video games I had read about for ages . Spent hours in that store.

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H

 

[Philip Hamm]

The vew from the Eiffel town is easily worth the wait, Particularly at night.

 

[Francois Caron]

Philip, I've already been at the top of l'Arc de Triomphe last night and filmed the Eiffel Tower at night along with the surrounding cityscape. The tower is beautiful in its European Union color scheme. I also filmed the La Défense sector and its square building with the hole in it.

I'm starting to tire out a bit. Luckily, most museums were closed today except for the Musée d'Orsay which I went to see after I did my laundry. This is by far the BEST museum I've seen during my trip! The impressionist gallery was fantastic, full of the type of paintings I can truly appreciate! And amongst the sculptures, I was "nursing a semi" admiring Aristide Maillol's seductive "L'Ile-de-France".

Strange thing in the Métro. I saw my second turnstile jumper since I got here. But what's funny about this one is that he did his move only when there was no one around except me! He didn't try to attack me or anything remotely close to it. But for some weird reason, it's as if he thought I was "safe".

The Paris Métro is definitely rougher than the London Tube. While both systems are over a hundred years old, London's Tube system has nearly wiped out all traces of graffiti and window scratchings. The Paris Métro however is plagued with graffiti and window scratches as far as the eye can see. The seating arrangements are also of very poor quality, making it very difficult to get out of your seat and off the train if you're sitting in the middle seats, further complicated by a severe lack of properly positioned handrails. The London Tube trains however not only have a single seating arrangement style that doesn't block the passageways, the handrails are plentiful, and there are reserved areas for your luggage!

It's still a toss-up as to which city has the best underground transportation network as I've yet to travel the Paris Métro during rush hour, which will happen very soon during an afternoon trip from La Défense! I should get some great shots then!

That's it for Tuesday. Tomorrow, I head to the Centre Pompidou, then back to Le Louvre to shoot a few more scenes for the vignette I wanted to make. I just want to grab a couple more shots to make it look really good.

 

[andrew markworthy]

You are far from the first person to ask this. It's basically a hangover from the 19th century when someone announced that this was the greatest sculpture and the Mona Lisa was the greatest painting and it became a fashion. Both the V d M and the ML are great works of art, but the idea that they deserve their almost hagiographic adulation is ludicrous.

 

[Francois Caron]

Wednesday. Third day into my Paris Museum Pass. And I'm beginning to be fed up of museums.

I went to the Centre Pompidou today. Regrettably, modern art doesn't appear to be a favourite of mine. Most often I either find it pretentious or just plain junk. But at least the Centre had a decent number of items where the artists were making a decent effort to try and communicate something in their works.

I also had lunch at their rooftop restaurant. They offered 30 grams of caviar for only 170 Euros. I had the omelet instead for only 12 Euros. I've tasted caviar in the past. Tastes like crap.

For dessert, I had the chocolate cake, also for 12 Euros. What shows up is something the size of a baby hockey puck. But contrary to North American cakes which are bland and loaded with sugar to hide the bad taste, this small dessert packed the biggest chocolate punch I've ever had! It was definitely worth the price!

I then went to Notre-Dame Cathedral. It's a big church, and it's very beautiful. But since I'm an atheist, its symbolism is a bit lost on me. Fantastic round windows though. It's hard to believe it came very close to being torn down just over a hundred years ago.

I then went to the Musée de l'Orangerie which houses the private collection of Jean Walter and Paul GUillaume. Man! Talk about a collection! Some of the most beautiful paintings ever made by early 20th century artists are on display here! And being a small museum, you don't have to worry so much about running out of time before the place closes. In fact, it's only the second museum I've encountered during my trip where you can actually take your time!

Tomorrow, the Canal St-Martin, the old Roman amphitheater, La Défense, and the Paris Métro at rush hour! Let's see how well Parisians handle the "Underground Squeeze!"

You people are still reading this stuff, are you?

 

[Carlo_M]

Francois, color me jealous. The SO and I went to Paris for 5 days in late 2006 and loved it (also went to south of France, Arles, Nice, Arpaillargues--near Uzes--for another 5 days) and loved it. Just reading your posts takes me back nearly two years. I'm not a big travel guy [mostly due to funds] but I can't wait to get back there.

And though I was raised Catholic, I've certainly lapsed and, to quote REM, "lost my religion". Even then, though, Notre Dame was quite an experience for me.

Didn't make the L'Orangerie, but based on your write-up, I'm putting it on my short list when we return.

And ditto about modern art. I just don't get it. Over the summer we did 4 days in NYC and hit the big museums, and a lot of MOMA just didn't appeal to me.

 

[Holadem]

Well, that it's 800 y/o is a bit humbling, no? I am not religious either but I love old cathedrals. I will check all these out some day: Most beautiful cathedrals in Europe

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H

 

[Carlo_M]

Cool list/site H.

Color me "Learned a new geography lesson" - didn't realize Moscow counted as Europe...

 

[Dennis Nicholls]

The old cathedrals are fascinating. The glass in the windows is thicker at the bottom than at the top of each pane. Why? Glass is actually NOT a solid but rather a very viscous liquid, and the glass there is starting to "pour out" of its frames. Another thousand years or so and they may have to fix it.

Carlo: the dividing line between Europe and Asia is obviously made up since they share a huge land mass. Generally you start in the north, go down the Ural Mts., down the Ural river to the Caspian, then across the Caucasus Mts., across the Black Sea, then through the Bosporus and Dardanelles to the Med.

 

[Holadem]

And don't forget, between North and South Ossetia

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H

 

[Francois Caron]

Here's my latest European Vignette. It's a bit dark.

 

[Philip Hamm]

Nice.

 

[Carlo_M]

Wow, when I was in the Louvre in 2006 they did not allow photography [let alone flash photography] of La Joconde. Has the rule changed or are people just blatantly ignoring it?

 

[Holadem]

It's a zoo in there, so the picture ban is not really enforceable. I was there last January and took tons of pix.

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H

 

[Francois Caron]

That's exactly what I thought of Le Louvre: a real zoo. Its status as a museum is being severely degraded by the mob mentality inside the place. It's no longer about looking at art as being able to brag to your friends and family that you were there.

The Mona Lisa room has a sign at the door that clearly indicates that no flash photography is permitted. But the guards are powerless to stop the thousands of people that show up every day not to look at the Mona Lisa, but to have their picture taken with it.

It's that insane scenario that inspired me to make that video. I found the scene so disgusting that I had to speak out against it in my own way.

To wash away that foul taste from my mouth, I went back to the Musée d'Orsay and gazed at my statue girlfriend. Schwing!

I also went to the Canal St-Martin. It's nowhere near as nice as depicted in the movie "Le Fabuleux Destin d'Amélie Poulain". I also went to the remains of "Les Arènes de Lutèce" and was surprised how good the acoustics still were despite how much of the original structure was missing.

I also went to La Défense. Yikes! Talk about a concrete wasteland! Whoever thought putting a hole in a building would improve the city's worldwide standing had a hole in their head! It looks like one of those boxes used to hold a chocolate Easter bunny!

And to be honest, there's nothing really special about the Champs Elysées. It's mainly a very big boulevard gradually being polluted by trendy British and American themed shops.

Tomorrow, I head back to London! The things left to do are go to Harrods, go back to the Globe Theatre, and visit the National Gallery before my trip home.

 

[Francois Caron]

A quick update.

Some idiot on the sixth floor of the hotel set fire to the flower window box with a cigarette! We had to evacuate the hotel while the fire department confirmed the fire was put out. The firemen then ripped out the flower box to make sure it wouldn't start up again.

The fire department responded very quickly. The major problem with Paris is the high number of old buildings. They were built at a time when fire codes simply didn't exist.

Hopefully the night won't be restless. I have a long day ahead of me tomorrow.

 

[andrew markworthy]

I've never been to the Pompidou [British and Italian architects, BTW], but I went to the museum of modern art when it was housed in its previous building. We had the place practically to ourselves. One of the temporary exhibitions consisted of a series of pencil lines on paper. Let me make this clear - that's one pencil line per piece of paper. Not all modern art is rubbish, of course. But the bad stuff amongst it really is eye-wateringly bad.

 

[Philip Hamm]

If you visit the Louvre out of season then generally the big zoolike crowds are only to be seen at the really famous stuff like the Mona Lisa, Winged Victory, Venus De Milo, etc. The rest of the museum is full of fantastic stuff and takes days to get through. I found the Muse De Orsay to be a zoo also when I visited in the fall of 2005.

 

[Carlo_M]

I was going to say, it was busy when I went at the "biggies" but far from a zoo. And I went for 2 days. It was in late September 2006.