Last Day in Paris...Part Two

Notre Dame

St. Denis holding his head...see story below

once again, love the gargoyles. The ones on Notre Dame are my favorites

The spot on the ground outside of Notre Dame where all distances from Paris are measured.

Notre Dame from the back

our love lock...awwww

attaching our lock to the bridge

celebrating 27 years in May

sealed with a kiss

attaching their lock

sealed with a kiss

Our love locks

this is only one side of the bridge!

french cheese

my favorite ice cream

Andy with his Berthillon ice cream reward for LOTS of stairs today!

love this metro station design

Musee d'Orsay

our dinner spot

these drawings along the wall were quite bizarre

radishes and butter instead of bread...interesting

escargot

and they thought it was delicious!

steak and macaroni and cheese with Burgundy sauce

magret de canard (duck breast)

melting center chocolate cake...divine

pistachio and chocolate pastry

chocolate mousse with orange sauce

Notre Dame was beautiful and they still allow photos inside although only without a flash. The "flash police" descended quickly upon anyone who used one. Here is the story of St. Denis, depicted on the left portal of Notre Dame. It is not John the Baptist as I once thought. "Saint Denis, the first bishop of Paris, met his death around 273 A.D., almost two millennia ago. The Romans, who then occupied Paris, already had their hands full in fighting off barbarian hordes when this charismatic Christian arrived on the scene. According to legend, Roman soldiers tortured Denis near the present site of Notre-Dame and then decapitated him on the slopes of Montmartre. Then—still according to legend—the martyred saint astonished one and all by picking up his head and walking northward almost four miles until he collapsed on the site now marked by the cathedral (formerly the abbey church) that bears his name. No matter that the legend was created centuries afterwards, probably by the monks of Saint-Denis. It gave their abbey and their founder a special aura, and Denis—whose torture and martyrdom were doubtless real enough, if not so fanciful—went on to gain a special prominence among French saints. His abbey church became the traditional burial place for French royalty, and his legend continued through the centuries. Which is why, on the portal of Notre-Dame or wherever you see him depicted, he is the saint who patiently holds his head in his hands." Interesting story don't you think. Anyway, because we were celebrating anniversaries, Andy had asked for something romantic to do and we decided to "lock our love" onto the Pont de l'Archevêché..which is the bridge behind Notre Dame. The tradition is to attach a lock onto the bridge, kiss your love and throw the key into the Seine. Our locks are on the 10th post from Notre Dame on the bottom just in case you happen by and want to check them out. There was a street musician playing near us which only added to the ambience. We had a lot of giggling during the whole procedure. We were tired from walking and doing the stairs up from the metro so we stopped at Berthillon for ice cream. The ice cream is very famous in Paris and only served on and near Isle St Louis. It was the perfect rest stop before we went to Musee d'Orsay, the Impressionist museum and one of my favorites anywhere. We saw Monet, Manet, Pissaro, Van Gogh, Cezanne, Degas, Renoir and many more. The last time I was there, the top floor was under renovation and we couldn't find anything that we were looking for because the exhibits had all been mixed up. It is all complete now and beautiful. One of my favorite spots in the museum is the giant clock where you can look out at Sacre Cour and Opera. We had dinner last night at Roger Grenouille whose specialty is frog legs. We didn't have any, but Andy said he wanted to try them if he ever got back to Paris. Andy and Danny had escargot (snails) instead and said they were very good. Our waiter was very entertaining and tried to speak English with us as we tried to speak French back to him. It was sooo funny. Andy told him about the bomb threat and he was amazed! He said it was not on the news! He had no idea where Louisiana was which really surprised Laurie. He thought it was near North Carolina? Laurie said surely he knew that Louisiana was founded by the french and he should know where it is. Well he didn't, but we had fun telling him where it was. Danny and I spent the rest of the evening packing for the trip home and figuring out where in the world I'm going to put all of my mustard! We are sad to leave and wish we had just one more day, but we have had so much fun and enjoyed our time together and with our friends. Until the next trip!