Et Finalement... Londres et Paris!

This is an extremely belated post, but here it is, by popular request: the end of my trip!

Swans in St. James' Park

On my final days in London, I visited Buckingham Palace, Hampton Court Palace, Westminster Abbey and the British Museum.  It was really interesting to see so many places I have read and dreamed about for so many years.

Cheesy, but I had to.

Buckingham Palace is really a giant tourist zone, but the gardens of St. James' park were lovely, and the imposing statue of Queen Victoria staring down the hordes of camera-laden tourists was noteworthy.  Hampton Court was beautiful, and essentially caused me to revert to my days of playing imaginary games of princesses and knights.  Having spent so much time reading about and studying the Tudors, seeing the place they held court was extremely exciting.  While the brick exterior with the statues of unicorns, dragons and lions was iconic, the interior, complete with actors dressed up as King Henry VIII, Anne Boleyn, Cardinal Wolsey was incredible.  The interactive exhibits really brought the history to life, and the audio guide taught me lots of interesting facts I didn't know.  That night I went with my cousins for dinner at the original Hard Rock Cafe, which was super cool.  Seeing the guitars of Jimmy Page, the outfits of Elton John, and the tambourine of Stevie Nicks was exciting, and enjoying all the music that was played was a novelty that didn't get old.

Buckingham Palace.  Not nearly as pretty as many of the other palaces we'd seen on our trip.

Queen Victoria daring people to doubt her supremacy.

The British Parliament

Parliament and Big Ben

Lions, unicorns and dragons greet you at Hampton Court Palace.

King Henry VIII.  I was one of the few tourists who was quick to curtsey upon his arrival in the room, and I garnered royal favor, allowed to kiss his ring (and take a picture).

A may pole at Hampton Court Palace, with the iconic red brick Tudor style buildings.

The following day I headed out in the rain and went to Westminster Abbey to see the place where most of the British Royalty have been crowned, wedded and buried since the 1500s.  I wandered from there past Big Ben and Parliament to the British Museum, where I intend one day to live.  A piece of the beard of the Great Sphinx at Giza, the Nereid Monument (built around 390 BC in Turkey), the Parthenon sculptures, a statue of Ramesses II, statues from Easter Island, the treasures are seemingly endless.  I wandered the museum for 8 hours or so, and barely scratched the surface.  After a nice dinner with the cousins, I bid them farewell, and caught an overnight bus to Paris.

Westminster Abbey

The atrium of the British Museum

The Rosetta Stone, which provided the key to understanding hieroglyphs, due to the same
inscription being present in Ancient Egyptian hieroglyphs, Demotic Script and Ancient Greek.

The Elgin Marbles, classic Greek sculptures originally part of the Parthenon, on display in the British Museum.  Greece is battling hard to have these artifacts returned.

I arrived very early in the morning after a sleepless night on the bus, and headed straight for the flat my parents had rented for me (I was unable to afford a hostel in Paris, and they disapproved of my plans to sleep at Charles de Gaulle airport).  I crashed for a couple of hours, then headed out to wander through the Jardin des Tuilleries, past the Louvre and its controversial pyramids.  I ate crepes and people watched in the Champs-Elysees, before going to the Opera house to purchase tickets for one of my favourite ballets: La Fille Mal Gardee.  It was almost painfully beautiful, and though I was struggling with exhaustion, I loved every minute.

The Cour Napoleon du Louvre, with Pei's controversial Pyramid.

A mini Arc de Triomphe in the Jardin des Tuilleries.

The Jardin des Tuilleries, which joins up with the Champs-Elysees, excellent places to people-watch!

The Opera House of Paris, where I saw La Fille Mal Gardee.

The next day I went to l'Ile de la Cite, the centre of Paris, which sits in the middle of the Seine.  I stopped first at the Conciergerie, a former palace and prison, which held people like Marie Antoinette and Robespierre before their execution by guillotine.  It is now a museum, and the public can see the

At Notre Dame de Paris.

guillotine blade that cut off Marie-Antoinette's head, along with the space where the guillotine used to sit during the Reign of Terror.  It was a short walk from there to Notre Dame de Paris, which looks so exactly like it does in the Disney film that I expected a hunchback to come around a pillar at any second.  After doing an audio tour of the Cathedral, I waited in a long line to get up the tower of Notre Dame.  The gargoyles were wonderfully creepy, the stained glass was gorgeous, and the views of Paris were stunning.  That afternoon, I headed to the Louvre to see some of the most famous pieces of art the world has ever seen.  The Venus de Milo is the most lifelike statue I've ever seen.  I didn't know a statue of marble could be seductive, but she really is.  Michaelangelo's slaves provoked a lot of thought, the Victory of Samothrace is dynamic, and the Mona Lisa's smile is as captivating as people say.  After touring art at the Louvre, I started off towards the Tour Eiffel to catch the sunset.  I climbed up up up the stairs to the second viewing platform, and had my second wonderful vista of the day.  By the time I got back down, it was dark, so I walked back to the Jardins de Trocadero, the best place from whence to see the Eiffel Tower in its lit up glory.  It was beautiful!

Stained glass inside Notre Dame de Paris.

Gargoyles look out towards the Tour Eiffel from atop Notre Dame's towers.

From inside the Pyramid at the Louvre.

Probably the most lifelike statue I've ever seen: the Venus de Milo.

Venus de Milo attracts crowds like crazy, though lots of foolish people snap a picture and walk on.

La Joconde, or the Mona Lisa.

Michelangelo's Rebellious Slave.

Michelangelo's Dying Slave 

Random interpretive dance in an archway at the Louvre.

Sunset at the Tour Eiffel.

My last full day in Paris, I went to the Palais de Versailles, the seat of opulence and wealth of the French Empire.  It was unreal.  Every ceiling was anointed with gilded cherubs and beautiful frescoes, mirrors were everywhere, and the gardens (which span 800 hectares of land) belong in A Midsummer Night's Dream.  It was amazing to behold, but also very easy to extrapolate the reasons that peasantry rose up in rebellion.  Not difficult to understand how if you couldn't feed your family, yet the King and his entourage were still sleeping in golden beds, anger would result.  The fountains in the gardens were unfortunately not running, because apparently they only turn them on for expensive shows at night, but the attention to detail in each of the statues was incomprehensible.  The family must have had armies of staff to take care of the maintenance of the gardens and palaces.  Yes, plural, because Marie Antoinette

A random fresco at Versailles.

decided that the main palace of Versailles was too decadent for her, and had a smaller, less ostentatious palace built in the middle of the gardens.  The main palace was extravagant in every sense of the word. The famous Hall of Mirrors would really have been something when full of grandly dressed lords and ladies.  Even crammed with camera-hoisting tourists, it takes your breath away.  Louis XIV, the Sun King, had it made with mirrors facing West towards the setting sun.  He had his audience approach from the gardens, so that they were walking towards blinding light, representing his own power and divine right to rule.  Returning to Paris a little bedazzled by the show of Versailles, I headed straight for the Musee D'Orsay, which sits on the banks of the Seine in an old railway station.  It has the largest collection of impressionist and post-impressionist artwork in the world, with work from Renoir, Degas, Monet, Manet, Van Gogh, Cezanne, and many many others, all of which were breathtaking.  I couldn't wrap my head around how much beauty I was surrounded by, and would have loved several more days in the museum to really soak it in.  I left the museum when it closed, and went across the Seine to a cafe for a glass of wine and some food.  I got to talking (in french!) with some local politics students, who were delighted to share information about the French political system.  While we sat and chatted, the bartender put on one of my favourite albums: Machine Dreams by Little Dragon.  It was a bit surreal.  I was very pleasantly surprised by the willingness of Parisians to listen to my hesitant French.  Although I am (or was) fluent in the language, due to French immersion, it's remarkable how quickly the grammatical rules abandon you when you stop using them every day.  I found that I could understand everything with little difficulty, but expressing my own ideas was slow.  People were, for the most part, very patient with me, and helped me to remember vocabulary I had forgotten.  It was a delightful last night in Paris and on my trip in general.

The sculpted gardens of Versailles.

In the back garden of Versailles, just outside the main palace.

Tourists in the Hall of Mirrors

The Hall of Mirrors

The bed of Roi Louis XVI.

On my last morning, I woke up extremely early and headed straight for Montmartre, a district in the north of Paris that sits on a hill and is home to the Basilique du Sacre-Coeur and the Moulin Rouge
cabaret.  It is the district of La Boheme, and many famous artists lived and worked from Montmartre.  I wandered the streets before anyone woke up to nurse their hangovers (Montmartre is a famous party district), and it was delightful.  Though I was out of breath from carrying all of my stuff up the steep cobbled streets, I enjoyed every minute.  I went into the Basilique and was awed by my surroundings.  It is a gorgeous building of white stone, and the interior has intricate stained glass along with impressive tile work.  I beat the tourists there, and found only locals, praying before going about their days.  Sadly, no photos were allowed inside, but I enjoyed photographing the beautiful panorama of Paris from its highest point.  Without stopping for too long in any one place (I had a plane to catch!) I raced back to the centre of Paris and got into line to see the Catacombs.  Happily eating pain-au-chocolats (chocolate croissants) hot from the oven, I read my book and waited, while the line steadily grew
behind me.  At last, we were allowed to enter.  They did a good job of presenting the history of the catacombs, from the historical content of the minerals (lots of fossils) to the existence of stone mines under Paris to its use as a home for the bones of the Cimitiere des Innocents (Cemetary of the Innocents), which was closed as a health risk in the late 18th century.  Today, the catacombs hold the remains of about 6 million people.  It was extremely creepy, indeed, I was running through the maze of skeletal remains by the end of the walk through, but I'm glad I went to see it.  From there, I dashed across streets, through the metro, and all the way to Charles de Gaulle airport.  I couldn't believe how much sightseeing I had crammed into a few short days in Paris.  I hadn't really felt homesick until I sat down on the plane, but as soon as I did, I was overwhelmed with a feeling of "I want my Mommy".  I must say, the timing was pretty perfect.  The flight home was without incident, and my Mom was waiting for me at the gate in Vancouver.

Love is a splendid thing!  It lifts us up when we are down!

Montmartre in the morning.

Basilique du Sacre-Coeur in the early morning.

"Stop!  This is the Empire of Death."

There and back again!  What a wonderful trip it was.  Many thanks to all of you, for reading, to my parents and grandparents for their emotional and financial support, to Gary, Nelly and Hanna for hosting us, and to Kelly, for being an awesome travel partner.  It was an incredible adventure that I shall never forget!