Orleans and Nuclear Pow-uh

So we drove to Orleans after Versailles. Nice town, I liked it...

Here is the cathedral at night...

We were walking arounda at 9pm and I was honestly surprised how quiet it was - most things were closed, etc.

The town had these little alleys - Orleans had more of a 'Mediterranean' look to it...

A bell tower where local magistrates sought refuge from the invading English...

And speaking of the invading English, there she is, Jean d'Arc (Zhean Dark - sounds funny in French, sorry...)!

By the beginning of 1429, nearly all of northern France and some parts of the southwest were under foreign control. The English ruled Paris, while the Burgundians controlled Reims. The latter city was important as the traditional site of French coronations and consecrations, especially since neither claimant to the throne of France had yet been crowned. The English had laid siege to Orléans, which was the only remaining loyal French city north of the Loire river. Its strategic location along the river made it the last obstacle to an assault on the remainder of the French heartland. In the words of one modern historian, "On the fate of Orléans hung that of the entire kingdom." No one was optimistic that the city could long withstand the siege.

And she did it! She helped lift the siege of Orleans and helped French generals win several battles against the English.

WARNING: Change of Subject!! ;)

Leaving Orleans the next morning we drove along this little country road and then suddenly there they were NUCLEAR POWER PLANT towers! Crazy....

Versailles and Louis the 'I love my picture!' king...

Is it a bird? Is it a plane? No! It's Louis the 14th's 'I love myself' palace! ;) (In all fairness, and I didn't know this, apparently he was almost killed by a mob when he was younger...so I guess things like that could affect you, but seriously, he has pictures/statues of himself ALL OVER THE PLACE!!)

So anyway, this is Versailles. Although it looks like Christoph hit the place, it's just reconstruction work going on....

This was my favorite part of Versailles - the chapel. This is the outside of it...

And here is the inside...it was just truly beautiful - it just seems 'clean' and 'pure' - I liked it a lot.

A view from upstairs...

Beautiful rooms....Versailles was definitely nicer on the inside than the outside...

There he is, as a Roman/Greek god or general or whatever....I don't know....again, I understand the trying to consolidate your land and making you the focus of everything, but still...it's just a bit odd.

Another beautiful room....

There he is again, looking 'great' on the wall...

and there it is!! The world-famous 'Hall of Mirrors'! This is where the Germans after 1871 declared Wilhelm their new Kaiser and where WWI was ended (treaty of)...

There is Ellen waving to the camera....

The gardens outside were just huge and as I've visited other castles from the same time period, almost all of them tried to copy Versailles in one way or another....Versailles was 'the Hammer' as they say in German ;)

Doing one of those 'look, I'm holding it in my hand' photos...

We decided this was Poseidon, but we don't know...

And another view of the back of Versailles...pretty-pretty....

You say EYE-FULL, but the French say IHH-FELL...

A clear view of the tower without that Aaron-guy getting in the way ;)

Eiffel, the designer/creator of the tower, had a permit for the tower to stand for 20 years, meaning it would have had to be dismantled in 1909, when its ownership would revert to the City of Paris. The City had planned to tear it down (part of the original contest rules for designing a tower was that it could be easily demolished) but as the tower proved valuable for communication purposes, it was allowed to remain after the expiration of the permit. The military used it to dispatch Parisian taxis to the front line during the First Battle of the Marne (WWI), and it therefore became a victory statue of that battle.



As the sky darkens, Eiffel gets its 'light' on....

The tower was met with resistance from the public when it was built, with many calling it an eyesore. (Novelist Guy de Maupassant — who claimed to hate the tower — supposedly ate lunch at the Tower's restaurant every day. When asked why, he answered that it was the one place in Paris where you couldn't see the Tower.) Today, it is widely considered to be a striking piece of structural art.









So we were just walking towards the tower enjoying its splendour, when suddenly it's splendour became even more splendiforous! It started to 'twinkle-twinkle little star' a million miles a minute! (I saw this from the plane as I flew into Paris, but just decided that it was 'seeing the lights of the tower from the air'. Umm...no, it REALLY was sparkling!)

Anyway, we figured out, more or less, just as Big Ben chimes every hour, the Eiffel Tower 'sparkles' every hour ;) Interesting way of keeping track of time...









The insides of the giant!














'Isn't it romantic?...' Actually, it was FREEZING cold, but we braved it and went up to the top! BEAUTY-FULL! With the moon and all...nice....













Back on the ground again, the Ihh-Fell Tour and the moon....need I say more?

The Triumphal Arch...

Guess where we are now.....

The Champs-Élysées is the most prestigious and broadest avenue in Paris. Its full name is actually "Avenue des Champs-Élysées". With its cinemas, cafés, and luxury specialty shops, the Champs-Élysées is one of the most famous streets in the world, and with rents as high as $1.25 million a year for 1,000 square feet (100 m²) of space, it remains the 2nd most expensive strip of real estate in the world (the first in Europe) after New York City's Fifth Avenue. The name refers to the Elysian Fields (Champs means 'fields' in French), the place of the blessed in Greek mythology.

There is the view and there is THE Arc de Triomphe!

The Arc de Triomphe is one of the most famous monuments in Paris. It was commissioned in 1806 after the victory at Austerlitz by Emperor Napoleon I at the peak of his fortunes. The arch honours those who fought for France, particularly during the Napoleonic Wars, and today also includes the tomb of the unknown soldier.

Here is a plaque commemorating when Alsace-Lorraine was returned to France after WWI (the Germans annxed them after 1871). Big deal/trouble between Germany and France!

Napoleon I's military victories...

and France's 'Tomb of the Unknown Soldier'....

The cool thing is you can go to the top. So the road on the left is the Champs Elysees.

Those buildings off in the distance is La Défense. It is Europe's largest district specifically built for business. La Défense is named for the statue, La Défense de Paris, which was built in 1883 to commemorate the soldiers who had defended Paris during the Franco-Prussian War. The name of the area sometimes causes confusion with visitors, who occasionally assume it is some kind of military zone or establishment.

That is a view of the area of Montmatre and the basilica called Sacre-Coeur. You'll definitely see more of that later on!

And there she be! THE Ihh-fell Tour ;) I just find it funny how something that was meant to be 'temporary' became THE symbol of Paris and possibly France.

It was built between 1887 and 1889 as the entrance arch for the Exposition Universelle, a World's Fair marking the centennial celebration of the French Revolution. Eiffel originally planned to build it in Canada, for the Universal Exposition of 1888, but they rejected it (Ow! Bet that hurt! ;). The tower was opened on 6 May 1889.

Paris - next verse NOT the same as the first...

'Okay everybody, we're walking, we're walking' ;)

You can see the Louvre in the background and this is the Arc de Triomphe du Carrousel (NOT THE Arc de Triomphe, that will come later ;) and was built between 1806-1808 by the Emperor Napoleon I on the model of the Arch of Septimius Severus in Rome. It was commissioned to commemorate France's military victories in 1805.













As we began our walk through the Tuilieries (a garden named from the tile kilns or tuileries which previously occupied the site) we saw French cops on horses....















Another view of the gardens, towards the Louvre...






















Fancy-schmancy lightposts on the 'Place de la Concorde'. During the French Revolution the area was renamed "Place de la Révolution". In a grim reminder to the nobility of a gruesome past, when the "Place de Grève" was a site where the nobility and members of the bourgeoisie were entertained watching convicted criminals being dismembered alive, the new revolutionary government erected the guillotine there. The first notable to be executed at the Place de la Révolution was King Louis XVI, on January 21, 1793. Other important people guillotined there, often in front of cheering crowds, were Queen Marie Antoinette and Robespierre. The guillotine was most active during the "Reign of Terror", in the summer of 1794, when in a single month more than 1,300 people were executed.





And here is the plaque that commemorates where the guillotine stood and Louis and Marie Antoinette's death. The guillotine was most active during the "Reign of Terror", in the summer of 1794, when in a single month more than 1,300 people were executed.


'A Tale of Two Cities', ugh....




















There is another view of Place de la Concorde with its obelisk. The center of the Place is occupied by a giant Egyptian obelisk decorated with hieroglyphics exalting the reign of the pharaoh Ramses II. It once marked the entrance to the Luxor Temple. The viceroy of Egypt, Mehemet Ali, offered the 3,300-year-old Luxor Obelisk to France in 1831. The obelisk arrived in Paris on December 21, 1833. King Louis-Philippe had it placed in the centre of Place de la Concorde on October 25, 1836. The red granite column rises 23 metres high, including the base, and weighs over 250 tonnes.

Bienvenue en Paris - getting over loss...

So after feeling stupid, embarrassed and talking to my credit card companies to get my cards cancelled, Ellen decided we should go and see Sainte-Chapelle. (Info on most of my blog comes from Wikipedia.org which I heart oh so much!)

Sainte-Chapelle was planned in 1241, started in 1246 and quickly completed: it was consecrated on April 26, 1248. The patron was the very devout Louis IX of France, who constructed it as a chapel for the royal palace.

The church used to hold a lot of relics (Jesus' Crown of Thorns, etc.), but now it's famous for these windows. It's 'the best example of 'transparency'' - in other words, the walls 'disappear' and the windows are the walls. They are truly beautiful!

During the French Revolution, the chapel was converted to an administrative office, and the windows were obscured by enormous filing cabinets. Their all-but-forgotten beauty was thereby inadvertently protected from the vandalism in which the choir stalls and the rood screen were destroyed, the spire pulled down and the relics dispersed. In the 19th century Viollet-le-Duc restored the Sainte Chapelle: the current spire is his sensitive design.

This is the Palace of Justice which took the place of Louis' palace of which Sainte-Chapelle was part...

Beautiful! You can see Napoleon III's 'N' on the bridges....you'll see more of him later...














Just another view of the Seine...

















They had a massive flood while we were there! The Louvre was under water and....








it's a good thing I had my trusty RED WINGS boots (I heart them!) to wade through the flood! (A 'friend' dared to insinuate that I should get rid of my beloved Red Wings boots - don't make me choose between you and my boots, 'friend', you'll lose! ;)

Okay, so just kidding, there was no flood, that's just the fountains in front of the Louvre! Old palace, now a museum...




There she be and she be pretty, ain't she?

The pyramid was designed by a Chinese-American in 1989! Ieoh Ming Pei 貝聿銘 is known as the last master of high modernist architecture. He works with the abstract form, using stone, concrete, glass, and steel. Pei is one of the most successful architects of the 20th century.