Oct 26-Monday Pere Lachaise & Notre Dame (Again)

Rain Rain GO Away! Our plan for the day was to go to Versailles. Fortunately Shane double checked the info before we got on the train. It’s closed on Mondays. Hum. Change of plans. We opted for Pere Lachasie, a fine old cemetery in Paris with lots of famous people in it। The City of The Dead। We seem to be on a theme here in Paris।

Pere Lachaise was beautiful, fascinating and a little creepy (sound familiar?) Very gothic and lovely with lots of famous people buried there. Chopin, Oscar Wilde, Edith Piaf, George Harrison, Jim Morrison, Isadora Ducan and the most heartfelt monuments to the Holocaust I have ever seen. Since it was the week before Tousaint (All Saint’s Day, Nov 1) many people were there visiting and sprucing up family graves. The ravens were everywhere and were happy to add to the creepiness by flying around and landing on the top of crypts posing nicely for pictures. We met a young couple who were working on a documentary about students living in France. They asked Shane if she would be willing to be a contact for consulting.

How fun!

<------Chopin

<---Edith Piaf

Holocaust ----->

After Pere Lachaise we stopped at a little Greek café. Cheap and wonderful. The man running the place was very nice. Everyone so far in Paris has been really nice to us. I think if you try and speak French, even badly, and act like a decent person you will have no trouble.

Next we went back to Notre Dame so we could see it in the daylight. It was a good choice as the back area was open to the public. It was closed when they were saying mass so we did not see it last night.

After we saw more of the inside we went around to the back of the building which I think is much prettier and much more interesting from an architectural viewpoint than the front. You can see the flying buttresses nicely.

This tree was behind Notre Dame I thought it was cool. The boats were on the river out front of Notre Dame.

These birds were really funny. They are in the bushes in front of Notre Dame. People come up with bits of bread in their hands and the birds just fly right up and land on them. Shane was trying to lure a pigeon but she had no bread and the pigeon caught on pretty fast.

Hungry now and in possession of an umbrella we set off to the Latin Quarter. We had dinner at Bistro 30 upstairs. The food was wonderful and the waiter cute. He flirted with Shane a lot so he also has good taste. It’s so funny to sit so close to the other people. I am glad they speak French and I don’t or I would always feel like I am eavesdropping on their conversations!

After dinner both of us headed off to the bathroom, which was at the top of the long flight of stairs leading to the second floor where we were seated. I came out first and as I was coming out the waiter dropped a whole tray of glasses down the stairs. It made a HUGE crash. I clapped quietly and he laughed and took a bow. Shane came out of the bathroom and said “Mom you didn’t cause that did you?” ACKKKK…NO!.

We went back to the hotel and bed early as we had to be up and off to the TGV (train) at 6:30am.

Bon Nuit.