A great way to spend the last day of 2016–seeing the sights of Paris with friends. We moved to Le Buci for our pain chocolate and double espresso before completing yesterday’s aborted return to Deyrolle for souvenirs. We ubered from there to the Romantic Museum. Our decision to uber was based on the fact that the temperature was 27 degrees (never got above 31) and we had a New Year’s reservation at 2:15.
I expected the Romantic Museum to be about romance and the symbols associated with love. In actuality the Romantic Museum focused on the Romance period in art history. The entire first floor of the museum held artifacts from George Sand’s estate–mostly her art collection and costume jewelry. They were donated by her great grand daughter to the City of Paris and moved here for exhibition. Our next stop was up, up, up to Sacre Coeur Basilica and the artist colony at Montmartre.
Sacre Coeur normally provides an expansive view of the city of Paris, but today the fog was so thick we could hardly see even the closest buildings, a different sort of beauty. We continued walking with the large crowd around the basilica and found the small square where artists have worked since the beginning of the twentieth century, including Salvador Dalí, Amedeo Modigliani, Claude Monet, Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec, Piet Mondrian, Pablo Picasso, Camille Pissarro and Vincent van Gogh.
While enjoying the art and being reminded of Jackson Square artists, we ran into two couples we know well in New Orleans. It really is an amazingly small world.
We ubered again to our apartments in preparation for our New Year’s reservation and were reminded that Paris expects large crowds tonight and is concerned about the safety of the thousands expected to celebrate. The Louvre was blocked off to vehicles so our driver had to find an alternative route to cross the river…no easy task since the rest of the traffic was in search of the same.
Lunch/dinner at Boullion Racine was excellent. Established in 1906 as a soup kitchen for local workers, the Art Deco decor added just the right amount of ambiance to the experience. After dinner, we walked a few blocks to the l’Aubusson Hotel (recommended by the friends we ran into in Montmartre) for a last round of drinks in Paris and a final au revoir to 2016.
My first meal in 2017 was pain chocolate and espresso–what a great way to begin the New Year! I was almost the only person on our street. The red door leads to our apartment. We pack now to begin our trip home to New Orleans. Until next time…
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