Le Seau de Susan

 LE SEAU DE SUSAN [SUSAN'S BUCKET]

October 27

The scene would shift today, as we took the train from Caen to Paris and began Susan's bucket list trip. Paris being Paris, a city with treasures I had dreamed about for many decades, I was happy to be along for the adventure. 

Aboard the train from Caen to Paris

France switches to daylight savings time a week before we do in the US, so we appreciatively fell back and got a welcomed extra hour of sleep. After the usual quick breakfast of expresso, juice, and pastries, we met the taxi that our hotel manager had again booked for us and made the short drive to the Gare Caen. My impressions of train stations in smaller towns were confirmed, as it reminded me more and more of a Greyhound or Trailways station in Mississippi in the 1960's -- a small and not particularly tidy station with a barebones staff. Our train left Caen about 9:30 AM and arrived at Gare St. Lazare in Paris a few minutes after noon.  The train had a couple of delays, about which announcements apparently were made. Once again I asked some of my fellow travelers if they parled anglais, and fortunately one woman did so fluently and was kind enough to keep us posted on our progress -- and occasional lack thereof. It was pretty obvious when we entered Paris and arrived at Gare St. Lazare, and again a driver was there to meet us and transport us and our luggage to our hotel. He was the least personable of our drivers so far, but he seemed intent on helping Susan make the appropriate contact with SCNF authorities to confirm the APB on her cell phone, which was, of course, still MIA. No break in the case.

Our hotel, La Maison Albar - Le Diamond, was literally just around the corner. Our driver helped get our bags in the door, and the staff of the Albar took it from there. We couldn't have asked for a more helpful, capable, gracious staff for our entire stay, nor a more attractive, comfortable hotel. We had a big room with a large bathroom and real shower, and as a bonus the location was absolutely ideal -- only a 30 minute walk from the primary attractions and less than a 5 minute walk to Gare St. Lazare (henceforth GSL), which is served by the convenient and inexpensive Metro (Parisian subway). Of course, we arrived at the Albar too early to check in, but the staff put our bags in storage until our room was ready, gave us advice and directions, and we were off to meet our guide for our 3:00 PM tour of the Louvre.  She was on the ball, having texted me to tell us where she'd meet us. We decided that since we'd been sitting and riding all day and had plenty of time, we'd take the 30 minute walk and stop and get lunch along the way. Our plans were somewhat foiled because Google Maps still had some payback left for us, leading us on a circuitous route "downtown" to the museum. We missed lunch, but made it to our rendezvous with Emilie (no, not the same one as on the Netflix series) for our tour.

The legendary and ginormous Louvre

Familiar pyramide Louvre landmarks

A small Arc de Triomphe and roue (Ferris wheel) 

Louis XIV by Bernini

Our Louvre tour was billed as a "small group" tour, and it turned out that it was really a small group -- just we two. Thank goodness we had booked this tour! Had we tried this on our own, we would have been totally overwhelmed. The Louvre is immense, basically covering a city block. And the crowd?  If it had been larger during the Olympics, we would have hated it! The Louvre was teeming with tourists, and we were delighted to find Emilie at the Louis XIV statue ready to lead us in.  Thankfully she had a Vox Box type communication device! We not only wouldn't have heard her without it; we would've lost her in the sea of people. Emilie was both very knowledgeable and passionate about art, and she helped us navigate the crowd, which was literally elbow to elbow around the most popular works. We spent over 3 hours finding, viewing, and learning the backstory of some of the art from the periods which we told Emilie were those in which we had the most interest.  Rather than try to tell you about what we saw, I'll lean on the title of one of Rod Stewart's first solo albums, Every Picture Tells a Story, and just share with you a taste of what we experienced:

Venus de Milo

Supper at Emmaus by Veronese

Even the ceiling is art

The star: Mona Lisa by da Vinci

    

The Mona Lisa fan club

  

Louis XV's crown

Liberty Leading the People - Delacroix

The Wedding at Cana - Veronese

  

Portrait of Baldassare Castiglione - 
Raphael

Mercury by Giambologna

When we finished, we were exhausted, hot and sweaty, thirsty, and hungry. We bade Emilie farewell and gave her our heartfelt thanks, then decided to begin walking back toward the Albar. We knew we'd pass scores of restaurants, and decided we'd let our fortune and growling stomachs be our guides. As we approached the opera district, which is about 10 minutes from the Albar, we saw a place called Le Relais Opera (relais supposedly means relay ... don't ask me?!) that looked French enough (outdoor tables and attractive, intimate indoor tables) and had an appealing menu. The waiter was a bit formal and standoffish at first, even though we remembered to say, "bonjour" and ask him if he spoke English before launching into an English diatribe. Our Southern charm eventually wore him down, and he was helpful and efficient. We had a delightful meal, then made our way back to the hotel. Our luggage had made it to our room just fine, and we stumbled in, got cleaned up, and turned in PDQ because we'd have another early start and full day tomorrow.

Welcome to Paris!