Paris - Day 4

Sunday - 6/7 Organ, Astronomy, Crypts, Art, Food!

In spite of another late start (must have something to do with the late nights) we made it over to St. Sulpice church in the left bank area in time for the 11:30 organ recital. What an unbelievable experience! I've never heard such wonderful organ music in my life - the organist would hold some final chords forever, finally lift his hands, and the sound would continue reverberating in the huge church for several more moments. We then found the "secret door" which leads up a steep winding staircase to the organ loft where we were able to meet and chat with the organist and watch him play a bit in the next mass. He is utterly charming and the views from up on high were tremendous also. Once the 12:00 mass ended we were able to walk around the entire church and enjoyed the art and seeing the "rose line" that Dan Brown talks about in the DaVinci code. Of course, Dan Brown's interpretation is not true, but the true story is pretty cool also. Early astronomers asked to put a stone obelisk against one wall with a line on the floor connecting the obelisk stone to a marker in the floor on the other side of the nave. Because of the orientation of the church, the sun shines right on the marker on the summer solstice. Pretty cool!

We followed that astronomy lesson with a visit to the Panteon - former church turned memorial to and crypts for heroes of France. Buried here are Voltaire, Rousseau, Braille, Marie Curie (though we couldn't find her!), Victor Huge and many others. In the center of the building is the original Foucault pendulum which is much cooler than the one hanging in the Museum of Science and Industry since it is hanging from a ceiling that's at least 5-6 stories high.

So, we followed music, astronomy and crypts with a ride to Monmartre. Our goal there was to see the Dali museum, Picasso's studio and Van Gogh's home. Rick Steeves has been our best friend throughout this trip, but today he failed us. He had one of his cute little maps to help us tour around Monmartre,,,but he failed to include street names and we got lost finding Picasso's studio. Finally realized, of course, that we had walked right past it1 The neat thing about trying to find these two artists' "digs" was that it got us out of touristy Montmartre and into areas where real people live. The Dali museum was wonderful. There were at least 8 large sculptures---something I hadn't known he had even done! The other cool thing was seeing the series of twelve paintings on the twelve tribes of Israel. (I had mentioned a couple of weeks ago about a woman in Northbrook who told me she owned these very pictures and had just had them evaluated by Sothebys. Seems she owns one of about 150 signed print sets--one side is here in the museum and she has one. As I suspected she is sitting on a pot of gold!)

Dinner was at a Montmartre restaurant in a non-touristy area. I had onion soup and croque monsieur - two typical dishes that are on my to-eat list. Crepes remain on that list - hopefully tomorrow.

We added a means of transportation to the list today - a funicular ride up to Montmartre. Parisians walk and walk and walk and go up and down and up and down---even metro riding requires a tremendous number of stairs and long hallways. But, as the Spanish say, Vale la pena! (It's sure worth it!)