First Sighting

Sunday was a slow kind of day. We got up around 9:00 and just hung around the house for most of the day. We went down the street briefly to get a baguette for what is becoming our main daily meal: Bread, cheese and sausage (we usually throw in some mayo, avocado and tomato too). This time we were fortunate enough to have fried sardines as well, a little treat that Cha brought back from southern France. They were delicious.

After lunch we lounged around a bit more and then decided to go check out Park Monceau, just northeast of our neighborhood in the 8th Arrondissement. This park is reportedly one of the places that Marcel Proust enjoyed spending time. It's kind of a funny park. There are several small-scale yet not-exactly-identical replicas of other famous monuments from around the world, such as Corinthian pillars and an Egyptian pyramid. This park was also the site of the first silk parachute jump (out of a hot air balloon), a massacre in 1871, and the setting for three of Claude Monet's paintings.

It was a hot day and everyone had the same idea as us. The park was filled with joggers, families strolling, couples lying about in the grass, and about a million kids. It was a little too crowded for us and wasn't very large so we just took a quick stroll around and took a few pictures.

A well-behaved bird lets me take its picture.

I'm sure the pyramids at Giza are better.

Nice fat tree

Triple Smart

Parc Monceau didn't take long so we decided to head down to the Seine waterfront between Champs-Elysées and Tuileries. This was the first time I had been to this part of Paris and it is a very big tourist area. As we walked toward the water, the first thing we saw were two lavish buildings facing each other:

Le "Petit" Palais

Le Grand Palais

As we neared the Pont de la Concorde (one of the bridges that cross the Seine), Charlie asked, "Did you see that?" I though he was referring to the huge lion statue (below, right). I said, "Yes," took a few more steps and then realized what he was actually talking about... The Eiffel Tower.

This was the first time I had seen it since we arrived. I gasped loudly, got a lump in my throat and my eyes immediately welled up with tears. I'm not sure what the emotional response was all about. Maybe it was the first time that I actually believed that I was in Paris. At any rate, it was an impressive sight.

We decided to stroll the southeast direction so that the sun wouldn't be blaring into our faces the whole time. We happened upon a flea market of sorts, very obviously priced for the wide-eyed tourists abounding in the area. Although it was way beyond our budget to buy anything, we stopped in at an interesting stall that contained a variety of old cameras and accessories along with some medical artifacts and oddities. Charlie and I love this kind of stuff.

Medicine bottles and preserved amphibians

Yes, the skull is wearing glasses

One of these things is not like the others

Flu shot anyone?

Kid in a candy store

Corporal odds and ends

We left the store and continued on down the bank until my feet couldn't take it anymore. Along the way I admired this boat.

Who says you have to have a house to have a garden?

Fin.