EUROPE DAY 33: MOULIN ROUGE

For our last day in Paris, we went to another museum, the Musee du quai Branly, which features indigenous art, cultures and civilizations from non-western countries. Once again, we entered a world of wonder and delight, which I have seldom experienced in museums. They have a river of words that is projected onto a wide, circular ramp that takes visitors up to the second floor. The "river" moves downward, words colliding as they rush along. They meander from side to side and visually flow down the ramp, sometimes splashing up the sides, providing a visual effect of water. The words include place names, names of cultures around the world, and words of geographical things (like "island" and "mountain") . It feels alive and draws visitors upward, beckoning us to find the source (the words start dribbling out from underneath a ceiling and down a wall). We were enchanted.

The whole design and placement of the exhibits was wonderful, drawing us from one thing to the next in a very creative way and giving us a feeling like we were exploring. We spent most of our time at the Oceania collection-- gorgeous carved items and clothing and masks. We also saw a fascinating exhibit on tattoos--the history and styles of tattoos throughout the world. Spent a wee bit of time in an exhibit about the Tiki craze in the USA in the 1950's. By that time we had reached our physical limit of 2 hours and were tired but so sad to leave.

We spent our farewell to Paris evening doing classic Paris things--a dinner cruise on the Seine and then a show at the Moulin Rouge. What a great way to end our visit. And yes, the show was quite spectacular.

So now we go back to Amsterdam on the high-speed train, spend a couple of days there eating pancakes and trying to get all our purchases into our suitcases, and finally head for home after 5 weeks of traveling. It has been a great trip and something of a Grand Tour, although that was not the intention when we started. As often happens when traveling, it just turned out that way.

EUROPE DAY 32: A FOOD INDULGENCE EXTRAVAGANZA

Well, this was quite a memorable day, indeed. We started the day early and hurried directly to Notre Dame to see the inside before the thousands of tour groups showed up. Once again, I tried to imagine what people in olden times must have felt when they entered and it is easy to imagine their being overwhelmed. It was beautiful. We spent quite awhile slowly walking around or just sitting and looking. I especially liked the statue of Joan d'Arc.

Then we headed over to our, by now, usual petite dejeuner spot and enjoyed our usual and then went to the Musee d'Orsay for a jaw-dropping visit to the Impressionists and Post-Impressionists. Yes, the crush of visitors was rather unpleasant, but seeing many paintings that I have liked over the years and seeing them in person, so to speak, was thrilling.

The museum layout felt something like a rabbit warren--it was difficult to get a feel for how to find pieces we were interested in visiting, which is good and bad. The bad part was that it was hard to find the Gaugin paintings because they had been temporarily moved, but the good part was that we saw things I would have missed otherwise. After 1.5 hours, we reached input overload and our feet and knees hurt so we started to leave. But this is one of those places where you keep seeing something else that you are compelled to go look at and so on the way out we passed a gallery of art nouveau furniture and we were sucked in for another half hour. If I lived close to this museum I would be a regular visitor and just feast my eyes on one artist at each visit. We hated to leave but we just couldn't take in any more.

We took a pedi-cab to Fauchon's and had a spectacular lunch--salad, a glass of wine, and a little dessert each. The place is all mirrored walls and pink tables and gold lame draperies and wait staff in dark grey pin-stripe suits with pink piping. Our salads looked like works of art, each item carefully positioned to please the eye and tasted spectacular--and the dressing was perfect. And the desserts almost made me swoon--we shared a caramel eclair (they are famous for their eclairs) the size a large cigar, skinny and long, and a lemon tart that was about a 2.5 inch square in size and was so intensely lemon it was amazing, and not too sweet. Each bite just filled my mouth with flavor. 

After a short rest, then a shower and change, we embarked on our dinner adventure to Maxim's. Yes, THE Maxim's. This was one of those crazy ideas that we came up with 2 days ago during a "what if" chat when we were talking about this Paris visit as probably our one and only opportunity to see Paris. And that led us to dream up the over-the-top idea of trying to get a reservation at Maxim's--a very famous and historical restaurant. So we asked the hotel concierge to get us a reservation and voila, we were successful. We were stunned. And of course, we did not bring any glamorous evening wear on this trip although we did at least bring respectable dress up outfits. 

The interior is elaborate art nouveau and gorgeous with dark woods and soft murals along the walls. Each table has those classic little cabaret lamps with pink shades, grouped around a small dance floor in front of a small stage for the chanteuse who sang and played the piano during the whole evening. It felt very 1880's. Sadly, it turned out that we were only one of three sets of diners that evening, so the place was pretty empty. I know that Maxim's draw is their history and fame and that people dine at other places now for leading-edge food, but I hope our evening was not an indication of a serious decline in business.

Happily, the food was magnificent. We started with champagne--but of course. My entree (which is the starter course in France) was beef bouillon. I expected a bowl of soup but instead received edible art. They first served a bowl with a slice of beef at the bottom with vegetables on top that looked like it had a garden growing out of it, then they poured the bouillon around the whole arrangement. The bouillon produced an explosion of flavor in my mouth (you are going to hear this phrase several times)--the flavor was so concentrated and complex and robust. And the slice of beef was the same. It had obviously been cooked for hours because it was butter-soft and full of flavor. Essentially it was a slice of pot roast but elevated to a much higher dish than just pot roast.

My main course was a fillet of beef with truffle sauce and a side of puffed potatoes. That description does not begin to describe it. It was a large portion of beef fillet swimming in a sauce that was thick, almost like syrup, and was so complex in flavor, so rich and intense, that I've never tasted anything like it before. The flavor just exploded in my mouth and I could not even begin to identify what was in it. Although I loved it, I was only able to eat about a third of the dish because it rapidly just became more than my mouth could handle--I guess it is possible to experience a flavor overload. And the potatoes were quite unexpected too. Imagine a potato chip about the size and shape of a madeline. Then imagine two of those put together to form a little hollow potato pillow. Then imagine it hot and crunchy but also a bit chewy. Delicious, and they stayed puffed up throughout the entire meal. I have no idea how they made them. Altogether it was magnificent. 

Dessert sent me over the moon because I enjoyed, I savored, I swooned over the most absolutely perfect Grand Marnier soufflé I've ever had. Every bite was a piece of cloud with a delicate essence of Grand Marnier, not too much but enough to recognize. I can die happy now.

And so a spectacular, never to be repeated, day ended after 3 hours of dining--we were back at the hotel by 11:00. Between our lunch and our dinner, we spent about 600 euros, which is a whopping amount of money for two meals. I think we will have the most expensive poop in Paris tomorrow.

EUROPE DAY 31: MORE PARIS AND THEN RACLETTE

We got a rousing start today--emerged from our hotel room at 11:00 AM and walked across the street to "our" petite dejeuner cafe. We must have tipped the waiter well yesterday because he remembered us and what we ordered. So we had the same thing all over again. Why mess with a good thing?

Our first destination was Notre Dame but the line to get in was a hundred miles long (in the hot sun, I might add) so we walked all around it and resolved to get up early tomorrow and go in before the thundering hoards show up. Then we got back onto a hop-on-hop-off bus and rode around the last two loops. We have now seen all the major areas, the famous sites and buildings and churches, and gotten a bit of a feel for Paris. 

Of course we had to hop off to do a bit of shopping at a major epicurean foodie store, Fauchon, at the Place de la Madeleine. My, the array of items they have, both sweet and savory. And my oh my, the prices they charge. The savory dishes at their deli and the chocolates and pastries were exquisite works of art--I don't think I've ever seen food that gorgeous. I just wanted to lick everything! And wouldn't you know, we didn't have time to sit down and try even one pastry. We are trying to figure out how to squeeze in a lunch tomorrow. 

Tiredness and input overload set in so we went back to the hotel. After an hour of resting up, we were back out on the street by 8:00 PM, ready for dinner--a shared salad of fresh orange, grapefruit, avocado, and tomato slices over lettuce with a yogurt dressing and then raclette over boiled potatoes with a charcuterie plate to go with. We ended with adequate but slightly disappointing servings of apple tartine and chocolate mousse. And of course it is Europe, so we were treated to a very good sidewalk trumpet concert during out meal, not to mention the people watching. It was 11:00 PM by the time we were finished -- we have gone native indeed. We are definitely having more fun here than I expected.

EUROPE DAY 29-30: PARIS

Basically, we took the high-speed train to Paris and checked into our hotel with no hiccups. Sounds straightforward and simple, doesn't it? Well yes and no. It's all the logistical stuff that gets me tired. We had to find the right train platform (the Amsterdam train station is not as easy to navigate as Munich) and find the right coach (you have reserved seats on the Thalys train). On arrival, we had to find the entrance to the Metro, figure out how to use the ticket machine, figure out which Metro line to take and which stop to get off on, figure out which Metro platform we needed to wait on, and then figure out which set of stairs to go up once we got off and which direction to start walking to get to the hotel. Whew. Nothing went wrong but there were thousands of people in the train station, the Metro station, and on the Paris streets so by the time we got into our room I was tired. I guess I am feeling my age.

Our hotel is dinky (we are in Paris, after all), but the decor is all black and mauve and grey and definitely cool, and we even have a tree-shaded balcony with 2 chairs and a little table. The bathroom is tres tres moderne although my shoulders almost touch the walls when I stand in front of the sink brushing my teeth.

We are located on the left bank at Saint Michel, about 3 blocks from Notre Dame, 5 blocks from the Louvre, 3 blocks from the Pont Neuf bridge. It's a perfect location. In fact I am sitting on the hotel rooftop terrace watching the lights on the Eiffel Tower, about a 20-30 minute walk away. I am really in Paris, indeed.

The next day was our first full sightseeing day so we started out at a respectable10:00 AM and had croissants and coffee at a nearby outdoor cafe. I mean, isn't it obligatory to have a croissant at least once in Paris? The night before we had French onion soup with dinner--just going through the list of must-eat items. So far the brasserie waiters have been quite friendly, contrary to my expectations. 
That's a nice surprise. I do have to admit that after wracking our brains to remember how to say 'please' in French, going through English-Spanish-German and then giving up, we had to ask our waiter and then felt immensely dumb. But honestly, at this point we've been dealing with too many languages for our little brains.

As a side note, the entertainment during breakfast was watching several different cars trying to park in a space that was half the size of a shoe box. The 4th car to try actually got in--there were only about 3 inches in front and back of her car--really. We almost stood up and applauded.

We bought tickets to the hop-on-hop-off bus that has 4 different routes that loop around Paris and over 50 stops. We rode the bus on 2 of the routes--a total of 3.5 hours of seeing wonderfully familiar sights come alive before our eyes. As a result we have modified our no-museum decision and plan to go see some of the impressionist paintings in a couple of days. That, and some wandering down narrow streets with interesting shops, and a stop for a substantial late lunch (too full for dinner now), comes to a full day for us. And by the way, for those of you who are keeping score on the number of times I complain about the weather, it has been absolutely perfect in Paris--sunny and 73 degrees with a cool breeze. 

I must say that even if I was dying to go up the Eiffel Tower or go into the Louvre, for example, I would have changed my mind after today. The lines were unpleasantly long and the number of people milling around was off-putting. Summer has clearly arrived. Even last week in Amsterdam we noticed the sudden invasion (dare I say explosion?) of tour groups and clumps of young people wearing backpacks. Navigating down the sidewalks is getting to be an Olympic class sport and today I had a child behind me ram himself against the back of my knees, causing me to teeter a bit. I stopped stock still and the mother gave me one of those "what's the matter with you?" looks. I tried to return an indignant old lady look.

World Cup soccer continues. Algeria played last night and won. We kept track of the score by counting each time we heard cheers echoing through the streets. Although the French don't go soccer-nuts in their clothing and outdoor decorations (they are much more cool than the Dutch in that respect) they cheer just as loudly.

EUROPE DAY 28: CHURCHES IN ATTICS AND TALL SHIPS

We spent all day today getting a healthy dose of cultue. First we went to Our Lord in the Attic church, which is a Roman Catholic church that a wealthy merchant built in his attic as a secret church when the Calvinists outlawed the practice of Catholicism. The church seats about 150 people and even has an organ. It was used for about 200 years until Catholicism was allowed again and they built a regular huge church. Lots of VERY narrow, circular, steep, tiny stairs, which scared me. But it was a very interesting esxperience.

Then we continued our meandering along a tiny canal to Oude Kerk (Old Church) which is the oldest building in Amsterdam, established in 1306. It started out as a Roman Catholic church then was switched to Puritan in 1578. It was falling down in 1955 and was purchased for a song and has undergone an extensive restoration. The ceiling is all wood, like an upside-side down boat hull, which makes the acoustics fabulous. Nowadays it is no longer used as a church but retains many church features and still has over a thousand graves under the stone slab floor and 4 organs that are used for concerts. We really emnjoyed our time there. An interesting aspect of Amsterdam is that the church is in the red light district so there were ladies in their windows open for business (yes, on a Saturday morning), right across the alley from the church and right next door to a school. That's just the way life is here.

And then JACKPOT! We discovered a Dutch chocolatier and a few minutes later a Belgian chocolatier. Now my mission is to find them again when we get back from Paris so I can bring some home.

Last on the culture list was a visit to the National Maritime Museum. I mostly went because my sister really wanted to go and see the ship models. I expected it to be boring but figured I would accompany her anyway. And boy how wrong I was.

Looking on the museum map, every room sounded terminally boring. We hit the ship models first and they were fascinating. Then we wandered into the ship decorations display that had a bunch of carved figureheads and rudder heads along the middle of a long room with a virtual display of water rushing below them all down the middle of the room. We sat there for quite awhile. Then we moved into the navigation instrument room--ho hum, I hear you say. But their display setup was so creative and interesting, it just made us want to look. The following room was photographs (I thought that would definitely be the point at which boredom set in) and was so intriguing that we stayed far longer than we anticipated. The room was set up with comfy wing-back chairs arranged in groups around coffee tables. Each chair had a photo album in front of it on the coffee table, so you sit in the chair, push the English button on the chair arm, and a voice in the back of the chair starts telling you stories about the person who took the photos and what the photos are about. We moved from chair to chair, loving every minute.

We went on a virtual reality sea voyage through time and then spent a fair amount of time in their unusually good gift shop. And there's still stuff we want to go back and see. It is by far the best and most creatively designed maritime museum I have ever seen.

Tomorrow we take the high speed train for Paris, which takes about 3.5 hours. We plan to do mostly very touristy things and will avoid the Louvre because there just isn't enough time.

EUROPE DAY 27: SCRATCH BRUGES

Don't let anyone ever tell you that travel is predictable or easy. Just when you think you have all your plans figured out to go to Bruges, reality has a way of tossing everything up in the air. Which is to say, we're not going to Bruges. At all. And you'll just have to cancel your expectations of all that chocolate you expected me to bring home.

So what happened? Well, we bought the train tickets yesterday and it was a tricky schedule--we needed to change trains in Rotterdam and then change again in Brussels--but we were game. All this for a 1-day round trip that required 6 hours of travel time total. But what the heck, that Belgian chocolate was calling.

We showed up at the train station early enough and found the correct platform, but things just didn't seem right. We kept hearing an announcement repeated over and over in Dutch, occasionally in English, about the train to the airport being cancelled, but it didn't hit us until we both heard the name Rotterdam. It turns out that there was a big power outage somewhere that messed up the trains and ours was cancelled. So we trooped down to the ticket office and stood in line only to be told that we had to take a train to Utrecht and change here but the agent had no idea what train we should change to. We instantly decided that things were way too complicated and that we were gonna give up on Bruges (earlier in the week we considered staying in Bruges for a few days but the hotels were all full) so we got a refund.

So what next? We went to the international train ticket line and bought tickets to Paris, which means that in a couple of days we'll be spending 2 travel days and 4 full days in Paris. And then we spent the next 3 hours in our hotel room trying to find a hotel and book reservations and then trying to decide on which tours we wanted to take. All totaled, we spent 5 hours not going to Bruges today.

We were hungry after that and we wanted comfort food so off we went, back to the pancake place and stuffed ourselves. I'm not going to tell how many pancakes we ate and I swore the waitress to secrecy after she recognized us from yesterday, and then I did the Jedi knight trick to erase her memory. And then it started pouring-- same as yesterday when we were eating pancakes. What is with this weather, anyway?

EUROPE DAY 26: PANCAKES

Wandered around today. Rode one of the trams for about 30 minutes in one direction until the scenery got boring, then rode back and had lunch at a genuine Dutch pancake house. We had a taste of all their specialities. First we split a ham and cheese pancake which was a huge crepe-like pancake (but a little a bit more substantial than a crepe) with thin slices of ham and melted cheese. It was heavenly. Then for our main course we split a traditional Dutch pancake served with slices of lemon and dusted with powdered sugar. YUM--it was as big as the plate and beyond heavenly. For dessert we split a serving of traditional poffertjes, which are little tiny puffy pancakes, served with fresh strawberries and whipped cream. We were over the moon. I am going to make sure we go back for more before we fly home.

By the time we were finished eating it was starting to rain and we were ready to go back to the hotel. Both of us planned to read for awhile, which we did, but then the next thing we knew we were waking up and it was 8:00 at night. We seem to be sleeping more than usual and I think it is a combination of our constant processing of new input, constant vigilance, increased exercise, and, oh yes, perhaps age.

We headed back out for dinner to a place recommended in the guidebook, called Bazar. The neighborhood looked a bit deserted but we found the place and it was clearly a popular spot. And we had a spectacular Persian dinner served with a side of frites and mayonnaise, washed down with Dutch beer. By the time we got back to the hotel it was almost 11:00 at night and getting dark. Jeez, eating dinner that late? We really are going native.

Tomorrow we are off on an adventure to Bruges. We have to change trains twice--let's hope we don't get lost in Brussels.