Our French Adventure - Paris Part Two

 With the summer heat building in Paris, it was starting to become exhausting. But I was not going to let it stop us from seeing more of the city. So armed with water bottles, sun cream and a spare T-shirt, we spent our final day exploring. And boy, did we cram a lot into it!

We started off with a wander through the Jardin du Luxembourg (Luxembourg Gardens), a charming set of gardens laid out in 1612 by Marie de Medici, who was the widow of King Henry the 5th. It's an expansive set of gardens, with an attention to detail. Every tree lined avenue leads your sight to an impressive building or monument, like the observatory or the Luxembourg palace, where the French senate still occasionally meets.

Everywhere you look, there is statues of French monarchs, gods & goddesses and notable people, and while it feels busy, it's a relatively calm and serene area in the centre of Paris.

This was the palace overlooking the grand basin, where model boats race each other doing laps around the cherub fountain in the centre. The gardens are free to visit, and a nice place to try and get a little respite from the heat.

Of course, as you exit the park, there are other ways to get some respite from the heat, such as visiting the Haagen Daaz shop on on the exits, and enjoying a cold treat! There's no better way to cool off! 

But for James the heat was getting to be too much, and he decided to head back to the hotel to try and cool off in the pool for a few hours, before coming back out to meet me for dinner, so with a few hours by myself, I thought I'd tick off a few things on the list. I decided to do a little walking tour by myself.

I decided to do a walk along the banks of the Seine, and spotted this beautiful bell tower of the former Church of St Jacques. The church was built in 1523, before being demolished in 1793 during the French Revolution, with only the tower surviving. Just by looking at the incredible details that are left on the tower, makes you realise that the church would have been beautiful, and possibly a rival to Notre Dame across the river. Now that's really saying something!

Wandering across the bridge got me these lovely shots of the Seine and Rive Driote splitting before re-joining each other a little later.

I'm not sure if the waters are yet clean enough for swimming in for the upcoming Olympics, don't think you'll find me in them! 

I couldn't help but steal a glimpse at Notre Dame, which was still under re-construction after the devastating fire in 2019. Work was steadily going on restore the cathedral to it's former glory, and I can't wait to return and revisit it again one day to see how it's gone.

From one Parisian icon, to another but in a slightly different way, is the Eiffel Tower. We've all heard about it, seen it, and most of us have been on it, but I've never seen it quite this way before. I think we all forget about the modern side of Paris, where the centre remains so intact in its historical sense, so seeing the Eiffel Tower in line with these modern skyscrapers was really quite fun! That coupled with the traditional river boats moored up, it adds another layer to the city.

Love this picture of the train midway across the bridge, almost perfectly centred!

I'm in Paris, there has to be a mandatory Eiffel tower picture!

I then headed up on the Metro to the flea market. One of the largest in Europe, it actually combines several different markets selling many different things, like antiques, books, coins, clothes & music, along with many other things. It's one of those places that I think if you can't find it here, you'll never find it! It's easy to get to, just ride metro line 4 to the final stop at Porte de Clignancourt, and follow everyone else there! I had a lovely couple of hours browsing the various stalls and shops there, and came home with a vintage French coin and a couple of CD's. If you want to know more about the market, then check out their website @Paris-flea-market.com. I spent around two and a bit hours there, and I don't think I even saw a quarter of it, before catching the metro to meet up with James and to get ourselves some dinner. He was feeling a bit more refreshed after an afternoon in a cold pool, and was happy to visit an interesting looking church on the way.

This is the Sainte-Trinité (Saint Trinity Church), with it's incredible barrel vault nave. I'd read about it online before we got to France, and it is notable for being an iron framed building, making it much stronger and therefore larger and more open. Light streams in through the windows, and the beautifully rounded arches everywhere give it a really warm and welcoming feeling.

The church is one of the newer ones in Paris, with construction starting in the 1860's. It's free to enter in daylight hours, and it's worth visiting, we were the only people there aside from an old lady who was sweeping up, and it's full of charming paintings on its walls depicting some of the saints. Try and get there in the afternoon, when the sun shines through the stained glass and leaves colourful reflections on the floors as you walk around, you can see some of it in the picture on the right. It's super easy to find, it even has a dedicated Metro station on line 12. 

We headed out into the street to find some dinner and some souvenirs to take back home, and then in the next part, I will tell you all about the final thing we did in Paris, that was one of the most fun things I've ever done.