Au Revoir a Paris...

Not being the type to rush things, we gave ourselves another four nights in Paris, staying at the Hilton Paris-Opera, just to enjoy the ambience of this great city as it heads into spring. Maybe spring is coming early, but the February weather was fine and sunny, with temperatures about 5C, with the Parisians obviously determined to enjoy the glorious sunshine. Now that the sun is out, south facing icons enjoy the benefit of fabulous bright but low-level light, irresistable to photographers.

It was a pleasure to be in Paris this time because the public transport strikes are over, and the Metro and other trains are running normally. Workers' disputes with the government are still current, but the unions are orchestrating things to distribute the grief, and maybe minimise the harm to their popularity. Now, professionals are on strike, and we saw a huge protest at the Opera by laywers and medicos, noisy but peaceful without violence, we're happy to say. We took advantage of the stunning weather these few days by wandering the streets, partaking of occasional crepes, cocktails and coffees!

What better place to stage a protect, on the steps of the magnificent Opera.

The forecourt of the Opera hosts a noisy protest by lawyers and medical professionals.

We never quite came to terms with the short 9 hour days in France. Where we were was close to due south from London, but an hour further east in time zones. Daylight never truly arrived until about 09:00, and sunset was about 18:00. Being dark outside meant we slept in almost every day, and had to rush to make it to breakfast (which usually closed at 10:00). In Paris and the bigger towns, it was evident that workers and early birds where up and fully active (in the dark) from about 06:00, but not much happened until daylight in the villages.

Busy but very informal flower market just off the Rue Saint-Lazare.

We didn't fully relax in Paris, but spent one day getting to Villers-Bretonneux in the Somme river valley, so we could go to the new Sir John Monash Centre at the Australian War Memorial. Plan A was to catch a train to Amiens, and rent a car for the half hour drive to V-B. Amazingly, the rental car offices in Amiens were open such restricted hours that we could not make this work and give us enough time at the SJMC. Trains run to Amiens fairly regularly, but the rental car companies are running to some other playsheet. So Plan B, which we followed, became to drive the whole way (about 160km) from Paris in a rental car. Once we found the Avis office in an obscure underground carpark under Le Madeleine, this plan went off without a hitch. Our car, a Renault Megane had its own GPS, but someone had set its preferences to "avoid tolls" which caused it to recommend a bizarre route. Luckily we had our own navigator which gave more helpful directions. Once we were out of chaotic Paris, we followed the A16 autoroute almost the whole way, at a cost of EUR9 each way, a fabulous road with a speed limit of 130km/hr and not too much traffic.

The Australian war memorial at Villers-Bretonneux.

Graves of 2100 Commonwealth soldiers, many still unidentified. Four hundred died in the Battle of Amiens.

We have made a pilgrimage to this war memorial previously, in 1981, when we were touring Europe with our son. In that long-ago trip we trained to nearby Corbie (with a Eurailpass), could not find a bus, and hiked about 5km to the memorial. Our drive this time was easier, but the memorial is in an obscure location, not very well signposted until you are very close, and we had to zig-zag a bit to zero in on it. Luckily, the memorial is quite tall and visible across the fields. Then no signage to tell us where to park or get in, but once we found the entrance, we were told that signage is controversial but discreet improvements are coming.

Signpost from the Somme battlefields.

The SJMC is a new museum (opened 2018) which is designed to be "subservient" to the war memorial. It is. It is behind the memorial and effectively underground. Its AUD100M was totally funded by the Australian Government, and tells the Australian story of the Western Front in the First World War as well as being a homage to John Monash (1865-1931), "one of the best allied generals of the First World War and the most famous commander in Australian history" (Wikipedia) who planned and co-led the pivotal Battle of Amiens fought and won on these very hills in 1918.

Inside the SJMC, an emu scultpure made of barbed wire on the right.

Top half of an AIF poster.

There are some artifacts of war (documents, uniforms, weapons etc) in the SJMC, but it is mostly a state-of-the-art interactive multimedia display. Visitors are guided through it using an app you have to download to your own device and listen to with earphones. It's all very impressive, and would take forever if you watched and listened to the entire program. But with connected screens on all walls and the floor, the visual effects are fantastic, and, of course, sad and depressing. The museum covers everything from call-up to repatriation, and featured some really great imagery. We spent a lot of time in the museum, took a lot of shortcuts, and eventually retreated to the cafe for a pleasant lunch.

The main (of many) animated multimedia displays in the SJMC.

Ceremonial entrance to the underground SJMC.

We asked and were told that there are about 50,000 visitors to the SJMC, mostly Australians of course. At the time of our off-season visit, there were maybe a dozen people there. It's out of the way and hard work to get here, so we're not surprised that visitor numbers are less than original expectations. Battlefield tour groups must boost the numbers in warmer seasons and around Anzac Day. For us Aussies, it's a pretty moving place to visit.

Floor plaque at the SJMC, together with what must be the motto of nearby towns.

We drove back to Paris after calling into Villers-Bretonneux, a town devoted to Australia even though none of us can pronounce its name correctly. Famous signage says "Never Forget Australia" and kangaroo emblems are here and there. The museuem is barely a few kilometers out of town. We hope the schools of V-B have excursions to the SJMC, there could be no better way of showing the children what happened in their neighbourhood hardly more than 100 years ago.

A copy of "Mercury riding Pegasus", (1701) by Antoine Coysevox (1640–1720) in the Tuilieries Gardens, original at the Louvre.

Parisian elegance in architecture, the fabulous buildings along the Rue de Rivoli.

And below, their magnificent colonades.

The Vendôme Column at the centre of the square was originally erected by Napoleon I to commemorate the Battle of Austerlitz but was torn down on 16 May 1871, by decree of the Paris Commune, to be re-erected later.

Statue of Jean d'Arc in front of the impressive Saint-Augustine church near La Madeleine.

Rather lonely florist stalls in front of La Madeleine, a church now but originally designed as a temple to the glory of Napoleon's army.

Finally, it was time to depart Paris and France, back to London on the Eurostar, from the majestic Gare du Nord. Luckily, this time we did not have to walk. The city was operating smoothly, the taxi fare was EUR10, a far cry from the EUR30 we paid to travel a mere 100m in traffic gridlock on our arrival. We enjoyed our last Parisian sunset on a crystal clear evening from the roof of Galeries Lafayette, later with cocktails and champagne!

Au Revoir to Paris - our last sunset.

The magnificent facade of the Gare du Nord railway station, our departure point for London.

From the waiting room, passengers pour off our Eurostar as it arrives at Gare du Nord.

Bienvenue à Paris...

No caption required!

With Paris mostly crippled by strikes, some Eurostar trains were cancelled, so those running were absolutely full, and the already inadequate departure lounge at St Pancras station was extremely overcrowded, or maybe it's like this every day. The train itself was excellent, smooth, comfortable and fast. We expected problems at Gare du Nord with no Metro running, but it was much worse than we expected. We queued for 90 minutes for a taxi (almost as long as the channel crossing), when we finally got into a taxi (dirty and stinking of cigarettes) it became stuck in a traffic jam before we left the station precinct. The strike was not the taxi driver's fault, and nor was the traffic jam, but he was happy to exploit it at our expense. Waiting rate in Paris taxis is about EUR0.80 a minute so, after 40 minutes when we had travelled less than 100m (we kid you not) so we abandoned the taxi and decided to walk. But our fare for that 100m was over EUR30, about AUD50! The driver was hardly surprised when we abandoned him - probably he wondered why we had persisted for so long.

Documentation of a EUR30 taxi fare to travel 100m!

Dragging our heavy bags, the 2.3km trek felt like a long way, but Google maps was invaluable and it was mostly flat or downhill. Away from Gare du Nord, the traffic was still heavy but moving, so we could have taken another taxi, but by then we were on the road. It took us half an hour or so, but our troubles were not yet over. Checking into our hotel at 8:10pm we were told our room was not ready! After the manager endured Mike's anger and Clare's diplomacy, they upgraded us to a suite which just happened to be available. But (see London post) Hilton Hotels have not covered themselves with glory so far this trip.

The Palais du Louvre at dusk, with the iconic pyramid.

Panoramic view of three wings of the Louvre from the centre of the great square.

Beautiful Sainte Chapelle hides within the Palais de Justice.

But Paris is Paris and the city compensates for all manner of ills. We'd still rather the Metro was working, it's hard on the feet having to walk everywhere, and even with very modest objectives, we finish each day exhausted. Actually, the two driverless Metro lines are still running (nos 1 & 14) so we (like everyone else) find ourselves getting as close to our destination as we can on those lines, than walking the rest of the way. And we have even started to figure out the bus routes. The buses are uncomfortably overloaded and the roads are clogged because of the Metro outage, so nothing is going well.

Iconic Paris architecture under a leaden sky.

Surely one of the most beautiful clocks around, at the Palais de Justice.

Walking, walking, up to 20,000 steps, we spent our days revisiting old haunts, including laundromats. Even though we've seen them before, sometimes multiple times, we never tire of them. Paris is such a city. And to rest our weary feet, we found many occasions to pause for a cleansing ale, a crepe, or some other sort of snack.

Crepes on the street provide, if nothing else, a delicious opportunity to sit down after a lot of walking.

Notre Dame is a manifest catastrophe. The magical spire is gone, of course, and so is the roof and many stained glass windows. Ugly temporary protections are in place, and the whole compound is fenced off like the construction site it is. We could see a few workers high up on the cathedral, but the current activity did not seem to be too intense, the holiday season no doubt. A monstrous construction crane was doing occasional lifts. A sad but essential place to visit when in Paris.

Looking so sad, unsteepled Notre Dame Cathedral in the earliest stage of its massive repair job.

The cathedral has a temporary roof, wooden frames to support its flying buttresses and covers where stained glass windows used to be.

We hadn't yet figured out the buses when we set out to a cafe, the O Coffeeshop, co-owned by a very good friend, so we had a couple of k to walk, from the Avenue de Champs Elysees across the 7th (so past the Eiffel Tower) and into the 15 arrondissement. It sits in long street of tranditional French cafes, so you'd wonder about its viability, but when we got there, we were astonished to see a long queue waiting outside. The patrons appeared to be young and trendy, and it's clear that Aussie themed cafes (featuring lamingtons, smashed avocado and Vegemite) can find their niche in Paris! Thanks to Tim and Matthew for treating us like royalty at the crowded O. And there we discovered a #42 bus would take us all the way back to our hotel next to Gare Saint Lazare! The bus was very full, but (benefits of seniority!) we both got seats and enjoyed the scenery on the way home.

Spectacular Russian Orthodox church and school.

When in the 7th Arondissement, the Eiffel Tower can peek at you between buildings.

In a street packed with cafes, the Australian themed O Coffeeshop has a queue waiting at the door.

Under the magnificient dome at Galerie Lafayette's Hausmann store.

No operating metro line goes near Sacre Coeur either but wanted to go there for the buzz of Montmatre and the view. A bit more savvy now, we found that the #95 bus would go most of the way, so we used it. No luck with seats this time. After enjoying the crowds and excitement of the hill, and finding a cafe for a nice lunch, we were happy to walk it off back to our hotel, downhill all the way.

A true cliche maybe, the great Basilica of Sacre Coeur as viewed from Montmatre.

Looking down the steep cobbled streets of Montmatre.

Almost certainly a fake, this Heath Robinson machine nominally used to make hot spiced wine.

Dramatic skyline over Paris from Sacre Coeur.

This busker at Sacre Coeur knows how to hold a crowd. He even sold some CDs.

Walking everywhere across Paris probably got rid of the last of our jet lag, and eventually it was time to head to Rennes to kick off our driving trip of Brittany.

A modern church, Eglise St Andre de l'Europe, but its bells, which were ringing, look like an afterthought.

Delightful Dreux...

The purpose of our trip to France, and indeed, of the entire holiday, was to attend the wedding of some dear friends. But this is not a blog about the wedding - our friends deserve their privacy. Instead, this post in our blog just covers the town, Dreux, we stayed in for the wedding, which was nearby.

Travellers boarding the Eurostar at St Pancras Station in London.

We first travelled to Paris Gare du Nord from London St Pancras via the Eurostar, thus ticking off a long-standing bucket list item from our travel planning. The train rockets along at up to 300km/hr and is smooth and quiet. It spends about 20 minutes under the English Channel in the 50km Eurotunnel. After leaving London, it stopped at two more stations in England. Apparently there are also stops in France before Paris, but our train didn't pull up at these. France immigration checks are undertaken at St Pancras before boarding. Our train to Paris appeared to be 100% full, and there is roughly one departure every hour.

St Pancras station in the north of London is a swish, clean modern facility. It was very crowded, but we felt quite safe there with all our luggage, and easily bought some good coffee to fortify us for the journey. Gare du Nord in Paris is equally busy, but, sadly, comes out badly in the comparison. It was dirty and unkempt, and while we were waiting to organise our rental car, we came to recognise the scammers and beggars on their return visits.

Our rental was almost a people mover - it was a Citroen Picasso C4, and felt uncomfortably big in comparison to the much smaller vehicles crowding the Paris streets. In the dark bowels of the Gare du Nord carpark (it was parked on level -7), it took us a long time to find the parking brake control, and then, in heavy traffic, maybe 30 minutes to actually exit the car park. Then another hour to travel much less than 5km to the Peripherique freeway around Paris. This was not a navigational problem, our Garmin worked perfectly, just mind-blowing congestion on poor roads and really bad driving behaviour where blocking intersections is the norm rather than the exception.

Rue D'Orfeuil is a busy downtown street in Dreux, lined with interesting buildings.

Once out of the city traffic, it took less than an hour to get to the delightful town of Dreux, about 80km west of Paris. Dreux is ancient, and was known as Durocassium, a Celtic capital. The first major battle of the French Wars of Religion was held in Dreux in 1562. This town has history beyond contemplation to us Australians! Its population now is about 35,000.

View of Dreux from the hill of Chapelle Royale Saint-Louis. Eglise Saint-Pierre centre left & Le Bellfroi right of centre.

Exquisite detailing on a 250yo house in Blainville.

The centre of Dreux is an extensive pedestrian only area, which includes a large Place Metezeau where our chosen hotel, Le Beffroi, was. Cars can't approach the hotel but the Place itself is atop a large circular underground carpark. We discovered that electric bollards can be lowered by locals with the right swipe card, so they can enter the mall and service their businesses. Luckily for us, the carpark payment system was out of order and we didn't have to pay for entire 5 day stay.

The Hotel Le Beffroi sits in a cluster of shops around Place Metezeau. No-one around at midnight.

The town is replete with splendid old buildings, not the least of which are the Hotel-Dieu (12th Century) and the Saint-Pierre church (13th Century) but our favourite was Le Belfroi, a belltower started in 1512, once the town hall. It was wonderful to stroll around these historical buildings by day and night, attempting to read their attached plaques describing their stories.

Spectacular architecture in an unheralded residence in Rue du General de Gaulle.

Wooden houses in Dreux dating back to the 15th Century lean precariously towards each other across a narrow lane.

The belltower of Dreux, after which our hotel, le Beffroi, was named.

Breakfast in Dreux was taken at the Cafe Dante in the Grand Rue de M. Violette.

Dreux is overlooked but not in any way dominated by the Chapelle-Royale on a modest hill in the centre of town. It's relatively recent, being first built by the Duchess of Orleans in 1816. Older ruins on the site date back to 1142 and the Renaissance.

Chapelle Royale Saint-Louis built in 1816 by the Duchess of Orleans.

The dome of the Chapelle-Royale Saint Louis is 25m up & was constructed in 1816 using a painting by Roussel.

The Ambulatory of the Chapelle-Royale contains the tomb of King Louis-Phillipe I (d1850) and his first decendents.

Outside the wedding celebrations, we sampled several of the cafes, bars and restaurants in town. A lively market sold us fruit and coffee. We almost had to go hungry on Sunday night, when everything shut down except a bar which didn't serve food. But the patrons there were very helpful, and really tried to help. Eventually, with the help of another Aussie family in town for the wedding, we found a low-rent pizza take-away on an outer fringe of the village.

Dreux is bisected by the pretty & twisty La Blaise.

The wedding itself was wonderful. The French sure know how to enjoy themselves!

The scene of the wedding, a very pretty, very old Eglise Saint Pierre in the tiny village of Marville - Moutiers - Brule.

The wedding reception was at the Chateau de Sorel in the tiny hamlet of Sorel - Moussel.