Deux Musees -- in one day!

Wednesday, 8 September 2010

Bonjour!

Ah, what an artistic kind of day! Awoke about 7 to a very overcast, gray and drizzly day. Not very attractive outside, but hey, it’s Paris – how bad could it be?

R went down to the boulangerie, and our usual breakfast of croissants with raspberry jam and O.J. Cleaned up and headed to the market at Rue Moffetard. We only had a few things to get, and to be honest, even though it was after 9 a.m. the market looked like it was just getting started! Maybe it was the weather…Stopped at our favorite Italian market for breasola (yes, folks, you’ll be hearing a lot about breasola from here on in…) and parmesan (seems like it evaporates quickly here too, and we can’t even say it’s like Tucson and a “dry heat!”). More tomatoes and some arugula to go with the breasola. Back to the apartment and planned the route to our morning’s destination, Musee Marmottan Monet.

The Musee is located in the 16th arr. And is primarily a venue for works by – you guessed it! – Monet, one of our favorites. Got there just on opening time, 11 a.m. There was a line outside, but once the doors were opened, it moved quickly. Our Les Amis du Louvre cards got us a great discount; basically cut the price in half! Having been there before we knew where to start – downstairs, actually, where the rooms are that hold most of the Monets. This time there was a special exhibition of Monet and Abstractionism, with comparable works of Richter, Pollack and other abstract artists. Very, very interesting! R actually found a Jackson Pollack piece that he liked! Who knew?! We had a nice look around the museum, after which we decided to head back to the center of town. Jumped on the 32 bus, which passes just outside the Marmottan, but found a little neighborhood called “Passy” – so got off there to find something to eat.

Found Café/Bistro Favorite and headed upstairs for lunch. Very, very nice place; excellent food! R had a Croque Monsieur with tomatoes and salad – basically an interesting variation on a grilled ham and cheese sandwich, but this time, very beautifully presented! I had their Salade Paysanne, which included lettuce, tomatoes, hard boiled eggs, walnuts and emmenthal cheese. Excellent! To this we added sparkling water (the waiter checked with us THREE times to make SURE that it was sparkling water that we wanted!) and a nice half-bottle of red Bordeaux – YUM! There you have the makings of a terrific lunch!

From there, we walked toward the Seine, and discovered a huge and elaborate outdoor staircase leading down through the Park Passy and to the Seine. Very lovely, and R would have taken a picture or two, except that it was really raining then. Boarded a bus back toward “home” and then connected on the Quai Francois Mitterand with the ever faithful 27 which took us to our door!

At that point, we decided that naps sounded really good – and the next thing either of us knew, it was 5 p.m.! Whew!

Fortunately, dinner tonight was leftovers of BTOR with a fresh batch of haricots verts (green beans). Didn’t take long to organize and clean up. Decided then, it was about 6:30 p.m., to head over to the Louvre for their late-closing on Wednesday night. Arrived around 7 (and STILL crowds of people standing in the rain waiting to get in at the Pyramid entrance!! Don’t these people ever read websites so that they can AVOID things like that?!) Tonight, we decided to go through their second special exhibition, which was about the trade routes of Saudi Arabia down through the centuries.

Excellent, excellent exhibition!! An incredible collection of old photographs along with archeological artifacts that have come to light literally within the last 50 years! They’re still excavating some of these places! It was fascinating to see artifacts from 400-200 b.c. and watch the outside influences of Greece, Egypt and Rome creep in. Very well done, and incredibly interesting! On a side note, I tend to think of Robert as one of the most widely read and historically knowledgeable people I know, yet here within the span of just a couple of days were the ancient civilizations of Saudi Arabia and Meroe, neither of which we had ever heard of before! That left us wanted to know more, but of course the exhibition volume that was in English literally must weigh about 7-8 POUNDS! Note to the planning committee: Definite need for a second trip to the French Poste – just to get this one book HOME!

After that, we decided to head home – not wanting to schlep this new book all around Paris…R says he thinks it will definitely be a coffee table book … providing it doesn’t collapse the coffee table first!!

Until tomorrow then!
Much love,
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