A Rainy Day in Paris

Today was the first rainy day in Paris.  It was also Sunday, so there was no chance of running errands, or seeing apartments or getting done any of the other things we need to.  That, combined with the rain, decided us for visiting some tourist sites this morning.  Perhaps, we thought, with the rain, there will be fewer tourists.  We've mostly stayed away from the famous locations.  There will be plenty of time later to see everything.  So far I'm afraid to say we've seen mostly places that relate to, or are close to items, on our To Do lists.  Although we have started walking more instead of taking the subway when possible, which means that we are continually making serendipitous discoveries.  Silke and Jerome joke that while other people come to Paris and do tours of famous places or museums or cultural sites, we come to Paris and make a walking tour of colleges.  ("Collège" being the appropriate school level for them.)  We have the exterior of many a Paris college.  There were closed last week, but one can get an impression from seeing the building and the notices posted outside.  Here is one we visited:

One of the places we looked at today was the Eiffel tower up close.  We have already seen it from many places in a distance, including from our apartment.  We didn't go up.  It was windy and cold and cloudy without much view I expect.

We also happened across l'Arc du Triomphe de l'Etoile.

We did try to visit la Bastille.  Place de la Bastille was easy enough to find, but when we arrived we found that we were 223 years too late, the Bastille itself having been destroyed in 1790.  We also hadn't brought any pitchforks with us.

By the way, if you haven't watched the video in yesterday's post, go do that now.  We think it's pretty funny.