Brussels, Belgium..it is a slow time waiting for the ride home

Making my rounds of Brussels to see a few attractions, but not to intensely by any means. Last night, the dinner was excellent with a chocolate mousse that was oh so rich and creamy.

Here is a picture of a cathedral that tried to be but did not make it to the upper echelons of ecclesiastical beauty because of financial difficulties created by the revisions in design. One of the largest cathedrals in the world but it is a great contrast to the Barcelona chatheral which was started at the same time.

The Grand place and Grote Market is quite a beautiful square. It is quite ornate. Fortunately, Brussels was not bombed during WWII.

The pose constructed for the picture

At first, the picture pose was a bit unusual to me as I saw folks sprawling across the floor of the Louvre or alluringly shimmering up the stairs of the Seville Cathedral or  meandering around a statue to suddenly find the right spot and curl their head back toward the camera with mouth agape for unique photos.  Now, it looks like folks really are having fun composing the pose in its many variations.

My bag

Now, I can understand Tom Hanks character and his creation of Wilson, (the soccer ball companion in the Castaway). Here is my constant companion courtesy of my brother. My bag has been extremely useful, and always with me, but no it does NOT have a name.  This may be my last post as I leave in a few days and nothing much is happening.

The trip has been TREMENDOUS!!!!!

Bayeux, France, Normandy region and D-day tour

I have always been fascinated by WWII and D-Day. So it was a full day tour to Omaha Beach where the Americans landed and Sword Beach where the British landed.  There were five total beaches of Utah, Omaha, Juno, Gold and Sword spread along 60 km of coastline for D-Day. War is not the prettiest sites to see, but momentous in its change on history.

bunker complex of Nazi Germans

The picture at the left is the bluff where Nazi German gun placements were supposedly located. US Rangers had to scale and take the battery in 30 minutes. The guns were able to fire 15 miles and were a threat to ships and the landing.

Observation bunker on bluff

So the pictures above are the bluffs and down the beach which is you can NOT see in the picture above is Omaha Beach which is the picture on the right. This beach produced the most horrific causalities of the landings on D-Day. Behind this lady running is a Nazi German bunker that destroyed numerous American Tanks.If you look at the end of the path on the right is another bunker and then look on the right in the picture the base of the flagpole. You will see what appears to be a square hole and that is another bunker. All the bunkers face down the beach which is Omaha to be protected from Naval bombardment. So none of these bunkers suffered any direct hits and were all active during the landing.

The left-hand picture is looking from the bunkers in the above picture to  Omaha Beach were the Americans were landing. Looks nice now and has been a resort area for many years even before the war. Fortunately not far from this site on the beach the Americans broke through because of the following factors: the cliffs collapsed from the bombardment, fortunately a group of US Rangers were at the spot who were supposed to be reinforcements, the spot was a blind spot for the bunkers, US engineers were in the area to blow a bigger hole, and the Rangers led the infantry up the hill to create a beachhead, there were no Nazi German reinforcements or counter-attack, and General Rommel was away visiting his girlfriend.

Still, the tragedy of war is all over this area as judged by the cemeteries.
 Here is the cemetery seen in Saving Private Ryan and it is an immense American cemetery sitting above a portion of Omaha Beach.





In afternoon, I visited the British landing zone that includes soldiers from the British Commonwealth.  Here is a key Nazi gun placement that was fought over and then the cemeteries.

Sly, nickname of our tour guide

Nazi artillery in taken by British soldiers for D-Day

Immense bunker sites for the Artillery

Mont St. Michele, France (Normandy region).

3 levels, top the abby, middle village,  lower the fortress

I always wanted to visit this sightseeing masterpiece of architecture. The effort to get to Mont St. Michele (Mont Saint-Michel) started rocky but fortunately it resulted in a smooth trip. I have always wanted to see this abby on an island in the bay that has the highest tide changes in Europe. Unbelievable stuff and very dramatic setting. At first I was going by train but it is a little train station in Bayeux. So I went at night to buy a ticket and it was closed. I tried to read the schedule on the door and thought I needed to be there the next day at 7 am but also thought there were other options. Then I go in the morning at 7:50 am to buy a ticket and it is 20 minutes too late for the only reasonable train. The other train options were not viable.Walking home and not wanting to give up, since this is the ONLY day I could go,  I was looiking through my Bayeux guide and find a mini-shuttle that leaves at 8:30 am. I call and they have room for me and walk directly to the shuttle.

It was worth t extra euros for the shuttle. The shuttle driver took us up the back stairs and treated us as a tour and then bought our tickets without waiting in this HUGE line. She got us audio-guides and the most expedient route to take on the tour. On the way to and back to the Bayeux she provided some commentary. It was a good deal.



When we left Mont St. Michel there was a 11 km line of traffic to get to Mont St.Michel. It was just enough for the audio-guides, as there were massive amounts of people in this very small place. There is really only one lane to go and everybody is zombying along the walkway. At least you can't get lost. See the picture of the walkway with 3 levels of tourists.

The driver said there were 10,000 people at Mt. St. Michel yesterday who bought tickets for the abby while not all visitors go to the abby. Take a look at wikipedia for the place. There is a grand total of 32 residents and it is small, but a dramatic locale.

This area has the largest differences in tides in Europe and the ocean at low tide is 13 km away. See the landmass in the distance with the photo on the left. in the photo on the left, all the area that you see and more will be ocean when the high tide happens.

So visitors take walks with a guide along the low tide areas. The guide is important to the know the tide schedule and quicksand is prevalent. At the top of the abby at Mt. St. Michele there were emergency lookouts who were looking for people stuck in the quicksand. The sand is like cement and very clingy.

I always wanted to go here and luckily it all fell into place. Although 3 hours visit was more than enough because of the volume of tourists.

Bayeux, France in the Normandy region and WWII history

Went from Paris by train to Bayeux, France for extensive knowledge acquisition on the WWII D-Day invasion.

 Bayeux was first town recaptured by the Allies after D-Day and it was never bombed nor destroyed as other towns in this region were.  So the cathedral is intact and town has many old buildings too. This area was part of the American zone and where the Battle of Hedgerows were fought. These battles lasted for months and was immediately after the D-day. Many more Americans died in the Battle of the Hedgerows than who died during D-day invasion.

Also there is WWII cemeteries everywhere in the region and WWII was pure hell.

The cemetery outside Bayeux was for Commonwealth soldiers. As the case with British soldiers, they are generally buried in the area that they died.  Americans are given a choice for the remains to be returned to the USA or buried where they fell.

Wandering Paris, France and finding my final attraction

Last full day in Paris, France and needed a train ticket. So it was Sunday and needed to go to the train station which was a couple miles. Saint Nathalie, the ticket saint, who worked at the train station and spoke 5 languages with American English being one! So, I quickly succeeded in buying my last two train tickets of my voyage which were to Bayeux (Normandy beaches) and then Bayeux to Paris and onto my final destination of Brussels, Belgium. Then it was much more walking to some sites that were in the area. Gravitated to the Natural history museums thinking, it was paleontology and evolution of humans, but never really found that museum. Instead went into the Natural History museums, beautiful gardens, Pantheon (Pantheon, Paris description), Palais Luxembourg, and gardens at the Luxembourg.  I loved walking the streets of cities and visiting gardens and parks. Lastly, never made it to Versailles for numerous small reasons.

Lots of parks - National history gradens

Lots of folks reading and relaxing in the parks

Pantheon - former church

The final attraction on the list was walking down the Champs Elysees which is the shopping mecca and historical avenue to the Arc de Triomphe which was one massive arch. Lots of history happened there including WWII and the Nazis marching around the arc and then Paris being liberated and troops marching around the arc then. I really can not get the WWII concept of Nazi Germany conquering France but 150 years before there were numerous wars with French as the victors and some with Austria and Prussia as the victors, so it has been going on for a long time.

Paris, France at the Centre Pompidou

Yes, another art museum of contemporary art which you can not take pictures inside the museum. On the outside you can. Sometimes, I feel like a lonely tourist snapping a picture of the big spectacle of life or trying to make it a spectacle by snapping the picture.

This was take at the Centre Pompidou on the outside. Centre Pompidou - art museum

Paris, France - The Louvre and art

Huge Galleries everywhere

The Louvre (The Louvre website) is amazing and overwhelming in the grandeur of the art and presentation of the art. Simply put the size of the halls filled with art is just beyond description. I am talking about some HUGE pieces of art too. The size of beauty is incomprehensible in this museum. In addition, there are so many other art museums on Paris. I went to three additional museums and there are many more devoted just to Monet and Rodin for example.

The Pyramid is one entrance to the Louvre

Huge artwork everywhere

Some photos to describe the size of the place and here is the website for your personal perusal. I spent 7 hours in the Louvre which meant just literally walking the hall after hall and sculpture yard after yard and Napoleon's room after room. Sorry to say, I did little in focusing on the art which would take you a lifetime at over 380,000 pieces of artwork of which 30,000 are on display.  I have never seen so many masterpieces of portraits of men, nude females, and biblical scenes. The Louvre gets 15,000 visitors per day and most visited museum by far at 8.5 million (see Wikipedia).

HUGE masterpieces everywhere

Code of Hammurabi - Babylon

In the Louvre you can take pictures but no flash, although at the Mona Lisa there were plenty of flashes.  Still the closest visitors could get was about 10 feet or so.  So many fascinating objects that I have heard about throughout history. Not being educated in art, enables me to stroll through the Louvre. Okay, not the best way to understand things. I have take the time to be educated at home. The Louvre is not a place for cram courses in art.  It was quite the experience.

Paris, France

Started strong but could not find a museum pass and the rain created some barriers.
.After my failure in visiting 5 metro offices to find a museum pass, the rain was nagging and it was time for a pizza. The thinnest pizza that I ever ate and it was good too

Bathrooms to the right can get very tight. I am taking a picture in the mirror and a sink is below me.

Nothing like a good pizza to perk me up on a rainy day.

The rain let up and I went to the Notre Dame de Paris cathedral which is not too far from where I am staying and the pizza above. Very old of course and has gone through many periods of destruction with a huge restoration in the mid-1800s. Quite impressive, especially the stained glass and rose windows, the treasures and relics, and the famous people affiliated with the church and honored through statutes.

Dreaded U-turn line to enter. 

The crowds are humongous here in Paris.  This the dreaded U Line, that goes so far, the line runs out of straight-line space and must form a big U. Fortunately, it went very fast, especially with some nice folks from New York who were vacationing in Paris.

There was a little wine with the lunch which produced a SISH on my entry to the sacred grounds. Yes, I deserved it but it is silly, since there are 12 million people who plow through the cathedral each year (most popular attraction in France). Just look at this line and all those people are milling around this space which is sacred to many.  Just an interesting conundrum to keep it scared as people visit it for cultural reasons. Here are some inside pictures which are NOT against the rules.

Lots of treasures in the extra room and the audio-guide was difficult to follow but the first is the carrier for the crown of thorn of roses, second has a piece of cross attributed to 300 CE and third has a nail from the cross or maybe these are just the carriers. Hard to tell.

Finally the best caramel ice cream that I ever had. The Seine River is in the background. There is some dark chocolate at the bottom. The cone was not so fresh but the ice cream was the second best since Yleca in Spain.

Paris, France, arrived today from Dijon.

Arrived in Paris today and miraculously the planning was so smooth I almost fainted in my new bed. A greek god looked like he was going to piss on my head and I needed to react quick.

This morning walked into a train office in Dijon with my little note and had a ticket in 5 minutes, fabulous lunch, good timing for the super-fast TGV train which was really moving along that track, waited a short time in line for a taxi (no bus today), taxi took the direct route to the hotel and voila neatly tucked into a pretty little hotel and into a pre-booked reservation (last night booking at that). 

I did book this hotel, thinking it was a different hotel and fortunately this new hotel is so much better than the original hotel. I was in a bit of panic trying to figure out what I actually booked on booking.com and where it is.  I finally went with it and kept the reservation.  

TT and I made it to the Greek or is Roman room in Paris

This new one is in a similar location near along the left bank of the Seine river, near the Lourve, Musee d'orsay and Notre Dame.  When I did find the original hotel on the internet it would be a bad deal for me to stay.  The new hotel called Hotel de Lille (instead of hotel du Lille)  gave me a renovated room since I am here four days which has some interesting Greek wallpaper, the bed is superb, bathroom fantastic, and very pleased, am I. Not a bustling nightlife but I like to sleep then. 

Really pretty amazing to be here in Paris and I am excited to be here with all the sights. Got me rejuvenated.

 First views of the city of lights. 

 A couple hours after checking into my hotel, I walk 2 blocks to the Seine River and see this view on the left hand side. 

 I continue walking across the bridge where I took the above picture and come to the Louvre portal which is 3 blocks including a bridge from my hotel.

 I walk along the esplanade and there is a ferris wheel and some rainy clouds. 
I look to my left and see the Eiffel Tower in the distance. Sorry it is fuzzy because on max telephoto and I need to be stable which is hard for me to achieve:) 
  I found a French flag to photo. 
Finally, I decide to walk to the Eiffel Tower where there are tons of folks at night and get the photo below. It is freakin huge and I must have been jaded by all those miniature Eiffels that I have seen  over the years. Sure felt small standing directly underneath it.