Paris in the sun

Last month, I made my 7th visit to Paris. Here’s a few of our photos from our weekend in that wonderful beautiful city where there’s always something new to do …

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We got caught in a shower at sunset and as we passed the Pantheon, the clouds parted to show the tip of the Eiffel Tower lancing a sky of gold, above wet cobbles that shone like polished copper.

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On a lazy Sunday morning, we stepped down in to the Metro to confront our shadows.

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Imagine an old 5km railway line on a viaduct – remove the trains and the lines, fill it with a green walkway of trees, butterflies, roses and ponds. Above the noise of the city, the place is filled with birdsong. That’s the Viaduct des Arts, mother nature at the heart of Paris (and it’s free).

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‘So cool, she was like jazz on a summer’s day, music, high and sweet…” We just sat on a pavement and listened to this joyous jazz quartet on a lazy Sunday afternoon in le Marais, an old part of Paris filled with pre-revolutionary buildings and wonderful galleries and museums.

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The view from Montmartre, a large hill in Paris is rather spectacular. But we all had eyes for a young lad from Ghana who tapped a football on his feet, head and shoulders, and could keep doing it whilst climbing up a lamp post taking his shirt off. The crowd were enthralled. People came to take selfies with him. What a star.

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How many languages can you say ‘I love you’ in? Je t’aime, ich liebe dich and moi tumak bhal pao (Assamese) – that’s my pathetically tiny list I’m sorry to say. Here they are at the foot of the hill, in 200 languages. Zoom in to see your language here. The Wall of Love is 612 enamel tiles, that say ‘I love you’ 311 times in 250 languages.

That is all. There is nothing else. As the Beatles once said, love is all you need.

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Our last night in Paris, saying goodnight to the Pantheon from the hotel room. Saying goodnight to Voltaire, Victor Hugo, Louis Braille, Jean Rousseau, Marie  Curie and other great French people who have contributed so much to mankind and are buried there.

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A path by the side of the river Seine next to a little island in the heart of Paris. To me it’s a rather special place – you see those steps? I was a nervous man the last time I took them, for at the bottom of those steps I proposed to my now wife. To read that story click here.

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Paris, home of some of the greatest art collections on earth, and a superb standard of graffiti that adorns its walls, trains, vehicles and anywhere else a youth with an aerosol can access. (Zoom in to read the witty reply.)

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Gare du Nord – catching the train home to London. Always a sense of sadness leaving a remarkable place. Au revoir Paris, till next time!

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