Did I mention how SOFT the beds were in the London apartment?  Well, needless to say, after a travel day we took the opportunity to sleep in a bit.  I was the early riser, albeit at around 9:00.  I wandered down to the nearest underground station (Queensway) and bought passes for the day which would be good for both the buses and the underground.  We roused ourselves, and walked a block to Bayswater Road, and caught the 94 bus to Piccadilly!  We LOVED the double-decker bus, riding up top, of course.

Everyone in the world seemed to be walking up and down Regent Street leading into Piccadilly Square.  What a melting pot of humanity!  After de-bussing, we went straight to a reduced-price West End ticket booth to see what show tickets we could secure.  The night before, we had already booked “Porgy & Bess” (my FAVORITE) at the Regent’s Park outdoor theater.  At this stop, we ponied up and bought tickets to WICKED, and hatched plans for two more while we were there;  four nights, four shows!

After perusing Piccadilly Circus, we meandered down to Trafalgar square, sneaking up on it from behind the National Gallery.  Again, every London tourist was gathered here.  We talked about Nelson’s Column (do YOU know who Horatio Nelson was?), watched the impromptu sideshows popping up around the square, and the kids attempted to climb the giant lions (2 out of 3).  And once again we were HUNGRY.  Yelp led us to a great pub nearby, and we sat upstairs and filled up on fried EVERYTHING.

From Piccadilly Circus we caught our bus in the reverse direction, headed back to the apartment for a quick rest and change of clothes before “Porgy & Bess”.  [Of course, as I write this, it’s August 27th and  I’m one month removed from these London days, and many of the details have slipped away from me;  more accurately, PUSHED off the far end of my very-limited mind-shelf but the addition of all our back-to-school activities and concerns.]  We took a cab to Regent’s Park and luckily found ourselves with plenty of time to sit and have dinner at their outdoor café.  It was a BEAUTIFUL evening, and we had a wonderful dinner of salmon, QUINOA, salad….well, LouAnn and I had a wonderful dinner.  Kids weren’t to KEEN on the QUINOA – (see what I did there?).

The production was WONDERFUL.  It was a minimal set, with tables and chairs, which were moved around continually by the characters, as the only set pieces.  Supreme talent, especially with Porgy – he was outstanding, sympathetic yet strong.  Bess was strong, but you didn’t ache or secretly cheer for her redemption like Besses we’ve seen in other productions.  The kids LOVED it.  And its timing was perfect, as we’d just listened through the soundtrack in the car the week before while speeding through Normandy.

We meandered home through the darkened London streets, excitedly talking about the show….

First double-decker bus ride!

Trafalgar Square

C’mon, you guys help Jack!

Well, ok, never mind.  Smile!

Isn’t this an amazing picture?!  (Sorry for the sarcasm; this was the only lunch photo from that day)

Ellis wanted a picture with a REAL, old-school DDB.

Passing Loubie’s favorite store!

Walking the last bit home through Hyde Park.

Cab ride to Regent’s Park for “Porgy & Bess”

Dinner outside the theater.

Ellis & Georgia dutifully recreating the poster;  Jack not-so-dutiful.

Sneaky picture in the no-camera-zone.

The outside of our wonderful FLAT!

Although our time in Normandy was too short, it was time to move on.  Normandy had been a peaceful and restful stop for us, away from big-city life, sandwiched neatly between stays in Paris and London.  Somehow we figured out how to re-pack the Peugeot, and we scooted out of Caen mid-morning, headed back to Paris.  Countryside gave way to suburbs; suburbs gave way to Paris proper.

Driving in Paris was an absolute free-for-all, much worse than Florence.  And making this second edition of my Paris driving even more stressful was the need to find a gas station before returning the car, as I had been assured by Monsieur Hertz that bringing back an empty tank would cost me hundreds of euros and one of my children.  (just to be prepared, I had already picked out which child)  On our Google Maps display, gas stations kept appearing just around the next corner, but then we would turn said corner and see no gas pumps – only parking garages.  It finally sunk in that, in Paris, the gas stations must be IN THE PARKING GARAGES.  This flash of brilliance hit me after only the fourth parking garage was passed;  I pulled into the FIFTH one, and, voilà!  Gas!

I returned the car to the Hertz garage under Gare du Nord without HITTING ANYTHING.  At the counter, I averted my eyes when Jean-Luc asked me if there had been any damage to the car, hoping they wouldn’t inspect it too closely.  (No such luck – they called me a week later to ask if I had noticed the “large abrasion” on the right rear fender.  Naturally, I blamed it on LouAnn.)  I handed over the keys, then turned quickly and made my exit.

The Stumbos, all their worldy possessions in tow, then snaked their way through the bustle of humanity that is Gare du Nord.  Even got to see someone get arrested!  We found a deserted corner in which to camp out as we awaited our 4:00 departure on the Eurostar train, which would take us UNDER the English Channel and into London.  Yep, the Chunnel.  We soaked up the last bits of being in a foreign-language-speaking country.  We wrestled our bags onto the train, fell into our seats, and zoned out for the two-hour ride to the Motherland.

Disembarking at London’s St. Pancras station, we could feel a buzz of excitement between us.  I think it was a combination of things – arriving at our last stop of the trip, knowing it would be our last MOVE, being in an English-speaking country….  We were in the home stretch to, well, HOME.  And after seven weeks abroad, I think we we were beginning to get READY.

The first good sign in London was that we were able to fit all of our stuff, and all of US, in ONE London cab.  Woohoo!  It was about a 15-minute ride through the London rain from St. Pancras to our apartment in Lancaster Gate, bordering the north edge of Hyde Park.  It was a PERFECT location, and a PERFECT apartment, the finest accommodations of our trip.

Au revoir, Caen Novotel with no air conditioning!

The puzzle, put back together in perfect form.

Look, kids – the Arc de Triomphe!

Look, kids – the Arc de Triomphe!

It’s barely NOTICEABLE.  Particularly when you’re distracted by LouAnn’s cha-cha pants.

Taking over the Gare du Nord.

Chunnel-bound!

Arrival in London

Standing on the LEFT now, of course

AMAZED it all fit.

And WE all fit!

Amazing kitchen in our amazing apartm—-excuse me, FLAT.

We ordered Lebanese delivery the first night, of course!

Location of our amazing home for the five days in London.

Up and at ’em early once again in Caen.  Today’s agenda included the Normandy American Cemetery and Mont St-Michel.  And a lot of driving.

The Cemetery is hard to describe.  It struck me from both ends of a spectrum – the huge number of American lives lost during the invasion, and the singular, individual stories that were highlighted as part of the exhibits.  The amazing stories of individual courage and heart create such PERSONAL connections to the soldiers in question; then your understanding suddenly and rapidly expands – like a Jiffy-Pop of realization – to consider that every single cross and Star of David in that Cemetery represents a STORY, a LIFE that was unique in the way it was lived and then sacrificed.  And it becomes overwhelming.  9, 387 individual stories, personalities.  9,387 groups of loved ones who mourned.  And how to impress the gravity of that on your children?  I decided not to attempt it.  We let the experience speak for itself as we toured the exhibits and then the Cemetery itself in a steady rain. Truth is, we were ALL moved; the kids loved reading every story.

My FB post from those days:

“I’ve been deeply moved by two days spent at Omaha Beach, Pointe du Hoc, and the Normandy American Cemetery. Words fail, yet a few come to mind. Courage. Persistence. Heart. Leadership from both Leaders and the led. These characteristics are not exclusively American, but they have made our country great, and were demonstrated in ABUNDANCE on those days 70 years ago, and in the weeks and months that followed. I am humbled, heartened, GRATEFUL.”

We then pulled ourselves together and drove 1.5 hours to Mont St. Michel.  So incredible!  This ancient abbey and village sit on a tidal island.  Ever since a brief visit in high school, I’ve been desperate to get back and have a full tour.  It was a lot of climbing, but it was worth it!  The first monastery was established here in the 8th century.  The abbey itself, for the most part, was built in the 12th century.  The lower parts of the island comprise a small village, now solely focused on tourists.  And the monastery is still active, housing I-don’t-remember-how-many monks; we actually saw a few of them praying in the chapel.  They pray up to eight hours a day.

We had a wonderful dinner at one of the restaurants in the village, with a view back over the low-tide marsh to the mainland, before a very tired car-ride back to Caen; it was like driving a hearse!

Beginning of the indoor exhibits at the Normandy American Cemetery.

Just one of the many individual stories highlighted in the exhibits, making the experience so PERSONAL.

Exiting the exhibits building and making our way to the Cemetery.

Mont St.-Michel appearing out of the mist as we approached!

Entering the village.

Touring the abbey; we love audio-guides!

This ancient hamster-wheel inside the abbey is attached to a sled system that would be used to haul supplies up to the monastery.  The pallet would be loaded up in the village, then monks would get in the wheel and start walking, pulling the pallet up to the abbey.  Genius!

Praying monks.  Probably wasn’t supposed to take this picture…..

Dinner in the village.  I had the famous local mussels, and only GEORGIA was interested in sharing them!

The E-Bug Smolder.

Back-seat scene during our drive back to Caen…..

From a very loose, relaxed travel day to a very FULL day in Normandy.  And what was, quite possibly, my favorite day of the entire trip.

We were up and out of the Novotel in Caen at a reasonably early hour.  Beautiful, sunny day.  The plan for the day had us heading northwest, hoping to visit Bayeux, the D-Day Museum, Omaha Beach, and the Normandy American Museum all in the same day.  Rather ambitious.

We stopped first in Bayeux.  It’s a wonderful little town, quintessentially French, with a beautiful cathedral in the center.  We bought pastries and strolled through town.  Visited the cathedral – which was consecrated on July 14, 1077, and then rebuilt in the 12th century in a beautiful Gothic style.  Drove back out through town, passing a beautiful old mill just outside of this small city.

We continued northwest-ward, turning off the main motorway to head up to Omaha Beach.  The small roads are lined with the famous Norman hedgerows, and I nearly wore my phone out taking pictures.    These ancient hedgerows, which form property boundaries, were a critical element of the effort to wrestle control of Normandy away from the Nazis.  The hedgerows, though a prominent feature of the Norman landscape, were completely overlooked by the leaders planning the Allied invasion.  The troops simply couldn’t get through them, and the few openings in the hedgerows were pre-sighted by the Nazis – like walking into a trap.  The Sherman tanks we used could occasionally drive OVER the mounds of hard dirt, but doing so would expose the vulnerable underside of the tanks to German anti-tank guns.  But the ingenuity of the American soldiers prevailed, as they designed and built ways for the Shermans to bore holes in the dirt, which they would fill with explosives.  Anyways, I thought it a fascinating detail of the war, so I took lots of pictures.  Miles and miles of hedgerows, hundreds of years old, in beautiful emerald green.

The D-Day Museum was small but impressive, filled with items from the invasions, both donated and discovered.  Lots of questions from the kids, lots of talk about what a daunting undertaking it all was.  Neat films that told very personal stories of soldiers and nurses that survived.

From there we drove a few short miles north, through the small town of Saint-Laurent-Sur-Mer, until we dead-ended at Omaha Beach, site of the first and largest invasion.  There’s a beautiful monument there, and flags from the Allied nations flying, but other than that it is a beautiful, everyday beach.  The weather was beautiful, so there were tons of people on the beach and in the water.  We had lunch at a nearby cafe, then the kids changed in the car and we spent a few hours on the beach.  We LINGERED, and it was wonderful.

Next it was back in the car for the short drive to the Normandy American Cemetery.  Unfortunately, we had run out of time – we got there just as it closed.  BUT, this gave us time to go see Pointe du Hoc.

Pointe du Hoc, west of Omaha Beach, was a key strategic point for the Nazis, and Allied Target #1 for acquisition.  A group of Army Rangers, led by Lt. Colonel James Rudder, was charged with overtaking the Nazi installation there, which was heavily entrenched with elaborate concrete bunkers, tunnels, and huge 155mm guns that the Allies were keen to knock out.  The Nazis had never expected an attack from the shore, as Pointe du Hoc is at the top of a 100-foot cliff down to the beach below.  But that’s exactly where the Rangers attacked.  With grappling hooks, ropes and ladders, they fought and scrambled their way up the cliff while Nazi soldiers fired down on them from above.  Of the roughly 200 Rangers making the assault, only 110 survived to the top of the cliff.  But they quickly overtook the Nazi forces, captured the guns, and spent the next days in a desperate attempt to KEEP it until reinforcements arrived.  Today, Pointe du Hoc is an eerie but impactful monument to the Allied efforts there.  The landscape is still cratered from the bombings conducted ahead of the D-Day landing to soften up the enemy.  The Nazi bunkers are there.  You can walk to the edge and peer over the cliff that the Rangers somehow scaled.  It was wonderful.  We took our time, explored the bunkers and Pointe in a light rain, and read the many stories memorialized there.

Of course, this was the STUMBOS visiting a historic site, so it wasn’t without mishap or comedy.  Ellis found himself a concrete bunker entrance to climb down into, thinking that, like all the others they’d explored, it would LEAD somewhere.  But alas, it didn’t.  And he was STUCK.  It took both siblings and his mother to haul him out!

We stopped for dinner in Bayeux on our way back to Caen.  Good dinner.  GREAT cider.  And to top it off, “Tekila”, a LATIN REGGAE band, was playing downstairs.  Of course!

Arriving in Bayeux

The Cathedral

The D-Day Museum

Yet another historical lecture from Dad…..

The forward door from one of the many Allied landing vessels which carried troops to Omaha Beach

A Sherman tank

Omaha Beach

Georgia and LouAnn in front of “Les Braves”, created by French sculptor Anilore Banon to commemorate the 60th anniversary of D-Day in 2004.

We ate at a beachside cafe, where Georgia had a very American lunch.

Then, back to the beach!  The water was COLD, but kids don’t mind.

I did a lot of THIS on Omaha Beach.

Hedgerows!

More hedgerows!

One of many beautiful, ancient estates on the way to Pointe du Hoc.

Pointe du Hoc

German bunker

The memorial seen in the distance is at the top of the cliff the Rangers scaled.

The whole area is still pocked with craters from the Allied aerial bombing.

Looking down to the stretch of beach where the Rangers began their climb.

 

Ellis trying to escape from his bunker!

Our dinner spot back in Bayeux.

WONDERFUL cider…..

Tekila, the “latin reggae” band!

Another moving day!  This day would take us from Paris to Caen, in Normandy, and involve yet another DENTED RENTAL CAR…..

But first, we took a quick, early-morning walk over to Notre Dame cathedral to see and explain the FLYING BUTTRESSES.  Plus, one last haul from our local crêperie.

From there, I made my way via Metro to the labyrinthine Gare du Nord, and, eventually, the car rental counter.  I was determined not to be saddled once again with a car that was too small to accommodate our growing hoard of stuff.  This involved negotiations between two competing rental car counters, each Frenchman glowing with the satisfaction that they were both milking me for all I was worth.  In the end, it was a Peugeot from Hertz.  I successfully navigated out of the Gare du Nord parking garage, and wound my way through the confusing Paris streets (it’s not exactly laid out on a GRID).  I had plotted out the route to a parking garage near our apartment ahead of time, and pulled in without incident.  However, Paris parking spaces are SMALL, and, alas, I happened to kiss a concrete pillar with the rear fender as I pulled into one.  Just a wee flesh wound, really; BARELY noticeable.

Back to the apartment, then suffered through another session of watching my wife and kids haul all our luggage down 78 steps.  Such troopers!  With all our earthly possessions staged at Rue Seguier’s edge, we looked like a band of gypsies trying to introduce Paris to the high-cultured world of the American Garage Sale.  I hustled back to my garage, retrieved the scraped Peugeot, and navigated successfully back to the narrowest street in Paris.  I managed to pull onto the sidewalk across the street from #13, and gave the signal:  “hurry, load ’em up!  NOW!”  Somehow it all fit.  At the last moment, our host, Armelle, came around the corner!  So we got to say goodbye and thank her for her wonderful apartment.

Within 20 minutes we were out of Paris proper, motoring through the French countryside on our way to Normandy.  With my strict orders about not sitting for too long, we took frequent stops and traded drivers back and forth.  Early that evening we pulled into the Novotel in Caen.  A proper hotel!  LouAnn knew that meant ONE SURE THING:  Air Conditioning!  Nope.  No air conditioning.  But there WAS a pool.  Dinner in the hotel restaurant, and early bedtimes……

This was actually the night BEFORE.  LouAnn trying to PACK us.  Our belongings seemed to multiply like wet Gremlins.  And this was just AFTER sending two big suitcases home from Salzburg with my sisters…

For those of you with 49 seconds to kill, here are all 78 steps from our apartment to the courtyard.

Look, kids – Notre Dame!

GARGOYLE

“Oh, yeah, Notre Dame.  Cool.  Another cathedral.  Awesome.  Flying buttresses?  Huh.  Yeah, that’s neat…..”

Jambon et fromage….Nutella….DR PEPPER….

Oh, this isn’t even HALF of it….

Threading the needle of Rue Seguier in the Peugeot…..

It fit!

LouAnn and Armelle, our sweet host.

Off to Normandy!

This was the scene at EACH rest stop between Paris and Normandy.

The French countryside, whizzing by

Ok this is fun.  If you’ve read earlier posts, you may remember that, while I was in the hospital in Salzburg, LouAnn took the kids to the Salzburg Marionette Theater to see Mozart’s “The Magic Flute”.  They loved it, and it really stuck with them.  In the Paris Opera gift shop, Ellis found a DVD of the Met doing “Flute”, and he eagerly chose it as his souvenir.  In this video, as we zip through northern France, the kids are in the backseat watching the video.  And I’ve asked sweet LouAnn to recount the entire STORY of “Die Zauberflöte” for me from her recollection.  Listen for the children occasionally scolding/correcting her from the back seat.  You can also hear occasional interruptions from the French navigation lady. You’re a good sport, Loubie!

Well, we finally figured out how to solve the can’t-seem-to-get-up-and-out-of-the-apartment-as-early-as-we’d-like problem; this time, LouAnn and the kids got up early and went without me.  Turns out DAD was the problem.  Actually, knowing we needed early line placement to visit the Catacombs, LouAnn agreed to drag the kids out early and let me sleep in a bit.  Isn’t she the BEST?  By the time I showed up, just minutes before the Catacombs opened, they were snugly planted just 10 people from the front of the line.  Woohoo!

The Paris Catacombs are absolutely FASCINATING.  Now an official museum of the city of Paris, the Catacombs are the result of a few converging factors.  (I’ll give a brief and likely mildly inaccurate description of these factors, but if you’re really interested, go read about them:  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Catacombs_of_Paris)  In short, these ossuaries (that’s like the TENTH time I’ve used the word “ossuaries” today…) are filled with the skeletal remains of over 6 MILLION Parisians; er, FORMER Parisians.  They’re the result of two convergent factors:  over-zealous mining of precious Paris limestone to build the city and the over-crowding of Paris cemeteries.  With so much of the limestone removed under the city, Parisians began to suffer multiple, disastrous collapses.  The problem grew until Louis XVI finally took action in 1775 by establishing an Inspection of Mines service.  Concurrently, Paris cemeteries filled up.  So a plan was hatched to EMPTY all Paris cemeteries, moving the remains to the abandoned mines.  Voilà, the Catacombs.  Throughout the 1800’s, the remains were arranged into the museum-like display still existing today, as the Catacombs were fully mapped and visitors began, well, visiting.  Now it’s a wonderfully creepy walk through extensive tunnels, 20 meters below the city.  Well worth the wait!

From the Catacombs (and after, naturellement, a visit to the Catacombs GIFT SHOP), we moseyed over to the famous Rue Mouffetard for lunch at a sidewalk cafe.  Then back to the Metro for a ride to the Paris Opera House.  This impressive structure was, of course, the inspiration for the Phantom of the Opera story.  Impressive, indeed.  We had hoped to attend the then-running “Hunchback of Notre Dame” there, but it was just TOO pricy.  So we settled for a self-guided tour.  Absolutely beautiful.

After an afternoon rest at the apartment, we decided, this being our final evening in Paris, to have a relaxing picnic dinner on the lawn of the Louvre.  It was PERFECT.  The sun setting over the distant Champs-Elysees, our blanket spread on the perfect lawn, with the imposing and beautiful museum surrounding us.  Wonderful bread, cheese, and wine.  The kids playing soccer and trying to avert their eyes from the rather passionate and acrobatically-entwined couplets of lovers around us. We rested and laughed and felt very…..PARISIAN.  A perfect final evening.

The early-risers in place – just meters from the entrance!

Hatted in DISNEY attired, of course, from yesterday’s surprise trip.

The mark of the first Inspector General of the mines, appointed by Louis XVI.  Can’t remember his name.

Near the entrance, audio-guide in-hand.  Notice there are no BONES yet.

One of mine inspection workers carved elaborate scenes out of the limestone on his lunch breaks.

Bones, bones, bones.  The remains of over 6 million Parisians.

He took a musket-ball to the forehead, it seems.

An example of the huge caverns left by the many cave-ins.

The nondescript exit…..

….and, of course, the gift shop across the street.

Paris Opera House

The Grand Staircase

Side note – Jack had to haul this ladder down the 78 steps at our apartment, then back UP, so he could retrieve his brother’s raincoat, which he had “accidentally” thrown on top of the courtyard roof earlier in the week.

Real Frenchman!

Outside the Louvre at dusk, ready for our picnic.

The kids made a friend that night.

From the Tuileries Garden – Place de la Concorde, Arc de Triomphe

Notre Dame, during our late-night walk home…..

Yet another day we intended to get up and out of the apartment early, yet another day we didn’t quite make it as early as planned.  This time, we were headed to the Catacombs, highly recommended by our dear friends the Daniels (see the Lucca posting).  When we emerged from the subway station bright and early at 11:00ish…. we saw that the line to get INTO the Catacombs wrapped all the way around the block.  Some quick interviewing revealed that the wait was about three hours.  Ugh….

We retired to a nearby cafe to have some lunch and decide our afternoon.  We settled on a quick trip to Versailles to see the incredible palace and beautiful gardens.  The kids were a bit MEH about it, but trusted our judgment that it would be great!

But as we sat eating lunch, I was feeling a bit MEH myself about another palace.  So I hatched a plan to instead surprise the kids with a trip to Disneyland Paris.  A quick, discreet text across the table to LouAnn confirmed she agreed with the idea.

[NOW…..a POINTED NOTE to all of you who are QUICK TO JUDGE ME for spending a day in Paris, France at DISNEY:  I have spent this WHOLE TRIP being the MASTER OF CULTURE AND HISTORY.  Every BIT of this itinerary has been aimed at providing our kids the AUTHENTIC European experience.  Starting in MARCH, I had been asked no fewer than 200 TIMES, “please, please, please can we go to Paris Disneyland???  We’ll be RIGHT THERE!!!”  And every request was met with not just a refusal, but an AUTHORITATIVE refusal;  a refusal that carried with it a clear tone of disdain and shaming for the asking child.  “MON DIEU!  Good gracious NO.  We are NOT WASTING a day in Europe at DISNEYLAND!  Shame on you and your shallow, juvenile mind for asking!!  Cezanne and Degas are rolling in their GRAVES!!”  BUT…..I caved.  They were SUCH troopers during The Salzburg Incident that I decided to treat them.  Besides, I LOVE Disney World.  So LOOK DOWN YOUR GOOFY-SIZED NOSE at me if you will…..I’m not ashamed!]

So back on the Metro, connecting to the bigger train, all the way out to the LAST STOP.  Even though the upcoming-station list was scrolling on the screen inside the train car, the kids NEVER NOTICED the last stop said, “Disneyland Parc”.  It wasn’t until we were getting off the TRAIN that it started to sink in.  Needless to say, they were ECSTATIC.  We ended up with about 7 hours between the two parks, Disneyland and the Studios, and we had a blast.  I spent most of my time lying and sitting on benches, or traversing the parks to collect FastPasses, but I was happy to do it.

The morning started with a walk along the Seine!

QuickLoutakethepictureitsmellsliketinkledownhere…..

Lunch at the Indiana Café.  This may have been the exact moment – or near it – when I hatched my plan for the Versailles-Disneyland switcheroo.

What?  Disneyland!?!

This one’s funny because they’re so excited, but they have no idea where to go!

I managed to take a family selfie that’s focused only on me.  Huh.

Thank you, random British tourist!  (Disneyland was FULL of Brits)

 

Dead ringer.

This ride was called something like, “Woody’s Disc-Slipping Roundup.”  So, naturally, I didn’t ride it….

These two win the prize maintaining the highest energy levels late into the evening.  Would you have bet on anyone else?

Bastille Day!  Although, as we learned, the French prefer to call it Le Quatorze Juillet, and not give quite such a nod to the holiday’s violent genesis.  On July 14, 1789, a determined crowd stormed the Bastille, a prison where many political prisoners were held, and thereby kicked off the French Revolution.  The day is commemorated in Paris with a huge military parade and a grand fireworks display near the Eiffel Tower.  We had hopes of catching BOTH, without being in the center of EITHER crowd.

We had good intentions of getting up early to make the parade, but we are not the best at getting up and out early.  By the time we made our way towards the Champs-Elysees, many of the streets were blocked off and we had no idea where to go.  We caught military jet flyovers as they happened, albeit for brief glances between buildings.  Finally, we found a good spot to catch the troops marching by, and it turned out to be right at the END of the parade route.  The VARIETY of French troops was amazing, all with very different uniforms, weapons, marching songs…..  We even got to see some tanks speeding.  Yes, French tanks HAUL DERRIÈRE.

Later in the day, after dinner and some rest back the apartment, the boys just weren’t UP for marching back through town to find a good viewing point for the fireworks.  So LouAnn, Georgia, and I set out about 9:00 to get close but not too close.  We found our perfect vantage point on the beautiful Pont Neuf.  We talked and laughed as we waited for darkness to fully fall, watching the Seine dinner cruise boats pass underneath us and eavesdropping on the surrounding conversations.  The fireworks were absolutely beautiful, a pure celebration.  Vive la France!

View of a French flyover, ever so brief.

Not sure.  Navy?

Almost ALL of the units had their own marching songs!

French commandos

Best uniform?  Winner!!!

A hot dog?  With fries ON it?!  Get OUT!!

This apparently is some famous Paris landmark.  Can’t remember its name..

I had gone back to the apartment to rest at this point.  I let them out of my sight for ONE HOUR and they all buy BERETS.  Now we blend in for sure.

Although she is pretty cute…..

Lounging at a café, across the street from the bakery they named after me.

When we’re tired, and punchy, THIS is what we do for entertainment.  In case you can’t identify the feet…. Georgia on the left, LouAnn in the middle, Ellis on the right.

Camped out on the Pont Neuf, waiting for the fireworks.

Look at that Frenchy-looking dude behind us.  He even has a BLACK TURTLENECK on.

Our view…..waiting for darkness….

The Louvre!  But how to tackle it all in one day…..with three kids…..  And with a late start at that!  We hopped on the Metro, stopped for crêpes on the way, then entered the museum through the sneaky Porte des Lions entrance, which every website told us would mean no lines, no waiting!  Apparently the secret’s out, because we still waited…..

Oh, the mass of people!  But we hit the highlights we wanted to.  It’s just so vast that you can’t get your head around it.  And for some reason, every time I enter the Louvre (ok, it’s only been 3 or 4 times) I get an irrepressible urge to SIT.  Somehow I kept moving, and we LOVED it.

After the Louvre, we wandered back to our neighborhood and ended up at El Chuncho for MEXICAN FOOD.  Woohoo!  Oh, don’t roll your eyes at ME, blog-followers.  We’ve eaten local cuisine for six weeks!  It was time for nachos and fajitas.  And surprisingly, the guacamole was VERY good.

Actually, the day started with a bathroom concert….  Jack discovered that the “hum” created by the lights in the apartment’s bathroom created a perfect “drone” chord.  He provided the melody.  Yes, these kids are musical.

Crêpes.  AGAIN.

He can sing, play the drums, AND bell-kick.

Headed towards the sneaky Portes des Lions entrance, which, of course, didn’t turn out to be that sneaky.

The Coronation of Napoleon, by David.  Massive scale, very impressive.

Dum-dum.

SO many paintings

Go David!

The THRONG around the Mona Lisa.  Sorry.  I don’t get it.

Ellis and Georgia both made their ways to the front of the pressing mass of photo-snappers, with some help from the museum guards.

This is somebody FAMOUS.  Either Greek or Roman.

I got to see Vermeers!  LOVE Vermeer.  Love the Dutch.

The Napoleon Apartments.  I nearly exhausted myself making the, “funny, we almost did our living room JUST LIKE THIS” joke, but no one laughed.

Ellis tugged us around until we found this one, which he’d seen a thumbnail of on the museum map.  He claimed he wanted to see what the shape in the background was.  Uh-huh.  Lots of giggling at this one….

Exiting through the pyramid

First full day in Paris!  And it was BEAUTIFUL outside.  I went early to the bakery and brought back wonderful pastries and croissants; we each effectively ate a stick of butter for breakfast.  We hit the streets and wandered up to Notre Dame cathedral.  But the line to go INTO the cathedral was ridiculously long; we got kind of a late start.  So we admired the outside, then promised to return another day that week EARLY in the morning to see the inside (SPOILER ALERT:  we NEVER made it back to Notre Dame).  From there we walked a few blocks to the Conciergerie, a former prison that housed hundreds of prisoners during the French Revolution, many of whom went from there straight to the guillotine!  The kids were naturally FASCINATED by the guillotine.  The Conciergerie also held Marie Antoinette as she awaited her ultimate fate.  It’s a fascinating place to visit and learn about the process during the Revolution; it was a rather paranoid period in French history!  [BTW, the last execution by guillotine in France was in…..1977!]  C’est horrible!

After the Conciergerie, we crossed the river back into our neighborhood, and wound our way through the quaint but bustling streets….

[ASIDE:  The thing that struck me most profoundly about Paris during this time back was this:  all the stereotypes about Paris, all the movie scenes, all the caricatures…. they’re all TRUE.  Paris is REALLY LIKE THAT.  There really ARE old men on the street corners playing accordions.  There really are countless pairs of lovers embracing on the banks of the Seine.  There really are sidewalk cafés every 10 feet, where people slow down and sit and drink wine or coffees and watch the ladies ride by on their bicycles with baguettes sticking out of the handlebar baskets.  And it’s not a show – even off the beaten tourist paths, these things exist and reflect a way of daily Parisian life that we’ve all imagined.  And there’s a comfort in that, a familiarity…..an unexpected speed with which you, even as a foreigner, find yourself falling into the daily rhythm being played out around you.  So even though I’m sure the Stumbos stuck out like sore American thumbs to the natives around us, WE felt like we blended in, right from Day 1.  I ordered breads and pastries at the local boulangerie with the refinement of my high-school French.  We bought groceries, we lingered at cafés, we reclined on the grass in the park and read.  We stopped HURRYING.  We SAVORED; that Parisian practice that I treasured most of all…..]

We strolled through our neighborhood, stopping first at for crêpes from a sidewalk vendor near our street.  We split along sweet/savory lines – some ordered ham and cheese (jambon et fromage) and some ordered NUTELLA.  Our intention was to meander in the general direction of the Luxembourg Palace and its wonderful gardens.  I, the master navigator, was sure I was headed correctly.  LouAnn begged to differ.  “Nonsense,” I replied, “I know exactly where we are.”  Well, I could waste a lot of words and space here elaborating, but suffice to say LouAnn was RIGHT, and we walked many more miles that day than we needed to, and after we finally righted ourselves at her direction and entered the gates of the Gardens, I was still getting quite an earful from the better half.

The Luxembourg Gardens are wonderful.  In the center, behind the palace, is a huge, shallow fountain filled with small toy sailboats that are rented nearby.  We sat and watched them.  We also walked over to see the ancient grotto.  By this time, we were hungry for dinner,  so we headed north again towards our apartment and wound up at Relais L’Entrecote for some WONDERFUL steak frites, the only thing on the menu.  Our waitress was so cute; she loved the kids and kept bringing them extra fries.  After stuffing ourselves with steak, fries, and towering desserts, we wandered back towards the apartment.  I went back to rest, and LouAnn took the kids to see Pont des Arts, where all the lovers have hung their locks.  A trip which included, of course, highland dancing alongside a dashing young bagpiper.

In front of our apartment.

Look, kids – Notre Dame!

Inside the Conciergerie

Our local crêperie!  She was a master!

And they had DR. PEPPER!!!

Following their fearless leader!  In the wrong direction.

Giorgio and me.

Playground in the Luxembourg Gardens

Luxembourg Palace

Steak Frites!

Our sweet waitress.

OBNOXIOUS desserts!  (this was after I head left to go back to the apartment to rest)

Cappuccino selfie

Pont des Arts