Quel Désastre!

For all of you who have been anxiously awaiting the next installment of our Paris trip, please let me apologize. I have sworn that I was not doing any hard work on this trip, and suddenly a blog recounting the events of our last day in Paris looked like very hard work. It also may have been that is was such a frustrating day, that I had a difficult time bringing myself to the idea of reliving it. So, I will make this short, but I do ask you to envision a disaster that went on for nearly 5 hours.

At the end of our evening with Geneviéve, she insisted that we meet the next day at Luxembourg Gardens on the left bank in Paris. As we understood it, we were to meet at 10 a.m. at the Metro station, Sainte Michel, which is at the end of Boulevard Sainte Michel. From there we would walk to the Gardens. Polley and I left at 9:30, arriving at the Metro station a few minutes early (surprise, surprise!). The place was jammed with Parisians and even more tourists. It was a bright, lovely morning and all of Paris was outside! We waited . . . and no Geneviéve. We waited some more . . . no Geneviéve. I walked the mile or more to the Gardens . . into the Gardens . . . all around the Gardens. Then I walked back to Metro Sainte Michel. Polley had waited there . . . no Geneviéve. Finally, at 11:30 a.m., we decided we must go back to the Hotel and see if we had any message. Another part of this disaster was that the minutes on our French cell phone had expired, so we had no direct communication.

Upon arriving back at the hotel, there was no message. This seemed very strange. It was now noon. As our minds began to search for an explanation, we decided that what we thought was “dix heures (10 a.m.),” must have been “douze heures (12 p.m.),” so she had not called because we were not really that late – yet. So back in the Metro and back to Sainte Michel. Another hour goes by, more walking, more searching – nothing. By 1:30, we are at the end of options, so back on the Metro and back to the Hotel. We walk into the lobby of the Hotel and the manager says that she called 5 minutes after we left the last time. We use the Hotel phone to call her on her “portable.” She has been looking for us since 10 that morning as well. She is still waiting. She instructs us to meet her at the main entrance of the Luxembourg Gardens. We get back on the Metro, taking it this time to Luxembourg Gardens Metro station.

When we got off at Luxembourg, we walked several blocks to the main gates of the Gardens. . . nothing, no Geneviéve. I then thought I would walk up to the plaza that fronts the Gardens, another several blocks . . . nothing! I then headed back to Polley . . . nothing! Back to the plaza . . . nothing! Back to Polley . . . nothing! Finally, in desperation, I begged, in French, with a kid to let me borrow his “portable” so I could call Geneviéve and find out where she was. 15 minutes later, at about 2:30 in the afternoon (5 hours after the adventure began), we found each other. Geneviéve had been doing the same thing we had been doing. Walking between Sainte Michel and the Gardens. How we had missed each other, we will never know. And the fact that she had stuck with, was amazing. Frustrated, embarrassed, and tired, we sat and had lunch and eventually laughed about it over a bottle of wine and a couple of Croque Madames! The only saving grace, was that it was a glorious day and all of France was outside.

Following lunch, we did take time to stroll about the Gardens.

As I said, it was a beautiful day. We just strolled about, first passing the Palais du Luxembourg


As you can see, the flowers were brightly in bloom




I particularly liked this one, as when one stepped back, the girl's hair and suitcase perfectly matched


Geneviéve, who also is a wonderful photographer, was our guide as we wandered the grounds. She is also a real card, as you can judge from her serious moment here with The Thinker


Most of what we did was to visit the array of sculpture the Gardens offer




Some quite recognizable: The Statue of Liberty, dedicated to the victims of 9/11


Others of various periods and subjects




This one is of an actor, if you couldn't tell:


The one thing that was quite amazing was that primarily at the Gardens, you are not allowed on the lawn. Chairs are set up in the walkways and people sit and look out at the lawns and flowers, and sculptures. Occasionally there is a fountain or two. However, there is one area, called the Pelouse, where we people can sit on the ground and, as you can see there was barely an inch of ground to spare:



It was truly a wonderful late afternoon. All the misunderstandings, and missed opportunities were forgiven and forgotten, as you can see from this picture of Polley and Geneviéve


As always with Geneviéve, she insisted on driving us back to the hotel and we all insisted that this was not goodbye, but simply à bientôt!