Day Seven : The Hill, The Church, The Cemetery and High End Fashion

Time to put our Metro passes to use.   Today’s plan was head to Montmartre,  to reach a church and walk over to the cemetery nearby.  We traveled over three Metro lines easily — directions and signs were easy to follow and even better since we wrote down exactly which way to go.

When we got off at Pigalle station we walked down some streets that although the district was supposed to be more upscale was full of small “Honest Ed” discount type stores and down another section many strip joints.

We walked up many flights of stairs to the top of one of the only two big hills in Paris.  Once reaching the top we went into the Sacre-Coeur church and was in awe of the architecture.   It was tempting to take pictures but inside photo/video-taking was not allowed.  Since it was on a hill we had a great view of the city — new header picture for our blog!

We found an easier way down and headed towards the main section of Montmartre.  We made a side track looking for a patteserie for Lily but it was closed as some things are during the holiday month.  Instead we happened upon the restaurant used in Amelie that you’ll see in the photo gallery below; it was called Cafe des 2 Moulins (“The Two Windmills”).  Also in that picture you can see a man in a green uniform, one of the many city custodians who noticed us taking the photos smiled at us and came over.  He explained to us other locations in the area used for the film and we tried to understand him.  All we really made out was “droite” (right) …. “gauche” (left) … “magasin” (store).  Needless to say we didn’t see any more Amelie locations but the area was picturesque.

Cimetiere de Montmartre  was our next destination.  We picked up a map and headed in.  The cemetery was ginormous.  Our picture cannot stress how big it is and we didn’t even see half of it. The next thing Mike noticed was cats love cemeteries.  Some of the graves we saw were film directors François Truffaut and Henri-Georges Clouzot.  Some of the sites were big, some of them you could step into and pay your respects and some were well-kept and some were marked as being unsafe.  The one thing that makes French cementeries unique is that they are non-secular.

We headed back into the main section of Montmartre and got some pictures of the Moulin Rouge – it was disappointing.

Back into the Metro and down to Parc Monceau known for being un-French like, not being symmetrical, using elements from varied cultures for it’s design (Roman, Chinese, Egyptian) and being occupied by little children with their nannies.

The last major stop of the day was the LaFayette Galleries and Printemps; two massive upscale department stores containing every imaginable thing from fresh gourmet foods like fish on ice, fresh made pâté to multitudes of boutique stores within the store like Cartier, Fendi, Louis Vuitton.

And back home again where we found out Glen and Cindy had a baby boy on August 16 and they named him Holden Hammond.  Congratulations to them!