Eurotrip #2: Chartres and Paris

Hi everyone!

Today I'm going to tell you about the second part of my trip to France that I went on at the beginning of November (you can read the first part here). After spending the week in Nantes and exhibiting the projects that we completed in the workshop, we took the car and went to spend the weekend in Paris. Despite the journey from Nantes to Paris being only 4 hours, we decided to treat ourselves, after all we are architecture students, and make a stop in the city of Chartres whose cathedral is one of the greatest Gothic French works and is studied in every and each architecture school in the world, whatever the country may be.

What I'm going to say could perhaps be counted as blasphemy in the world of architecture, but I enjoyed the small and unknown cathedral in Nantes a lot more than the famous cathedral in Chartres. This is thanks to what we found, which was necessary but annoying at the same time: restoration works.

Half of the great main nave was found full of scaffolding, so the perception of the giant and Gothic styled area was shortened. Also, a big part of the church had already been completely restored, so the dark, medieval stones which had been battered over the course of time, a testament of the works of the ancient foremen, ancestors to the building that stands today, had been replaced by clean and white walls that didn't at all give the same feeling of "historical vertigo" that is usually produced by the monuments that are hundreds of years old.

Also, one of the best things about this French cathedral is the colourful medieval stained glass whose unique and incomparable workings are the most important in the world. However, the grey clouds overhead and the weak drizzle that had accompanied us from Nantes, prevented the stained glass from showing its full potential, since it's not the same as seeing the stained glass with rays of sun piercing through it and awakening its vivid colours than it is with a gloomy and blueish stained glass window illuminated by a scarce and weary light.

To make matters worse, the famous circular maze on the pavement of the cathedral was covered in a huge number of bland wooden chairs, so this joined the sad list of disappointments about the Chartres cathedral. This isn't to say that I no longer like the cathedral, I simply had too high expectations for what I then found.

Nevertheless, I have to say that I really liked the sculptural set of more than 200 images of the cathedral choir which narrated the life of Jesus in a didactic way, with the aim of educating the illiterate medieval population. What stood out as well was the porches on the exterior façades and the strange difference in hight and style of the towers of this French cathedral, which is visible from the highway.

Once the visit was finished and with a strange bitter-sweet feeling, we proceeded on our journey to Paris. Despite there only being 90 km separating us from the French capital city, it was the worst part of the journey, because on arrival on a Friday in the early evening, the motorways which went into the city were totally blocked by tourists going into the city and Parisians leaving the city. Nevertheless, the anger that we were feeling all of a sudden disappeared at the sight of the Eiffel Tower, lit up as we passed it in the car through Trocadéro. As King Enrique IV (more or less) said: "Paris is well worth a hold-up".

After driving through the whole city centre and fearing for our lives on the gigantic roundabout of the famous Place de la Concorde, we arrived at our accommodation in Paris, where we were waiting for another Brazilian boy, who is a friend of my friend, and was also spending the weekend with us. We stayed in an apartment that we had found on Airbnb, which was right by the Père Lachaise cemetery. The apartment, that cost us 45€ per person for the 2 nights, it was great! It was a small flat with two bedrooms (each with a double bed), a living room (with a big sofa-bed), a small kitchen which was well equipped and two French style bathrooms: one with the shower and one with the sink.

We think that the girl who had rented us the flat was living there during the week and then leaving Paris on the weekends, benefiting from the flat by renting it and making herself some extra money, because all her stuff was there. However, the apartment was very clean, and we found clean towels for each of us, which was a very appreciated detail. Also, the WiFi worked perfectly and the location, without being in the city centre, was very good.

What was very odd but very practical was the system used for the keys. The owner sent us a message with two access codes to the building and to the stairs and one to a small box next to the door of the apartment, where we found the keys. Because of this, you avoided having to stay to collect and return the keys, you didn't have to worry about losing them and, above all, we didn't have to rely on the one person who would have the keys in order to go back to the house.

After leaving our stuff, we caught the metro and we went to Trocadéro, with the objective of going on a night time stroll through the city. After the corresponding photoshoot with the Eiffel Tower in the background from the crowded viewpoint of Trocadéro, we went to the feet of the tower, from where we walked along the banks of the Seine until we got to La Place de la Concorde and to the Église de la Madeleine. There, we soothed our hunger with a McDonalds (some advice for thrifty travellers: there aren't any 1€ hamburgers in French McDonalds) and we took the tram to return home, ready to get into the comfortable beds in the apartment.

The following day we woke up wanting to take advantage of the day and to enjoy Paris. However, we had to use a good part of the morning to move the car to a private parking area, which had been previously paid for, in order to avoid the dreadful Parisien fines. With one less thing to worry about, we rented bikes with the public bike rental company Velib', which was similar to the one that we used in Nantes. For 1. 70€ you can use the bike for the whole day, with bike stations all over the city, and saving you from having to take public transport (which costs 1. 80€ per journey, so you're saving a considerable amount). It works exactly the same as it did in Nantes: you can take the bike for 30 consecutive minutes, after which you have to leave it at one of the bike stops if you don't want to pay a supplementary fee, and then take your bike back again.

However, going around such a big city like Paris, there are some problems: whilst in 30 minutes you could easily get from one point to another in Nantes, in Paris the distances are a lot longer, so it's very likely that you'll have to make stops halfway through each journey. Also, with a much larger amount of users, it's likely that you'll find bike stops that are completely full up when you want to leave your bike, or you'll find empty bike stops when you want to pick up a bike. They also hold 150€ in your account per bicycle as a deposit. Supposedly the 150€ is given back within 24 hours of you returning the bike, but with the use of foreign bank cards, the money can be delayed for more than 12 days. Despite that and from my point of view, I think bikes are the best option because you can really enjoy the city from a bicycle and it's very cheap.

So, we got our bikes and we went to the legendary, Parisienne Île de la Cité, where we visited the renowned Notre Dame cathedral. Despite the hundreds of tourists that invaded the cathedral, I really enjoyed going back there (I had seen it during my last trip to Paris 10 years ago) - it's strange to note how it's changed in my perception after 2 years of my architecture course. After seeing the inside, we went to the back of the cathedral where there is a small pedestrian bridge that links this "île" with the Île Saint-Louis where there is always live music, with a beautiful view of the back of Notre Dame as a backdrop. From there, we went to the Georges Pompidou national centre of art and culture, more famously known as The Pompidou Centre. On the way, we went into a supermarket where we bought something cheap and quick to eat, which we then proceeded to devour in the interesting square that was next to the Pompidou Centre.

This square, formed by a gentle slope that goes down to the entrance of the building, is a good example of how to create a public space that works both for the city and as an atrium for the centre, because whatever the time, it's always busy. Completing the set, the other square that accompanies the Pompidou Centre, known for it's big fountain full of Miró's sculptures, is also full of improvised street performances.

After eating, we went into the Pompidou Centre, which is a really important and controversial architectural piece of work, where inside, as well as a library and diverse cultural institutions, there is also the Musée National d'Art Moderne, the entrance fee was 11€ so we were debating whether to go in or not until we discovered that entry was free for young Europeans who were younger that 26. Thanks to that great discovery, we could go into the museum and admire the beautiful views of Paris, as well as the huge collection of modern art that it hosts.

Divided into two floors, the museum has a tour of the whole modern art history, from the end of the 19th century right up to present day. The upper part, centred around modern art, hosts the main works and artists of this movement, with big names such as Kandinsky, Picasso, Klee or Brache, being key to understanding the birth and development of modern art as a whole. Meanwhile, the lower floor accommodates the contemporary collection showing artistic expressions of all kinds, from interactive installations to architectural projects. Although it's also very interesting, it can be less attractive for people who don't like contemporary art, as it's full of transgressive works and sometimes it's a little incomprehensible.

Once the visit had finished, we took the bikes to the district of Montmatre, where we went up to the Sacré-Cœur Basilica, a church from the 19th century which has influences from the Byzantine Empire, well known for its big, white dome that crowns the hill of Montmatre. From there we could admire the really beautiful view of the city during the "golden hour" (something photography lovers call the small pockets of time just after sunrise and after sundown where the sun illuminates the city with its special light, thanks to the inclination of its rays).

After that, I left the group and I went to meet my sister, who had come to Paris from Madrid for the weekend to see her boyfriend who lives and works in Paris. The three of us went to have dinner in a small Chinese restaurant in the area of Pompidou, where they serve really tasty traditional Chinese noodle soups which you can choose the spice level for - from 0-5. I chose level 1 and it was still really hot, so I don't want to imagine what level 5 is like. After that, we went for a stroll to the Louvre museum, where I said bye to my sister and went to find my travel companions again.

We went wandering to the Latin district, the university area of Paris, where all the Sorbonne's buildings are found. The one that stood out the most was the famous mausoleum whose dome dominates the whole district. From there we took our bikes and went right through Paris until we got to our apartment, where we ended our long and intense day.

We came to the last day of this long trip to France. As we didn't have much time, since we had to leave Paris at midday to return the car in Bremen on time, we left our bags in the car and we went to the Père Lachaise cemetery, known for being home to the resting place of famous people such as Jim Morrison and Édith Piaf. We separated there because each one of us wanted to pass our time in a different way. I took my bike with my Polish friend, Aga, and we went for a long bike ride around Paris, arriving at The Champs-Élysées and the Arc de Triomphe, from where we went back to the banks of the Seine.

After that, we got into the car and we got ourselves ready to face up to the almost 800 km journey that separated us from Bremen, where we arrived, completely exhausted, at 11 pm. It's strange that the day I arrived at my apartment in Bremen, I had already made it "mine" and considered it as my home (not my actual home), and I had that nice sensation of being home again after a long trip.

So here marks the end of the first of my travelling chronicles during that "travelling November" that I had. I hope that you have been entertained and that this serves as some help to anyone who is planning a trip to any of these 3 cities. I'll give you the link to my Itlian friend's Flickr again, where you can see the pretty photos that she took during our weekend in Paris.

See you later!

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