Cathédrale de Notre Dame

Looking across the Seine River to Ile de la Cité and Notre Dame.

Our Silver Paris

Welcome to my Paris travel journal,

where I share our experiences of our special journey to Paris.

Please use these posts as a guide for your own travels

to this amazing and wonderful city!

Or simply read, and dream...

As if we thought our first day was over!   On our evening walk along the Seine, we were in romance heaven, strolling by beautiful bridges and holding hands, chatting and kissing as we went.  But, that glimpse (above photo) was not the only one we got of Notre Dame on that warm lamp-lit evening.

We crossed pont d'Arcole and soon found ourselves in place du Parvis Notre Dame, the plaza in front of the cathedral.  There was a party in progress--or at least it seemed like a party.  People packed the place, and we heard music.  They were street performers, doing something amazing with fire and wowing the crowd.  We had to decide--watch the performers, or stand back and get a nice, long look at Cathédrale de Notre Dame.  The cathedral won.

Impressive.  Amazing.  There are just no words.  (I'm not into architecture or anything, but somehow I was transformed into a slack-jawed building admirer for a week!)

In the courtyard of Notre Dame, place du Parvis Notre Dame, is this statue of Charlemagne.  The inscription reads Charlemagne et ses levdes, or, without the classical Roman lettering, Charlemagne et ses leudes ("Charlemagne and his servants").  The statue was created in 1886 by Louis and Charles Rochet.

There was no going in to the cathedral on this night, so we walked around and crossed pont Archèveché with its lovers' locks adorning its fences.  Halfway across, we stopped to look at the back side of Notre Dame.

We continued across pont St. Louis onto Ile St. Louis, and turned again to look.

Although we never had the time to go in to the cathedral or climb up one of the towers to see a panorama of the city and a close-up of the gargoyles and griffins, we were to see a lot more of this fabulous building throughout the week.  Besides the Eiffel Tower, Notre Dame was my most-photographed building on our trip.

Can you find Notre Dame in the photo below?  I took this one from the top of the Eiffel Tower.

Here are some daylight shots of Notre Dame that I captured while on our boat tour on the Seine.

No history lesson today, no running commentary.  Just the beauty and awe of a church called la Cathédrale de Notre Dame.


Treasuring life's moments,
Christine

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