Summer is fleeting past and I have not had a holiday! The truth is we, Mark and I, haven't had a holiday in years, though I suppose our living in Amsterdam for several years may count by some peoples standards! The last genuine pleasure trip that we took was to Paris in 2001 - while we were in residence in Holland. We took the TGV, the high-speed train, from Amsterdam to Brussels (this leg was NOT high-speed at the time as the tracks were not yet upgraded) and then from Brussels to Paris at an astounding clip whistling us through the French countryside in splendor. I cannot recommend enough traveling by train in Europe. The experience rarely exceeds the time involved in flying, when one includes the check-in and disembarkment delays at either end of your flight. Additionally, the train is comfortable. Truly comfortable. You have generous leg space in First Class, (a pittance more than Second), and the ability to move about the coach almost without interruption, the food and beverage cart being wheeled through and the embarkation of passengers in Brussels were the sole exceptions.
When we arrived in Paris we simply acquired a luggage cart, just like those at the airport, and made our way to the street where we hailed a driver with a luxurious black Mercedes. We were whisked to our hotel via the newly renovated Opera, its newly regilded statues flaming in the late afternoon light. Our accommodation, the Hotel Saint Regis, was very comfortable if a tad overdone. The guest room interiors had a look of American French design with an overtly Provençal scheme of brightly colored toiles. These seemed out of place in the cool northern light of Paris. The lobby, dining room and bar were supplied with an English mix of damasks, plaids and chintzes which most of the clientele surely found comfortable but which I thought lacked the cool elegance of Parisian interiors. Nevertheless, the hospitality of the staff and the marvelous breakfast and dinner fare more than compensated.
We arrived in the spring. My previous visits had been in the autumn and winter and I was prepared for the cliches of "Paris in the Springtime" to be only hype and exaggeration. I was incredibly wrong. I have never seen the city more beautiful. The fresh colors and the feeling of walking through one large park, trees in leaf and flower everywhere, was incredible. We were enchanted!
Our intent was to meet up with our friends, Dr. Timothy Marten and Ms. Mary Heylin, who had arrived a few days earlier from San Francisco. Tim and Mary are ardent supporters of the San Francisco Ballet and were in Paris in conjunction with the troupe's visit. We had several wonderful outings with them, two of which come immediately to mind.
Mary was keen on acquiring china for their new home. She'd been looking among the shops without success. I was delighted to be able to acquaint her with the Bernadaud Limoges shop on the Rue Royal between Place de la Concorde and the Madeleine. After enjoying the marvelous array of patterns Mary opted for the 'Decor a la Reine', a historical pattern produced under the auspices of Ancienne Manufacture Royale Limoges. The pattern was originally produced by the Sevres manufactory for the Compte d'Artois in 1774. Her choice was to my delight the same pattern which I'd been given as a gift by Mark on our previous visit. Great fun!
The second memory I hold is of our joint visit to the Musee Nissim de Camondo off the Boulevard Malesherbes on the Rue Camondo near Parc de Monceau. This once private home was built in the Louis XVI style and fitted with what is now considered to be one of the finest collections of eighteenth century French furniture, painting, porcelain
and objets d'arts. It was a great pleasure to see these beautiful objects arranged as they might have been in a home (when your home is your palace) setting. The collection looks as though it was acquired over time, with beautiful objects of both the rococo and the neoclassical taste deftly mingled with affection.Afterwards Mary led us on a merry chase in search of the 'prefect' restaurant for the 'perfect' lunch, wishing to create a memory. She succeeded hugely! Mary is the person to be with if you wish to gain entrance to the latest and most chic spots in any town. She simply whips out her Blackberry and stylus and in a moment or two one is granted access to those places you and I can barely acquire a reservation! The charming place she found for us that day we elegant and sophisticated, but also very accessible. The staff took us to a small dining room on the second floor of the period building. Light and airy and homelike with pictures on the wall and an amazing bar containing a large wine collection displayed dramatically. The menus offered us incredible choice of
delicacies from which we chose some marvelous dishes, but I warn those of you who may have the spattering of French that I do to be clear about your menu choice. I was very aware that 'veau' meant veal, and 'poires noir' indicated that the sauce was made of blackened pears, but I was slightly dismayed to have overlooked that 'cerveau' indicated calf brains! It was a challenging lunch for I would not insult our hosts who were most anxious to please, and I must attest to the cookery being the finest I'd had to date in Paris. The rich sauce of caramelized pears is what I'd focused on when choosing the dish; now, again, I concentrated on the this magnificently prepared sauce and attempted to minimize the the fact that each bite of my entrée was from a perfectly presented mound of calf brain lobes... which I found to be of a chewy texture...!!
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