The French Journal

French theme parks: Pro and con

There are those of us who stay away from theme parks in the USA (usually).  And when it comes to French vacations, time is so precious that such a visit does not have any chance to make our lists. But if you're neutral on the matter,The Times (London), offers some opposing views.

First, a trip to space, at the Cité de l'Espace in Toulouse, is presented as an entertaining experience, one that's not "dumbed-down." Its theme is becoming an astronaut, so there are training sessions, tests, simulations, and an IMAX film about a space station. Overview: "For a fraction of the price (of a real visit) and a 90-minute flight from London to Toulouse on a conventional aircraft, you can enjoy all the delights of the solar system, weightlessness and even the Mir space station. And you can take your children."

On the other hand, the venerable Charles Bremner assaults Disneyland Paris and Parc Asterix, where "you pay a fortune to queue for hours with thousands of tourists eating chips and ice-cream to experience thrills that last sometimes no more than a minute."

One difference between the two parks the visitors at Disney are mostly British, those at Asterix are French. In the end, he finds Parc Asterix more bearable, but we're measuring degrees of misery.

Following Marie, short of the ax

After writing about Alsace yesterday, and after le mari suggested recently that he may want to visit the country home of a favorite saint, there's a definite German color to the atmosphere at my home. Since I have a big problem with German vacations (i.e., they're not in France), I've tried to ease into the idea by reading an article from IOL-South Africa, written by chum Daphne Beames, which traces the journey of Marie Antoinette as she left her home in Austria and onto France and her fateful marriage to Louis XVI.

This itinerary has its start at an inn in the Black Forest, one where Marie herself spent the night. Nearby is "wild, magnificent countryside." Crossing at Strasbourg into France (hooray!), Daphne proceeds through Barbizon, home of an artists' movement (post-Marie) and Robert Louis Stevenson (ditto). There are stays at Fountainebleau, St.-Germaine-en-Laye, and Versailles, with modest residences at each of them. (Think of them as very, very, very ornate highway rest stops.)

This may not be a journey for radicals -- but the Royalists among you can bask in the opulence and remain focused at this high point, before "the whole, elaborate structure of the Bourbon kings came tumbling down."

A Versailles gilt in silver

At one point, during the time of Louis XIV, the opulence of Versailles was even more than the modern restoration shows us. Louis, conscious of the need to hoard precious metal, furnished the chateau with furniture made of silver.

The items were long ago melted down, and the metal used to fund one of the Sun King's many military incursions. In Denmark's royal residence, however, similar pieces still exist, so when the Danish palace was about to be renovated and the furniture put in storage, the Queen approached Versailles officials and asked whether they would like to use the pieces for an exhibition. They said yes, of course, which brings us to the current show, "Quand Versailles était meublé d'argent/When Versailles Was Furnished in Silver," with the Danish pieces supplemented by loans from other collections. According to Bloomberg, "First, the scale, opulence and extraordinary quality of the architecture has the desired knock-out effect. Then comes the realization that this kind of arrogant display carries within it the seeds of its own destruction."

Well, if you're the type to get all judgmental about it, you might want to avoid the show. Anyone else will probably be dazzled, should you be able to get to Versailles before the exhibition closes in early March. The video at the head of this post, in simple French, offers a tantalizing, but oh-so-short, preview.

Versailles re-opens the Hall of Mirrors

After three years, the lustrously refurbished Hall of Mirrors at Versailles will re-open on Wednesday to the public. The opulent room was built over three centuries ago by Louis XIV, and entertainments there could accommodate as many as 1,000 guests. The renovation is the latest of a number of clean-ups that the room, nearly 250 feet long, has undergone over the years; paint has been removed from art work, revealing formerly covered figures, and gold leaf was applied by hand to the windows. The 12-million euro restoration was financed by a private company, Vinci, and an estimated 10,000 people will visit each day. Other projects at Versailles will continue at least through 2020.

The re-opening has garnered lots of press coverage; for example, ABC News has a slide show; the New York Times gives its view (reg. req'd); and there's the official Versailles site.

In the footsteps of the artist #2: Renoir

The National Gallery of Canada has a new exhibit opening this week, Renoir Landscapes, which served as a pretext for another writer -- this one named Deanna MacDonald and from The Toronto Globe and Mail -- to track down a few places that inspired some of the paintings by Auguste Renoir in the show. Planning a series of day trips from Paris, MacDonald starts with a visit to Chatou, close by the capital and the scene of paintings like Luncheon at La Fournaise and Rowers at Chatou; many of the original locales, like the Fournaise bistrot, had been destroyed, but in the town's newly designated Ile de Impressionistes, there is a reconstruction of the restaurant and a footpath that pinpoints where some canvases were crafted . All in all, the visit is evocative, which cannot be said, unfortunately, for the the town of Argenteuil, another day-trip destination. Once a beautiful little village where Monet and Renoir painted together, it is now a banlieue, notorious because a few years back Nicolas Sarkozy was greeted there with jeers and rocks. As MacDonald says, "Local authorities clearly have more to worry about than preserving an Impressionistic past." Finally, back in Paris, she goes to the Musee de Montmartre, which has preserved rooms in which Renoir once painted.

The Renoir show will run in Ottawa until September 9.

In the footsteps of the artist #1: Van Gogh

Lotsa travelers go to Arles in search of Vincent van Gogh's history, but Robert Garrett, writing in The Boston Globe, takes the journey many steps farther, tracing the route of the artist's decline up to his death and burial. After Arles, the location of the fabled "Yellow House" (which no longer exists), Garret continues on to Saint-Rémy and the asylum where the troubled artist stayed for a year. Eventually, van Gogh left the hospital and headed north to Auvers-sur-Oise; here, he worked for a month before shooting himself. Garret says that the hotel room in which van Gogh died still exists, and Auvers, "pretty and unspoiled," offers plentiful information on finding the spots of his final days. Garrett completes his pilgrimage with a walk to van Gogh's grave; the painter's devoted brother, Theo, who died six months after him, is also resting there. Garret's quiet finalé:

"In the rolling fields beyond the cemetery, I stop at a panel that displays a reproduction of van Gogh's painting of this very landscape, crows swirling over its field. On this day, I see and hear crows, as if the canvas has come to life.

"The painting shows a dark, menacing sky, but on my visit it's a beautiful day, the sky is tranquil. I look up at the open, blue sky, and feel quietly grateful that van Gogh passed this way."

Boules #2: Camping in Versailles

Another boules connection -- weak, I admit, but I'm trying to find themes here. When the son of The Guardian's Catherine Mack effuses about Disneyland - Paris, she counters by proposing a bike trip and camping (sort of) at a spot near Versailles called Huttopia. Once there, he plays boules with some other kids (his mother delights in the interaction she's fostered), swims, and eventually has his eyes set aglow by the twinkling lights of the Eiffel Tower. Disney is vanquished, even without a visit to a chateau that's supposedly somewhere in the vicinity.

Boules #1: Luxembourg Gardens

Boules, of course, is a game played in France and elsewhere, a kind of lawn bowling, in which metal balls are tossed and the object is to get your ball to be the closest to another small ball. A game of boules is the entrée for David Whitey, a writer The Sydney Morning Herald, into the world of le Jardin du Luxembourg in Paris. In a city of places to watch people, the garden makes Mr. Whitey a little giddy -- "It's magical in the most simplistic way, and if you can't fall under the charm of Paris here, watching happy children rubbing the manes of their donkeys as they ride, then heaven help." -- but, then again, it's the Luxembourg Gardens. Who can blame him?

Photo by SteveC77 on flickr

Regions of France - Ile de France

The Île-de-France calls itself the heart of France, and it's difficult to disagree. As the region that encompasses Paris, it is the most populous area of the country, the government seat, and the major business center -- and all of that is packed into less than 2.5% of France's land mass.

So here are some major facts about the Île-de-France, the next stop on our review of the official Regions of France.