So in my American phonetic reading of this walk, I read it as is.....Champs (like Champion) Elysees Walk. When my friend Jackie who know some French and had lived in Europe for a short time, started talking to me about it, I had no idea what she was talking about. I think I pretended pretty well, until I looked it up and was given the proper pronunciation and that we were talking about the same thing. :) Read a humorous account about this grand round about of 12 streets converging on the Arc de Triomphe, here. You can imagine the choas that this place is and how on earth are we going to get across there without losing a limb or life. Thankfully, there is an underground walkway - whew!
A little history lesson about the Arc de Trimophe: Following its construction, the Arc de Triomphe became the rallying point of French troops parading after successful military campaigns and for the annual Bastille Day Military Parade. Famous victory marches around or under the Arc have included the Germans in 1871, the French in 1919, the Germans in 1940, and the French and Allies in 1944[10] and 1945. A United States postage stamp of 1945 shows the Arc de Triomphe
in the background as victorious American troops march down the
Champs-Élysées and U.S. airplanes fly overhead on 29 August 1944. After
the interment of the Unknown Soldier, however, all military parades
(including the aforementioned post-1919) have avoided marching through
the actual arch. The route taken is up to the arch and then around its
side, out of respect for the tomb and its symbolism. Both Hitler in 1940 and de Gaulle in 1944 observed this custom.
the awesome part is we get to go all the way to the top!
the not-so-awesome part were the spiral staircase....dizzy.
cloudy skies again, but we're going to walk down this Champs-Elysee Blvd to the Bastille Monument (like the Washington monument) and then to the Louvre.
check out those trees on TOP of the building....I can't even get a tree to grow out of the ground!?
When we finished at the top, there was a military ceremony going on under the arc.
We passed a Renault car store on the way - had to stop. This was more interesting to me than priceless art.
We stopped for dinner at one of our favorite little places, then continued on to find a Disney store to buy the kids some stuffed animals. Jeff started buying the kids things from the Disney store in Florida and the tradition carried onto Paris.
We had wanted to see the Tuileries Gardens, but it was late and it was already closed. It was still winter and we found that most gardens were not in bloom yet, so not totally sad we didn't see it, but would have been much more pleasant than walking down what seemed like a deserted road (except the 1500 cars on the 2 lane road right next to us). I kept waiting for someone to jump out and try to steal our bag. After what seemed like MILES (our feet were sore from walking all over, up and down), we turned a corner and saw this. The Eiffel Tower in the distance - sparkling. It was breathtaking even from the distance we were at. This was what I had been waiting for.
Next stop......the Lourve (speed tour)
