A Walk in the City of Lights

You are standing beside me in this photograph, viewing the landscape. You know where you are, Oui?

This is a hiking blog per se, but your old buddy Jack gets around wherever his two feet can take him. I have a special place in my heart for the city of Paris.

I’m not a local, so I’ll never have to put up with the trials of living in the city or the country either. Having said that, I’d rather a long stay in Paris than the same in New York. As a tourist, I love a fine walking city, a city of monuments, and Paris is both. As a student of history, I can walk the tree lined boulevards, trying to picture all the drama that has unfolded over the centuries. Walking down quiet streets, away from tourists and traffic, or sitting on a park bench in the Tuileries Gardens hearing the echoes of Napoleon’s guns repulsing the Royalist mob of 1795.

You can survive a trip to Paris if you speak English, but French is first, and it behooves you to give it a go for courtesy sake. I have been to Paris many times. This international city has a different culture, customs and perspectives than I find at home. It’s love of food, art and architecture are evident within all it’s arrondissements. Maintaining a subdued demeanor goes a long way with the locals, particularly if you are an American.

On my first visits, I did many touristy activities. As time passed I was just as happy wander, or sit in the sun by the Seine, enjoying the sunshine.

Notre Dame Cathedral

Many years ago, I walked trough the doors of Notre Dame, the air thick with the past. When the Cathedral burned, even a non citizen as myself could feel the agony of the citizens, because I had connected myself through my footsteps in that sacred space (Religion not withstanding, in this very place Napoleon crowned himself Emperor!)

We live in a time of great uncertainty, of political and social upheaval. I have friends who have never traveled beyond the borders of America, and that is a mistake. You cannot know the people of the world unless you open yourself to it, and their culture.

Get your shoes on, and have travel documents in hand. Now is not the time to demonize others or raise the drawbridges. Let us not keep ourselves from places that can broaden our horizons.

 “La vérité est au delà des montagnes, pour la trouver il faut voyager!” – French Proverb