Getting around in Paris

It is easy to get around in Paris. The fastest way to get from one place to another in the city is usually the metro. Problem is, you don't see much that way. On a nice day like last Wednesday, walking is always a good option — if you have time.

Other good options are the bus or the bicycle. Buses are good because you can sightsee as you go — but you need to know the routes. The bike is good exercise but you really have to pay attention to what you are doing. Still, next to walking, cycling is probably the best way to get a real feel for the city. There are many more bicycles in Paris now than back when I lived there.

Back in the early 1970s, when I first went to Paris and spent a few years there, people rode little motorized bikes called Vélos Solex or Mobylettes. You don't see those any more. But you do see a lot of bigger motorbikes and motorcycles. Lately, you see more and more of the bikes like the one above that has two wheels in the front and just one in the back.

Another thing about riding the buses is that you do have to wait for them. They don't run as frequently as the underground metro trains. Waiting gives you time to study the maps and learn the routes. Or just to sit and watch and wait.

I used to work in the neighborhood where I took these pictures. For a year or two I worked on the Rue des Saints-Pères, just off the Boulevard Saint-Germain. I remember having coffee or lunch many times in the café called Le Rouquet that you see above. But I never had a motorcycle.

I did a lot of walking. The guy in the photo above could have been me 40 years ago. I was skinny like that, from all the walking and stair-climbing. It was a healthy life. Last Wednesday I was retracing some of those 40-year-old steps as I made my way on foot from the Place de la Concorde over to the Gare d'Austerlitz.

Le Pont et la Gare d'Austerlitz

Until last week, I don't think I had ever walked across the Pont d'Austerlitz in Paris. The views of Notre-Dame and the buildings along the river on the Ile Saint-Louis were spectacular, as you can see.

I'm not being chronological here. This was the last part of my walk through Paris, and I was on the other side of the city from the Place de la Concorde. My train back to Saint-Aignan would be leaving from Austerlitz station at about 4 p.m.

Before going into the train station, I took a little detour through the corner of the Jardin des Plantes — the botanical garden in Paris — near the natural history museum.

As you can see, a lot of other people had had the same idea. It was the Toussaint (All Saints Day) vacation, so schools were out. There were a lot of children in the park with their parents.

Lunching on linguine and lavagnons

We are lucky here in Saint Aignan to have a seafood vendor at the Saturday market who comes here from the coastal town of Marennes-d'Oléron, an area where oysters and other mollusks are fished and farmed. Yesterday, we had a lunch of little clam-like coquillages (shellfish) called, in the local language of the French Atlantic coast, des lavagnons.

Les coquillages appelés « lavagnons » ou « lavignons » sur les côtes atlantiques françaises

As is often the case with little-known fish and shellfish, no one name has come to be used for this mollusk in all regions of France. In some places, apparently, the term used is lavagnon, in others lavignon. There is also a bivalve called the donace des canards (Donax trunculus) which some web sites describe as a lavagnon, but the photos I've seen of the shells make me think it's not really the same clam we bought yesterday. I think what we bought is Scrobicularia plana, known in the United Kingdom as the Peppery Furrow Shell.

I like to purge or « faire dégorger » bivalves like clams and cockles in salted water with a little cornmeal added. After a couple of hours in the water, they will have ingested the cornmeal and excreted any sand they might have had in their digestive tract.

We first discovered and devoured lavagnons when we spent a week on the Ile d'Oléron in May 2008. We had the bad fortune that year to arrive on the island (by bridge) during a general strike by the area's commercial fisherman. The port towns and fishing villages were closed down, and all the fish markets and supermarkets on the island had no fish to sell. It seemed silly to be on an island known for it's fishing industry and be reduced to eating meat and vegetables.

Just a minute or two in a hot pan with some olive oil, onion, garlic, and white wine is enough to cook the lavagnons.

The positive side of the situation turned out to be that only the fishermen and boats that go out into open waters to exercise their trade and skills were involved in the strike. On the local markets, the shellfish that could be gathered or grown along the coast were plentiful. We spent the week gorging ourselves on oysters and clams. And we discovered the little bivalves called lavagnons. They were less expensive than the other local clams, called praires and palourdes, and they are sweeter and more delicate.

Serve the quick-cooked bivalves with linguine or spaghetti...

Walt first noticed lavagnons on sale at the market in Saint-Aignan months ago, but we never had a chance to buy and cook any until yesterday. The fish and seafood vendor doesn't have lavagnons for sale every week, so you have to hit it just right. This time, by luck, we were ready and the fish vendor had a basket full of the little mollusks to sell. Walt was down there shopping and picked up 600 grams of lavagnons for seven or so euros.

...and sprinkle on a generous amount of chopped parsley at the last minute.

The photos here sort of speak for themselves. What we made was linguine with what is called white clam sauce (in other words, no tomato). Olive oil, sliced onion and garlic, salt and pepper, a pinch of hot red pepper flakes, some white wine, and some parsley. It takes eight or ten minutes to cook the linguine, two or three minutes to cook the onion and garlic, and then two or three minutes to open the lavagnons or clams in a hot skillet or wok. You don't want to overcook them. The whole meal comes together in less that a quarter of an hour.

Gilded Paris

These are just a few examples of Paris gold. The first photo is a long shot of the gilded figures decorating the end of the Pont Alexandre III that links the Grand and the Petit Palais to the Hôtel des Invalides across the Seine. I took the photo a ways upriver, from the Pont de la Concorde.

The Alexandre III bridge was built for the Universal Exposition that took place in 1900. It's the bridge in the first photo I published in yesterday's post.

Not too far from the Place de la Concorde on the Rue de Rivoli, near the Louvre, stands the golden statue of French national hero Joan of Arc, depicted on horseback. It's also a 19th century creation. Here are two photos I took on Wednesday morning.

Joan of Arc on horseback at the Place des Pyramides

Joan was the young girl who was instrumental in throwing the invading English out of France in the 15th century, at the end of the 100 Years War. Unfortunately, she and this statue have become a symbol and rallying point for the 21st century's far-right Front National, whose members would probably be happy to see all today's invading foreigners tossed out of the country.

Finally, this is probably the most striking example of gilding in Paris. It is just visible behind the Assemblée Nationale building (that's the French parliament) from the Place and the Pont de la Concorde.

L'Eglise du Dôme at the Hôtel des Invalides

The domed church is much older than the Joan of Arc statue or the Pont Alexandre III — it dates back to Louis XIV, who was France's "Sun King" from 1643 until 1715. Today, the remains of the Emperor Napoléon Bonaparte lie in a massive marble tomb inside this church.