Place de la Concord

This post covers a walk we did on the second day.  It's funny, to go back and look at these pictures now, it seems like this was ages ago.  It seems like I've been here for a long time, and sometimes I'm surprised to know it's been less then four weeks; and then other times it seems like it's going so fast. Time has it's own way here.

To be really honest, this was not necessarily my favorite walk, but I partly says that with the benefit of hinde-sight, because at the time, I was completely charmed with everything I saw. I just know that this day the group was large and hard to follow, and that I didn't have my own book and never really knew where we were going.  Reading the book tonight was fascinating, I learned tons of history that our designated guide for the day didn't tell us.  For example, Louis the XVI and Marie Antoinette were executed on the Place de la Concord, but that didn't get mentioned when we were there.  

But I I had read enough to know that there would be a stamp market here on this day, and I thought "really?? a stamp market???"  Who would buy, or sell, stamps??  Well...

...here you go.  Look carefully, the little booths go all the way down the block, and they show up two times a week every week and sell stamps!!  Apparently stamp collecting is a big deal; I thought it died out about 50 years ago.  Wrong!!

This is the primary residence of important guests of the French government.

And we thought that this was the gates to the French "White House," (it's actually the Ministry of the Interior)

but this is it! They don't let you tour this residence like we do the White House..

but we were lucky and the gates opened and we got a chance to look in the courtyard.  In France they personify this residence the way we do in the US.  We say "the White House issued a statement...blah blah blah."  Here the executive residence is called "the Elysée,"  so they say "the Elysée...blah blah blah...

This building was built in 1718 and was the home for foreign ambassadors until the Revolution when it became a dance hall, and then later the home for Napoleon.

My first look at some of the upscale shopping in Paris.

And I know I've posted this before, but I still think it's so charming!

And then we hit the Place de la Concord.  A giant area with a roundabout, fountains, obelisks, traffic, tourists, crepes, street entertainers and a view of the Louvre, and the Arc de Triumph; and we really felt like we might actually be in Paris.  It was a pretty fun moment in spite of the rainy gray skies. 

And four weeks later, I'm still pinching myself!

Thank you to Brittany for the group pictures.