A magnificent dawn in Paris with Marnie
Marnie – “Pont Louis-Philippe”, on the left, “Ile St-Louis”, in the background, “Ile de La Cité” and Notre-Dame 5:52 AM – Marnie lives in Singapore. After having run several half marathons, Marnie prepares a marathon she will run this autumn. How to prepare a marathon while visiting Paris? A long tour with Paris Running Tour! Ideal to discover the city while doing our training. We thus traveled on a circuit of more than 18 km kilometers, with an amazing Parisian landscape parading under our eyes. We discovered a totally deserted Paris, embellished by the magnificent light of the rising sun. Deserted Paris? A start before 6 am + on Sunday + August! The Parisians went on holiday, tourists still sleeping, well parked cars. Paris only for us! Look on how the “Place de la Concorde” is deserted and beautiful in all the splendor of this summer morning: Marnie – “Place de la Concorde” Nobody in front of the “Palais de Justice” either… The Sainte Chapelle and Conciergerie, which surround it, are still in the quiet before the arrival of the visitors during the day. Marnie – The “Palais de Justice” of Paris, on the left, the “Sainte Chapelle”, on the right, the “Conciergerie” We ran along the river Seine which we crossed several times to benefit from beautiful points of view on Paris: Marnie – “Pont Neuf”, in the background, the “pont des Arts” Marnie – Footbridge Senghor, on the left, the Louvre, on the right the “Musée d’Orsay”, in the background, Notre Dame On the new banks of Paris, we made a little sprint to test the new new athletic track of one hundred meters: Marnie – New banks of Paris, athletic track of 100 meters Souvenir photo on the Esplanade of the Trocadéro, the best point of view to see the Eiffel Tower: Paris Running Tour – Marnie – The Eiffel tower – On the left, the dome of the Invalides Merci Marnie ! The route of the tour:
Around the Louvre with Janaina and Gustavo
7:13 AM – Gustavo and Janaina live in Salvador (Brazil). To visit Paris by running, we chose a beautiful stroll around the Louvre. We left the Grands Boulevards and went through the “passage des Panoramas” (see the previous post), the “Palais Royal”, and then we joined the Louvre, by crossing the Street of Rivoli: The Passage Richelieu connects the street of Rivoli with the Louvre Pyramid and allows to see the beautiful sculptures of the Puget and Marly courtyards (remember the article which speaks about the horses of Marly) : After this small break in front of the passage Richelieu windows, we continued our running at the foot of the Pyramid, the magnificent glass pyramid which respects the central space of the Louvre and allows to see the Louvre in its totality: What was there before the Pyramid? A stand of trees where cars could park. At the foot of the trees, impossible to see all the facades: In the same direction, towards the garden of the Tuileries, we had a photo break to take advantage of the view on the Eiffel Tower, the “Musée d’Orsay” and also some statues of Maillol. Look for them in the bushes by enlarging the photo: We then left the garden of the Tuileries by way of the small tunnel which goes out of the garden by going towards the river Seine. We crossed the Seine by the footbridge Léopold Sédar Senghor and going up the staircases of the bridge, where we enjoyed a beautiful point of view on Notre-Dame: On the other side of the bridge, we saw the beautiful Palace of the Legion of Honor, cleaned recently (we had spoken about its replica in San Francisco here): Evoking the various places to run, we spoke about the immense and long beautiful beaches of Brazil. In Paris, we also have the opportunity to have some beaches 😉 At least from mid-July to mid-August, the banks of the “Right bank”, in particular, welcome the operation “Paris-Plages“: A little farther, near the Louvre, is the Louvre Oratory, with the Statue of the “Amiral de Coligny”, whose tragic end reminds us sad moments of the French History: On our road, we passed by the beautiful “Véro Dodat” gallery and we were amazed by the height of a famous Parisian shoemaker’s shoes (see below, near the passage, the Christian Louboutin’s first shop): Merci Janaina, merci Gustavo ! The route of the tour:
Snapshots of a first visit in Paris, with Melinda
Melinda – On the bridge of Austerlitz. In the distance, Notre-Dame and Saint Louis Island beautiful houses Monday 27th May – 12:51 PM, Wednesday 29th May – 6:57 PM – First time in Paris for Melinda from Miami (USA) ! What better choice than to start a first stay in Paris doing a visit by running (with Paris Running Tour)? A good way of unwinding legs after a long travel by plane and a first discovery of Paris getting directly into the life of the city. And why not begin again two days later to discover new paths through Paris? We thus ran by following two routes which mainly crossed the disctrict of “Le Marais”, the Left bank, the island of “La Cité” and the center of Paris around the Seine. Here is the route (numbers indicate where the photos of this article were taken): We took numerous photos during our running: 1) “La rue des Barres” (Street of Bars). This name comes because formerly, in the 10th century, on the location of the street, a wall, a fence of wooden bars, constituted a wall protecting Paris: Melinda – “Rue des Barres” 2) “L’Hôtel de Sully” (The Hotel of Sully). The Duke of Sully, Minister of Finance of king Henri IV, lived in this noble mansion at the end of his life. By crossing the Hotel of Sully, we passed directly from the street Saint Antoine to the “place des Vosges”. Melinda – “Hôtel de Sully” 3) The “bassin de l’Arsenal”. Having crossed the place of the Bastille, we met the Basin of the Arsenal, port and canal connecting the river Seine with the Saint Martin canal and which, formerly, was a ditch which filled the moats of the castle of the Bastille. Melinda – “Port de l’Arsenal” 4) “Pont d’Austerlitz” (Bridge of Austerlitz). See the picture at the beginning of the article. 5) “Cour du Commerce Saint André”. Another place which is situated on the plan of the former surrounding wall of Paris, the wall of king Philippe Auguste. This passage, opened in 1776, allows to reach the Café Procope (1686), one of the oldest cafés in the world. Melinda – “Cour du Commerce Saint André” Second tour : 6) “Le Tribunal de Commerce de Paris” (Commercial court). This building presents the peculiarity to have a dome placed not in the center, but on the side, in a way that the dome is visible from the Boulevard Sevastopol. The dome closes the perspective of the Boulevard by the South. Melinda – On the bridge Notre Dame. We can see, on the island of “La Cité”, successively, the Hôtel-Dieu (Hospital), the “Tribunal du Commerce de Paris” and the Conciergerie. 7) On the “Pont Neuf” (“New” Bridge). Melinda – Pont Neuf. On left, the “Institut de France”, the Eiffel tower and, on right,the “Musée d’Orsay” 8) Colonnade of the Louvre. Summit of the French classicism, the Colonnade of the Louvre was realized at the request of king Louis XIV. The Colonnade of the Louvre served as model to numerous famous buildings, in particular, the Capitol of the United States in Washington, Metropolitan Museum of art in New York and San Francisco War Memorial Opera House. Melinda – The “Colonnade du Louvre” 9) Alexandre III bridge. The widest bridge in Paris. Built with the “Grand” and “Petit Palais” for the World Fair of 1900. The bridge offers a direct link between the “Invalides” and the Champs-Elysées. Melinda – the Alexandre III bridge – In the distance, the “Invalides” 10) The Champs Elysées. Melinda – Champs Elysées, at the end, the “Arc de Triomphe” and far off, the “Grande Arche” of “la Défense” 11) The equestrian statue of Joan of Arc, place of the Pyramids. She is situated not far from the Gate Saint Honoré, where Joan of Arc tried to cross Charles V’s surrounding wall to reconquer Paris, occupied at the time by the English. She was hurt by an arrow in the thigh there. Melinda – Equestrian statue of Joan of Arc, of Frémiet and inaugurated in 1874 12) The Puget courtyard in the Louvre. Melinda – Puget Courtyard, situated with the Marly Courtyard on both sides of the passage which connects the Louvre Pyramid to the street of Rivoli 13) Stravinsky fountain. This fountain, fountain Stravinsky or fountain of automatons, was created by the couple of artist Nikki de Saint Phalle and Jean Tinguely in 1983 and evokes the work of the composer Stravinsky. Melinda – the “Fontaine Stravinsky”, on the right George Pompidou Center Interesting and beautiful discoveries, isn’t it? Merci Melinda ! The route of the tours:
Running under the bridge Saint-Michel with Antje
Antje – Under Saint-Michel bridge – In the background, “Notre-Dame de Paris” 7h57 – Antje comes from another great and beautiful European capital, Berlin. She already ran several times the Berlin marathon, one of the fastest world marathons (the last four world records were realized in Berlin). Antje knows well Paris and that is with pleasure and while running that we rediscovered its most beautiful “paths”. A beautiful route of more than 14 km also passing under bridges of Paris as we can see on the photo above. Our running led us of the Eiffel Tower up to Notre-Dame, then up to the Arc of Triumph. This Friday was making the “bridge” between two holidays, May 8th&9th and the weekend so Paris was very quiet, even the Eiffel Tower seemed deserted (at least at 8 am in the morning). Antje – “Champs de Mars” and Eiffel tower Notice the scaffolds which leave the ground towards the first floor of the Eiffel Tower. These temporary elements are of use to the renovation of the first floor. The objective of this modernization project is to make this floor a more attractive place => Click here. Back from Notre-Dame, this time, it is ON the “Pont Neuf”, the New Bridge, that we ran: Antje – “Pont Neuf” – In the background, the “Pont des Arts” (bridge of the Arts) As its name does not indicate it, the “Pont Neuf”, literally “New Bridge”, is the oldest bridge of Paris. As you can read it on the photo, the bridge was built at the end of the 16th century. Yes, “neuf” means “new” (and not “9”). Is the oldest bridge the new bridge? Indeed, at the time of its construction, this bridge was very modern: all in stone, without houses on its edges (at last, we could know that we were really on a bridge while crossing it, impossible with houses!), and with sidewalks! These sidewalks were really new because very rare in Paris at that time… The “Pont Neuf”, already at that time, a beautiful place to stroll, to appreciate the sight and Paris! Farther, we pursued our route along the historic axis of Paris (see here), the Louvre, the Louvre Pyramid and the garden of the Tuileries : Antje – “Cour carrée du Louvre” Antje – Small break near the Louvre Pyramid Antje – In the garden of the Tuileries We then continued our road along the Champs-Elysées to go uphill towards the Arc of Triumph. Uphill? Yes indeed, do you know that the Arc of Triumph is put on what we called formerly the “colline du Roule” (The hill of the Roule). In 1768, this hill was leveled to have a more regular slope towards the Gate of Neuilly. The top of the hill was then 5 meters higher. Paris as flat as Berlin? Hem, not completely… So remember, when you will take the departure of the Paris marathon and will start with the Champs-Elysées, do not run too fast: if it is so easy, it is because you are in descent! Merci Antje ! The route of the tour: