Château de Vincennes

Before coming to France, my mental image of the word "château" was a stately manor, probably in the country, surrounded by grape vines and a rigidly symmetrical garden with precisely trimmed hedges. I assume I absorbed this correlation along with the untold number of French wines that bear such a scene on their labels. 

Something like this:

Lia at Château de Sceaux

It wasn't until I began exploring the sights of l'Île-de-France and learning a little of the French language that I discovered that château can also mean, quite literally, castle. 

As in a giant war fortress with a moat and dungeon. 

Like this:

let's step back for a shoddily constructed panoramic view:

Château de Vincennes is a very castley château. Handily located at the eastern terminus of Metro Line 1, it lies outside the Périphérique, but technically within Paris, because the surrounding Parc de Vincennes is a part of the city. Like many large houses on the outskirts of Paris, it was founded, in the 1100s, as a hunting lodge for the royalty. In the 1300s, things got fortified- walls were erected and the keep was built. It is, wikipedia tells me, "the tallest Medieval fortified structure in Europe." 

Keep(hah!) in mind that the above photo is just the donjon, or keep, of the Château- the oldest and most protected part of the complex. Below is a map of the entire layout. The keep is the the square area on the bottom. It is surrounded by a moat, as are the exterior walls. The doorways on the right and left traverse the surrounding moat and are the only ways to access the grounds. The chapel is the caterpillar-looking thing above the keep.

http://www.cheminsdememoire.gouv.fr/page/affichelieu.php?idLang=en&idLieu=1621

The site from which I stole this image has a wealth of information and photos. Check it out.

 While the whole complex is cool, the keep is definitely the star of the tour.  

 the moat and bridge

above: looking up from the bridge

below: the bridge from the gatehouse to the keep

The surrounding lower area, between the moat walls and the keep tower, housed servants and workers.

Inside the tower are the royal living quarters.

There are a lot of large fireplaces.

Amazingly, many of the decorative elements are still intact. With bright new paint and the original wood wall panels, it must have looked very regal indeed.

Many of the walls were adorned with paintings and graffiti, mostly done by prisoners.

here's one with Lia looking scary

After touring the royal living area, you can descend into the lower level of the tower.

The most protected room housed the well and was also used for food storage.

Château de Vincennes hosted many prisoners over the years, the most famous being the Marquis de Sade. Here is one of his letters, displayed in the room in which he wrote it during his seven years of captivity.

Upon finishing our tour of the keep, we found the chapel beautiful and closed to visitors. 

Here's the exterior. The interior? My guess is high ceilings, stained glass, crosses and saints.

We had lunch and crossed "Visit a Castle" off the to-do list.

The Family Vacation

The Mitchell family Paris vacation is sadly over. 

Here is a photo series titled "The Good Photographs with People in Them"

It is roughly chronological, but by no means a complete accounting of the trip.

Museum of Hunting and Nature:

an appropriately surreal first stop for the jetlagged and tired.

Jon fought a bear.

   

eating l'As du Falafel like pros in the park by the Carnavalet Museum

Jon and Brittany enjoying their first Paris protest.

the Roman arena: also a great place for family battles

Jon ponders the fall of John Galliano across the street from the now infamous café.

Château de Vincennes

Richard Lenoir market, Sunday morning near the Place de la Bastille

celebrating the launch of his new cosmetics line

photo shoot with the Code of Hammurabi for the next Super Lawyers issue

Pop-In, a comfortable and cheap bar near the apartment.

Rodin Museum, en route to The Thinker, with the dome of l'Hôtel des Invalides in the background

Rodin Museum

Jardin du Luxembourg 

The fountain had only recently been turned on for summer. 

We sat in the warm sun and watched the kids push sailboats around the pool.

Omaha Beach, near the American Cemetery

Pointe du Hoc, Normandy

Jardin du Palais Royal

Ici c'est Paris !*

Jeff's parents, brother and future sister-in-law are currently visiting us, so we haven't had a lot of time to update the blog. We have been herding them to various monuments (the Tower, the Arc, Notre-Dame and Père Lachaise so far), Paris-walking them to the point of fatigue, and trying to make sure they eat themselves silly. These things take time. But I know (or would like to think) that there are a few people who want updates and aren't interested in our excuses. So here is a quick little post to satisfy the curious.

As most people know, "football" means something different to the rest of the world than it does to people in the United States. While in Paris, we decided we ought to check out this strange, foreign version of football, so the day after Jeff's birthday, we went to see the home team in action. Here we are at the Parc des Princes, home field of the Paris-Saint-Germain team.

It wasn't very crowded, in part (I think) because it was a bit cold. Maybe around freezing. Perhaps you've been wondering how an outdoor stadium would work in a Minnesota winter? Well, after the regular game time had ended, we were pretty cold. By the time the second overtime finished, we could not feel our toes. Our verdict: put a roof on that baby.

Here is star player "Nenê" (a.k.a. Anderson Luiz de Carvalho - yes, really, Anderson!) on a corner kick! He was our favorite. As Minnesotans, we wanted to yell "Anderson!" but restrained ourselves, mostly.

Kind of a blurry shot of some of the crazed fans in our section. They were very, very serious about the game. We were scared to be too obvious about taking pictures of them. Some of them, I swear, you could write a really gritty depressing novel. 

Lucky for all of us, PSG won with two fabulous goals, on our end, during second overtime. 

* "Here, this is Paris!" what you chant while the players are running out, or when they score a goal.