Paris in the Autumn

It's Autumn, and Paris is shaking the leaves from its trees as the air turns crisper and light grows golden. What better than to spend an afternoon wandering around the rather beautiful Jardin du Luxembourg, a stone's throw away from my university at The Sorbonne-Cluny? Not much can beat London's Greenwich Park, the famous Royal gardens belonging to the old "Queen's house", and my old stomping ground for snowball fights, sledging, lazing in the sun and climbing trees. The Jardin du Luxembourg does however come pretty close with its boating pond and petanque terrains -also having been built and maintained by various monarchs (originally landscaped by Marie de Medicis in 1611) as they came to power.

 

The garden is typical of France's more structured attitude to leisure - you can't flop down on the grass with a beer or kick a football around here. But there are beautiful tree-lined promenades stretching to each corner, an Orangerie filled with tropical leaves, old men earnestly hunched around chequers boards and - donkey rides! Tea huts surround the children's play-area (I desperately wanted to have a go on the zip-wire!) and best of all is the central fountain where you can rent model sail-boats to set off on their up-teenth "maiden voyage". Greenwich Park might have sledging hills and a beautiful panorama, but the Jardin du Luxembourg makes you feel like you've been flung back into the Belle Epoque, where moustachioed gentlemen in long overcoats and stripy scarfs proffer their arms to their delighted female companions. It's known for its many statues - keen eyes will have noticed the model for New York's famous Statue of Liberty standing incongruously amongst the trees.

Luxembourg Gardens at Twilight by John Singer Sargent, 1879

The Jardins also house the Senat, part of French parliament where laws are voted on and passed, or so I'm told. You can apparently book in advance to go inside and have a look!

 Just a stone's throw away is the Pantheon, a grand old building which in its interesting history has gone back and forth between being a Catholic place of worship and a secular monument to man. It is now a monumental mausoleum, a sort of grand communal tomb to rival that of Napoleon's. The dedication reads: "Aux grands hommes: La Patrie reconnissante" (To the Great Men: The Grateful Homeland) - without forgetting some pretty special women too (Marie and Pierre Curie are buried here, and my friend and I also saw the tombs of Jean Jaures, Victor Hugo, Jean Moulin, Abbe Gregoire and Voltaire.

  

Dedication to Antoine St. Exupery, author of 'Le Petit Prince'. 

The Pantheon is free to European students from 18-26 years of age, and the Jardins are also free of charge. To anyone looking for a day out without spending a dime - I highly recommend heading over to the 6th arrondissement for culture, history, (and after all of that somber stuffiness) - a big breath of fresh autumnal air. 

À Bientôt !

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