New Blog Address

The Zumstegs on the Go blog has moved to a new address: www.zumstegs.us or zumstegs.us. Note the change: it’s now zumstegs.us (plural) rather than zumsteg.us (singular). 

Why did I change? This blog, at zumsteg.us, is a WordPress blog and so vulnerable to hacking. Last year that happened and the only way I – a WordPress non-expert – could keep it un-hacked was with a $100 per year plug-in. I also had to pay for the site itself. The new site gives me a much greater ability to change the format, and it will be almost 100% unhackable. If it does get hacked, I can fix it quickly. 

If you want to jump to the new site, it’s at https://www.zumstegs.us. If clicking on that link takes you to some strange place, close the browser tab and enter “zumstegs.us” manually in your browser search bar. 

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Back in St. Louis

After the most miserable Winter and Spring imaginable here in Seattle, we headed off to St. Louis in May to catch up on grandkid-hugging, tiki-drinking, general good fun and some warm weather. We had a great time!

First: here’s the St. Louis family:

The St. Louis Zummies – ready for a swimming pool outing.

Craig and Annie, Laurie and me, heading out to an excellent dinner.

Clara – 11 years old

Clara in her new look. It will likely change in few weeks, but we kind of like it!

Henry – almost seven years old.

A Ramble to Cahokia Mounds

A thousand years ago, Cahokia – just east across the Mississippi River from St. Louis, was home to around 20,000 people, with stockade walls, many buildings, and the mounds. These mounds were built for defensive and religious purposes, as well as burials of important people. There are over 100 mounds ranging from little bumps to Monks Mound: 900 feet long, 700 feet wide and 95 ft high, constructed from 22 million cubic feet of dirt, all dug up by hand and carried to the site in baskets (no excavators or dump trucks in the 12th century, when the most building activity occurred!).

This was an enjoyable ramble. The Interpretive Center was closed for renovation, and we’ll return when it re-opens, as we hear it has lots of interesting history and information. Some pictures of the biggest mound:

This is a big freaking mound! Those are the steps to reach the top.

Two smaller mounds in the distance.

Gardening

One thing Craig and Annie do not have is a lot of time to garden, so we helped out. They had done a lot of work to planted new flowering plants and shrubs which will look great in a year or two; now, though, weeds were taking over. So Laurie and I had at them and cleaned up a couple plant beds. The frustrating part was, as always, a week later the weeds were back so we did it again. Still, we were glad to be able to help.

Some new hostas, hydrangeas and flowering plants. Before Laurie and I attacked this bed, a fast-growing, highly-invasive plant was taking over. 

This is Craig and Annie’s new butterfly garden. All the plants are Missouri natives and should grow well in the terrible clay soil that makes up their yard. They did a lot of work to get these and the front yard shrubs and flowers planted – it’ll be fun to watch them grow and flower.

A Ramble to Memphis, Missouri

Memphis, Missouri, 10 miles south of the Iowa border, is not anything like the big Memphis in Tennessee. Memphis, Missouri is maybe 1,800 people, no spectacular sights (actually, no sights at all); really, no reason for us to visit except…

…my great-grandparents lived there for many years and my grandfather (Jacob Wendell Zumsteg) was born there. We figured that was reason enough to visit Memphis, Missouri, so we detoured on a drive to Kansas City to do a little ancestor-tracking in Memphis. 

We went first to the cemetery to see if we could find some Zumsteg graves we knew are there. We figured it would be a small cemetery and we’d have no problem. Not so; it was big, being the main cemetery for the county and surrounding areas. We had a section number for the Zumsteg graves, but the sections weren’t marked, so we just tramped  around. We found one Zumsteg tombstone, with graves for some siblings of my grandfather but we could not find that of my great-grandparents. Since it was about 90° and midwest-humid, we gave it up and drove into town.

First visit there: the library. A very nice librarian pulled out a binder that had records of all the graves in the cemetery and a map of it! I took a picture so we could go back and find what we were looking for. Gotta love a small-town library!

As near as we could tell, there are only two restaurants in Memphis and one was nearby, so we went there for lunch. Here’s one page of the menu; check the prices.


I’ve said the day of the $10 cheeseburger is gone, but not in Memphis, MO. Check that out: $6.50 for a double cheeseburger. Highest price for a sandwich: $5.75. Laurie and I each had a sandwich (Reuben for her, turkey club for me), ice tea (no alcohol available) and we split a large order of fries. Total cost: $18.71. Not for each of us, total cost. And the sandwiches were just fine.

Back to the cemetery. With our map in hand, we quickly located the graves we were looking for:


My great-grandparents emigrated from the Aargau region of Switzerland – just a mile from the German border – in 1853. We think they went first to St. Louis, where others from that region who had emigrated earlier lived. In the 1870s they moved to Memphis. Why? We have no idea. We talked to a woman in the hardware store on the main square (okay, the only square) and she remembers hearing that the Zumsteg family ran the pharmacy in the early-1900s. I have found nothing to confirm that, but she said she had a small glass bottle, used to store a liquid medicine or lotion, that had “Zumsteg” engraved on it, so that could be. My grandfather was born here in Memphis in 1881.

A street on the main square. Lots of empty storefronts.

The Scotland County Courthouse. Memphis is the county seat, so this courthouse, with a rather odd dome(?) is in the center of town.

We visited the courthouse where a very nice young man spent about 45 minutes digging through old property records to see if we could learn where the Zumstegs lived. We are not 100% sure, but we think the house below is where a great-uncle and his family lived. It’s likely built on land owned by the family since the 1870s and replaces an earlier house. But that’s mostly speculation. That last Zumsteg in Memphis, my grandfather’s youngest brother, left the town in the 1940s, moving to California, where he died in 1958.

That’s Memphis, Missouri. Honestly, I can’t see a reason you’d visit it unless you too have ancestors there. But honestly, we loved visiting it and seeing where my great-grandparents lived and where my grandfather and his siblings were born. 

Kansas City and Independence

After Memphis we drove to Independence, a good-sized city right next to Kansas City, on the western edge of Missouri. When we decided to go there, we had a purpose: to see the National Frontier Trails Museum. Both readers of this blog will remember that Laurie and I are “rut nuts:” enthusiasts of the Oregon and California trails used by emigrants in the 1840s-1860s to move from the East Coast to California, Oregon and Washington. In the early days of emigration, Independence was the jumping-off place for the three main trails – the two mentioned above and the Santa Fe Trail, to Santa Fe, New Mexico. 

If you’re in the area and interested in the trails, this museum is worth a visit. It has exhibits on the three trails as well as on the Lewis and Clark Expedition. Some pix:

Laurie checking out a map at the National Frontier Trails Museum

A replica of a wagon that would have been used on the Oregon-California trail. Imagine loading this with enough food for four-five months and heading off into the unknown.

We have a connection to stars of trail research: Irene Paden and her husband Bill, who spent many summers tracing the route of the California Trail. She wrote two excellent and well-known books about their travels and research on the California Trail. We’re interested in her because the Padens were best friends with my Arfsten grandparents for many years in Alameda, CA. My grandmother lived with Irene for several years when I was in high-school and when visiting my grandmother I was able to spend time in the basement of Irene’s house, which was chock-full of relics and artifacts they’d picked up on the trail over the years.

I learned that their collection had been donated to the Oregon-California Trails Association, which had then donated it to the National Frontier Trails Museum. I thought maybe some of that collection would be on display, but found just one small thing.

A knife from the Irene Paden collection.

The museum has just hired a collections manager and we’re hopeful that more of Irene’s collection will be on display in the future.

We also stopped in at the Oregon-California Trails Association office, which is next door to the museum. There we had an enjoyable conversation with a woman who has worked for OCTA for 30 years about OCTA and how much we enjoy being members. I asked about Irene Paden and she was able to show us all the information they had on her donation of the collection – inventories and descriptions of the items donated, clippings of news stories about it, pictures of the family. (The collection was actually donated by Irene’s son several years after her death.) Definitely a fun and rewarding stop on our trip.

Kansas City

Kansas City is a pretty cool place; we hope to explore it further on future trips. Our first stop was at a sculpture park associated with the Atkins-Nelson Art Museum. We were drawn here because the park has one of two Andy Goldsworthy walls (the other is in Storm King, New York. We visited that in 2019). This wall is not as long as Storm King’s, but we loved it. 

We can’t say why we love the Andy Goldsworthy walls, but we do. Maybe that’s art: you don’t have to analyze why you like something. No matter what, these walls really touch us.

World War I Museum

Who’d’ve thunk there is a World War I museum in Kansas City, but there is: a spectacular one. It was overwhelming, really. I have no good pictures of it to show you. Laurie lasted about two hours, while I could have spent a full day here.

One last thing to do in Kansas City/Independence

Ribs, brisket, chicken, beans, cole-slaw, white cheddar mac-and-cheese, potato salad and white toast. It was great!

Big News

While we were in St. Louis, Craig was interviewed for a campaign position by a candidate for the Missouri Senate. He got the job, which was exciting for all of us, and a little nervous-making for Craig. He’ll be responsible for “field operations,” which means getting canvassers, phone callers and postcard writers, training and scheduling them, and increasing the candidate’s presence in the district. Although Missouri is a fairly conservative state (think Josh Hawley. No wait, don’t think Josh Hawley; it’ll fry your brain), the district his candidate is running in is definitely of the blue persuasion, so Craig says she has an excellent chance of winning. Craig was involved in campaigns in New York, and this is his first real paid job in the field. Pretty cool, we think.

Dream Daughter-in-law

We have always said that Annie is the best daughter-in-law ever. One morning, Laurie was having a late sleep when came a knock on the door. She opened it and there stood Annie and Henry, with a freshly-made latte for Laurie. Is that the sweetest thing ever? 

That’s the wrap-up on our latest St. Louis sojourn. We were in Missouri for a little over two weeks, and we had a great time. We’re already looking forward to our Christmas trip to St. Louis.

P.S. Uncle Wiggily

Do any of you remember the Uncle Wiggily Longears books and stories? I remember having them read to me as a child and I read them to our kids. We brought an old Uncle Wiggily book of stories to read to Henry, expecting that he would find them too boring and slow. Wrong! He really enjoyed them and every night asked us to read a story.

Now for a bit of Uncle Wiggily trivia.The author, Howard Garis, worked for a newspaper and in 1910 wrote the first Uncle Wiggily story for the paper. He then wrote an Uncle Wiggily story every day, six days a week, for fifty-two years! (That is somewhere around 16,000 Uncle Wiggily stories!)

It was really fun to have Henry enjoy the Uncle Wiggily stories. And if the rabbit gentleman and Nurse Jane Fuzzy Wuzzy don’t fall into a vat of molasses and cause the postman to drop his mailbag, scattering postcards all over town, I’ll post something about our next trip – whenever and wherever that is.

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Christmas in St. Louis

I know that thousands of readers look at this blog to read about our travels inside and outside the U.S. of A., and so may be slightly disappointed that this blog is about our Christmas trip to St. Louis. Honestly, I won’t feel slighted if you skip right on by. But a big reason I do this blog is so that Laurie and I can look back and say, ‘Oh, yeah, we remember that.” And if you want to see what the Zumsteg family looks like now, and learn a little bit about St. Louis, give it a read!

Some St. Louis Background

We actually have an old connection with St. Louis. In 1853 my great-grandfather, Widillin “Wendall” Zumsteg, then six years old, emigrated with his parents and some family members (don’t know who yet) from a tiny village in Switzerland, about a mile south of the Switzerland/Germany border. Where did he emigrate to? St. Louis. For unknown reasons a few – maybe more than a few –  Zumsteg families made that trip in the early 1850s. Many moved on to St. Joseph, MO, and my Zumsteg ancestors moved to a tiny town, Memphis, Missouri, on the border between Missouri and Iowa.

Today there are quite a few Zumstegs in Missouri. Craig said that he once started to spell his name for someone and they stopped him, since they knew other Zumstegs. Someday we’ll make a run up to Memphis (population: 1,700) to see the town where my grandfather was born, and visit the cemetery where his parents (my great-grandparents) and several siblings are buried.

As for my great-grandfather Wendall Zumsteg, I have no information about his history in the United States. But he lives on: my grandfather’s name was Jacob Wendell Zumsteg, and my middle name is Wendell.

The Trip

I think both regular readers of this blog know that our daughter-in-law, Annie, is hands-down the best daughter-in-law ever. No, really. When we were in St. Louis in October, we planned to bring up whether we should come back for Christmas, knowing that it was only two months away, and knowing that sometimes guests can come a little too often and stay a little too long. We didn’t get a chance to bring up the subject; Annie asked us to please, please come at Christmas. We pointed out that we didn’t want to leave Derek alone in Portland, so she texted him an invite and by the next day it was all confirmed: all the Z’s would be in St. Louis for the holidays. We think it’s been at least 25 years since we’ve all been together, and then, Craig and Annie didn’t even know each other and grandkid Z’s were a long way off.

The whole fambly together again! At a coffee shop in Kirkwood. It was clear and cold that day.

We got to do some sightseeing. Here’s the St. Louis Arch. From a distance, it’s interesting, but up-close? It’s really impressive.



 We got in lots of walks, as the weather was excellent. Christmas Eve day was sunny and 74°! We walked through an outdoor sculpture park with some interesting installations:

Have you ever had that feeling that someone was looking at you? At this sculpture park, we   encountered that feeling strongly, but never figured out what it was.

The most interesting thing in the park was an owl, sitting in a tree by the side of a path.  We’ve never been this close to an owl in the wild.

We walked through a Farmers’ Market in Kirkwood which was selling trees and saw this one. Yikes!

Clara (age 11) with her new look.

Christmas Morning!

Henry was not up to snuff, fighting the flu. He rallied when the presents came out…

Henry (age 6) wearing one Christmas present (apron and hat – he loves to do stuff in the kitchen) and showing off another.

Annie showing off one of her presents – one of a set of three. That is a picture of blood cells; remember, she’s a scientist specializing in infectious diseases. These pictures are really beautiful.

Derek showing off his new look. Wouldn’t call it a “man-bun,” exactly. Actually, this get-up was for humorous affect. Derek has avoided hair salons since the pandemic started a couple years ago.

St. Charles

We visited St. Charles, about 30 minutes north of Craig and Annie’s house, on the Missouri River. St. Charles has many beautiful restored buildings from the late 1800’s/early-1900s, but honestly it’s a little cutesy, especially decorated for Christmas. I wrote some about the dilemma for towns like this when we visited one in France: to stay alive, they have to attract tourists; to attract tourists, they have to prettify themselves far beyond what they looked like in their prime. Prettifying themselves draws crowds of tourists and sightseers, which detracts from the “authenticity” of the town. No easy answer here – I’d like to see the towns maintain their 100-year-old selves, but then they’d disappear for lack of a reason for existing. Anyway, St. Charles:

Henry came down with some type of flu (wasn’t COVID-Omicron, evidently, as he tested negative) and for a couple days he definitely was not his high-energy self:

Don’t see Henry just sitting like this often; usually he’s exploring everything is sight. Flu slows everyone down, including Henry.

We had a great time in St. Louis, from start to finish. A couple days later Annie wrote that she was extending an invitation for us to come to St. Louis for Christmas for the next ten years. See what I said about her being the best daughter-in-law ever? We accepted the invitation.

Then, we had to fly back to Seattle. 

Return Flight

Now things got, um, “interesting.” First, Laurie caught Henry’s flu. Tuesday night (we left Wednesday), she started to hack and cough, had some head congestion and a bit of a sore throat. Departure day she felt worse and continued to go downhill as the day progressed.

On the other side of the country – Seattle, that is – a huge snow storm had snarled air travel big-time. The day before, the St. Louis – Seattle flight was cancelled and another big snow storm was forecast to hit Seattle late Wednesday night. So we were a little worried about getting home. Fortunately, the flights operated on our departure day and we arrived at SeaTac at exactly 10 p.m., one hour late. “No problem,” thought I. “We’ll get our bags, catch an Uber or Lyft and be home by 11:30. Right.

Unfortunately, that “late Wednesday night” snowstorm had arrived three hours before our arrival, and SeaTac was a mess. We waited on the plane for an hour before it got to a gate, then waited 50 minutes to get our bags – in a baggage claim area with thousands of people. During this time I was checking, with growing dismay, the Uber and Lyft apps. A ride from the airport to home usually is about $32-$34, plus tip. Lyft was now showing that ride would cost $155, but not to worry about the cost, because they had zero drivers available. Uber was saying $85, and they had “few drivers” so couldn’t guarantee that we could get a ride. Gulp.

Our bags arrived after about 50 minutes. Off to the ground transportation area we went. I thought maybe we could just catch a regular taxi home. Right again. The line – outdoors in 24° temps – was about 200 yards long, with a taxi arriving maybe every five minutes. I figured the taxi wait was at least two hours. We walked out to the Lyft/Uber area; I checked Uber and amazingly, it showed a driver available in seven minutes at that $85 cost. Honestly, I didn’t believe it, but I took the ride and, sure enough, the driver showed up about five minutes later. 

Now, I don’t know where the driver was from, but I’d guess the Middle East somewhere – Iraq or Iran or Egypt or thereabouts. He asked us if we wanted to wait for a four-wheel drive vehicle, but the Uber app said, “None available,” so he took us, saying, “I’m a really good driver in snow.” Sure, you learned that in a country that has zero snow ever. In the event, he was right. He was an excellent driver in the snow, which was good, because we went up several hills with a lot of snow on them.

We made it to the entrance of the development where we live. The driver said he would help us carry our bags to the house, but no way was he going to try driving there. He was right; he would likely not have been able to get out. We declined his offer and dragged our suitcases about a quarter of a mile through six inches of snow. Remember: Laurie is sick and getting sicker by the minute. We opened the garage door at about 12:45 a.m., almost three hours after we’d landed. 

The one wise decision we’d made before we left ten days earlier was to not turn off the heat in the house. So the house was cool, but not freezing. We left the bags in the garage, turned the heat up, turned the electric blankets on and got into bed. Home, sweet home.

Our backyard the day after our airport adventure.

Flu Update

It’s twelve days since Laurie came down with this flu. She says she has never been so sick in her life, and I believe it. It almost certainly was not COVID, since no one around her caught it and rapid transmission is the key marker of COVID these days. She never had a fever – another COVID symptom – nor trouble breathing nor the dry cough of COVID (but she surely had a cough; a terrible cough that lasted until just the last day or so). 

Our doc and our resident infectious disease expert believe this was a case of the 2022 flu, and they also say that this year’s flu is the most virulent in years. Laurie believes it! Almost two weeks after she felt the first symptoms, she’s starting to feel human again. 

 

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St. Louis Sojourn

We arrived in St. Louis pretty whupped from the flights from France but glad to be there. We got to the airport about midnight and had the great pleasure of seeing Clara there – we hadn’t expected that! The next day was a kind of hanging around day, taking a nap, just relaxing and catching up. 

When we came through St. Louis on the way to France in July, Craig and Annie’s furniture and household stuff arrived the morning after we arrived, so the house was, in a word, disorganized. This time, of course, it was a real home, with everything in place. We can tell you that it is a really nice house, in an excellent neighborhood, with lots to do and see. We will definitely explore more on future visits and we’re looking forward to doing that. 

This trip, we relaxed and got back in United States mode and we also saw some very interesting and cool things: a fabulous botanical garden, and the National Transportation Museum and a park with contemporary sculptures

First though, the most important thing: pictures of Clara and Henry!

Clara (on the right) and her best friend Caleigh in their Halloween costumes, as plague doctors. Lookin’ good, eh?

Henry (age 6) getting ready for a bike ride.

Henry and Grandma on the bike ride. Not sure this is how it’s supposed to work.

Clara (11) with her blue-green hair.

Missouri Botanical Gardens

This botanical garden is not more than ten or twelve minutes from Craig and Annie’s house and it is beautiful. We spent a couple hours here and could have spent more. It has a wonderful tropical building, a beautiful Japanese Garden, a children’s garden and much more. 

You can see that we had a beautiful day to visit the botanical garden. I think it was high-70s that day.

I’d commit a crime to get a load of beautiful rocks like these in the Japanese garden of the Botanical Gardens.

Seattle artist Dale Chihuly had these glass creations in a pond in the tropical greenhouse. Don’t they look like an exotic bird?

Nice way to spend a late-October warm day, eh?

National Transportation Museum

Although this is the National Transportation Museum, the transportation is heavily oriented toward rail-based modes. There are many locomotives, of all ages, freight cars, passenger cars, trams and trolleys and streetcars. Then there are maybe 25 automobiles, one boat and one airplane. Since I bored you with the post on the Cité de la Train (Mulhouse) in France, I won’t bore you with lots of pictures from here. Maybe a few…

Big Boy 

This locomotive has fascinated me since I first saw one on display in Cheyenne, Wyoming, home of the Union Pacific. The Union Pacific built twenty-five “Big Boy” locomotives between 1942 and 1945; they are the biggest locomotives ever, 132 ft long and weighing 1.2 million pounds.  

“Big Boy” – aptly named, I’d say.

I’ve always wondered what the view was from the engineer’s seat. Visitors could climb into Big Boy’s cab to see what what the engineer saw: not much!

Want an idea of how big this locomotive is? Look at the very end of it, on the right side of the picture. That’s me waving out the fireman’s window.

Craig and Laurie in front of Big Boy’s driving wheels. There are 32 of those wheels!

Thought to be the oldest surviving locomotive in the United States.

This is a streetcar from the San Francisco Muni Railroad. I remember seeing these going up and down Market Street. I probably rode on one sometime.

For someone who enjoys old trains, this place is heaven – lots of interesting equipment around, some of it restored, much of it not. There seemed to be no restrictions as to where we could go, so we walked all over it. Lots of fun.

We also visited a park with many outdoor sculptures of the modern type, and a great city park, with playgrounds, walks, a huge swimming complex, an ice-skating rink and a bunch of other stuff. 

You can tell we like St. Louis! We’ll be back for Christmas, when it’s likely the weather will not be so amenable to getting out. But we’ll try!

Wrapping It Up

After a week of great times here, we headed for the airport. Gotta say that the St. Louis airport is becoming a favorite; it’s small, well-organized and not all that busy. Almost makes flying fun again.

We returned to Seattle on October 25, three months to the day after we had left there. As always, we were sad to leave France, sad to leave Craig and Annie and Clara and Henry, and glad to be back home. We’re already planning and looking forward to future travels – as a great friend says, “Making memories.” Thanks to all of you for joining us on our travels via this blog. For now…wrapping it up. 

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Not in France Any Longer

I’m writing this from home, back in Renton. We flew from Paris to St. Louis four weeks ago, spent a week with Craig and Annie and Clara and Henry, then came home three weeks ago. Are we happy to be back? Yes, as always. Were we sorry to leave France? Yes, as always. Sorry to leave St. Louis and Craig and Annie and Clara and Henry? Yes, as always.

The Return

Sunday, Oct. 17 we got up about 7 in the morning, finished packing, cleaned the cottage that had been our home for two and a half months, and headed off to the airport. We had everything we needed, including  COVID-19 tests done three days before, a “Letter of Attestation” swearing that we had not been around anyone with COVID recently, passports, boarding passes, etc. The drive, planned for a Sunday morning to avoid what can be horrendous traffic, was okay except for some horrendous traffic caused by an accident. But we had plenty of time so pas de problem.

We got to the car-return place, turned in the car, shuttled to the airport, checked the bags, went through passport control in about two minutes and then hit security. Ugh! Long lines, surly employees, and a continuous request for some document or other: COVID test, now the Attestation form, now boarding cards (two or three times), a hand check of my laptop bag, boarding passes again, etc. Just tiring.

Flight to Atlanta was fine, went through Global Entry (Immigration and Passport control) in about 2 minutes (if you’re traveling internationally, spend the time and money to get Global Entry; well worth it), thirty minute wait for bags which we then immediately put on a conveyor belt to go to the connecting flight, another poor experience going through security (no TSA PreCheck), and a two and a half hour wait for the flight to St. Louis.

We got to St. Louis and had a wonderful surprise when Clara was at the airport (with Craig) at midnight to meet us. She had blue-green hair, and I didn’t recognize her for a few seconds! Then, hugs all around. It was a wonderful welcome to see her there.

Usually when we arrive at Craig and Annie’s, it’s a drink and then bed. This time we skipped the drink. We had been up for almost exactly 25 hours and were physically and mentally whupped. I think we slept until about 10 the next morning.

I’ll post a report on our week in St. Louis (spoiler alert: we had a great time!)

A Quick France Summary

What was the best thing about our two and a half months in France? Spending more time than ever with our French “family.” When we planned this trip, we said the thing we wanted to do most was spend more time with our friends there; often they’re on vacation or busy or we’re off on some ramble; this trip we wanted to see them more. Well, we succeeded! All our friends made time for us – the first week we had a gathering the first night, the second night and the fifth night, and things didn’t slow down too much from there. 

So, Mary and Gilles, Jamie and Hervé, Pierre and Penny, Yves and Valerie, Riitta and Benôit, Lesly and Pierre: merci à vous for making our stay the best ever. We just can’t thank all of you enough for including us in so many wonderful, happy, memorable times. You’re the best! We miss you all!

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Chateau Fontainebleu – inside

Earlier I wrote about walking around Chateau Fontainebleau, one of our favorite walks here (Around Bois-le-Roi – Chateau Fontainebleau). Yesterday we returned to the chateau, not for a walk but to visit the interior. We’ve done this before – as in, three or four times before! – but we have enjoyed every visit and wanted to see it again before we left.

A very short history of the chateau: originally a hunting lodge for the French kings, in the first half of the 1500s, François 1 built probably 90% of what exists today. After François, every king and emperor of France added to – and in some cases, subtracted from – Chateau Fontainebleau. This makes Chateau Fontainebleau a museum of the French monarchy – everywhere you see changes made by successive kings and queens, often identified by those kings’ and queens’ monograms.

We had two pleasant surprises: first, more of the chateau has been restored and open to visitors; and second, the place was deserted. This made the visit much more enjoyable than being there as part of a crowd, even though Chateau Fontainebleau never approaches the crowds of Versailles.

Napoleon

The emperor Napoleon spent quite a bit of time at Chateau Fontainebleau, both with his first wife, Josephine, and his second, Maria-Theresa, so the chateau has collected a fair amount of Napoleon memorabilia and displays it in a small museum. Here are two of my favorite things there.

Napoleon’s famous hat and battle coat. He wore these in several battles. What you can’t see from this picture is how short he was: 5′ 6″ at the most.

The crib of Napoleon’s only legitimate child, Napoléon François Joseph Charles Bonaparte. When Napoleon abdicated the first time, in 1814, he named this son Napoleon II as his successor. France was having none of that, refused to give him any power, and stripped him of the title after two weeks. He went to Austria where he lived until dying of tuberculosis at age 21.

Crowds

We have been through Chateau Fontainebleau three or four times before, and while it’s never been really crowded (one of its attractions, we think), there have always been a fair number of fellow gawkers. This trip? Not so much.

The Gallery Françoise I. He brought the Renaissance to France, and this gallery is his crowning achievement in that respect. Notice the hoards of people.

A view onto the gardens from the gallery.

The Ball Room, probably our favorite room in the chateau.  Henry IV (ruled 1589-1610) had most of the decoration done during his reign. There are many triple “new moons” (“crescents,” in French, croissants), Henri’s symbol, and intertwined Hs and Ms (the M for Maria d’Medici, his second wife).

Cour Ovale

The Cour Ovale. This space has been the center of the chateau since it was first built, although the buildings forming it now were built mostly in the 1500s. For years I’ve looked out windows and through a gate and wished we could walk in it, but it has always been closed to the public. No longer! Visitors to the chateau can now stroll around the Cour Ovale, and we took full advantage! I love this courtyard and was very happy to be able to spend twenty minutes in it. A lot of historic people entered the chateau through the Cour Ovale.

The main gate into the Cour Ovale and the chateau.


As we (finally) left the Cour Ovale, I told Laurie that now I could die happy, having been there. An exaggeration, of course, but it was very fun to walk around this exceedingly beautiful courtyard that we’d had to look at from the outside for years!

Some Other Pix

This is the throne Napoleon used when he was at Fontainebleau. Napoleon was an enigmatic figure and I’m not sure anyone will ever be able to say whether he was good or bad for France. But no one can deny that he was a force. I’m fascinated by him and his place in history, but when I asked some French friends what the French think of him 200 years after his death, the response was, “They don’t think of him at all.”

Maybe the most beautiful library in the world, eh? This is the Diana Gallery, built by Henry IV and named after the goddess of the hunt, Diana.

Now, here’s a ceiling!

The Trinity Chapel

The upper level, for the royal family, so they didn’t have to mingle with the “hoi-polloi.”

The “hoi-polloi” level. Remember, the folks down here were aristocrats and courtiers of the royal family, but they had to stay in their place, even in the chapel.

Now you’ve seen the outside and inside of Chateau Fontainebleau. Our visit exceeded our expectations; new rooms had been restored and opened, we walked around the Cour Ovale and admired it, we had entire rooms and galleries to ourselves. Honestly, when we return, we’ll be back for our walks in the chateau’s gardens, and we will almost surely pay the admission to walk through the chateau’s rooms again.

Posted in Architecture, Around Us, Châteaux | Leave a comment

Puits Communes (Public Wells)

One day while walking down our street, we saw this in a wall near our cottage:

This well started our search. It’s about a hundred yards from our cottage here in Bois-le-Roi.

It’s an old unused well; we could see the pulley and bucket on a chain.There is a locked grill on the front so it cannot be used (and so kids and animals don’t fall down it!). We thought that was kind of interesting.

Then we found a historical marker sign on another street with a narrative about les puits communes (common wells) that were in this area when it was the commercial and residential center of Bois-le-Roi. There were many of these common wells, which the residents and businesses in the area used.

The sign said that thirteen of the wells, built around 1850, still exist. Ah-hah! The search was on. A challenge is that the sign said the wells were built in walls along the street (almost all houses here have walls around the property) but some wells were built in courtyards, which generally are now completely enclosed.

So on our almost-daily walks, we kept an eye out for puits. More than once I walked right by one and Laurie would have to call me back to show me. In the end, we found twelve for sure and one maybe, but the maybe turned out to be a no. Several of them are in courtyards which required some “over the wall peeping.” One we can see only the roof and about six inches of the opening. Eight of them are on walls, five are in courtyards (which took some searching to find).

For your viewing pleasure, here are the puits we’ve found, in no particular order:

Rue de France, near the railroad. 

Rue Guido-Sigriste, in the wall. This one is practically across the street from our cottage and we’d never seen it.

Rue Guido Sigriste, in a house courtyard.

Rue Denecourt.

Rue de la Republique, in a courtyard.

An unusual well; it has a rounded front with the opening on the side. No other well looks like this.

Rue de Republique, top of a hidden puit. We’ve never gotten a good look at this one, as it’s behind two gates, but it’s definitely a well, and I found an 1848 map that shows a well in this location.

Rue Louis Letang, near place Republique.

Rue Carnot, behind the boucherie.

Rue de France, in a courtyard.

The last found, on the back wall of a courtyard.

Rue de France, in a courtyard – not entirely sure this is one of the puits communes.

I suspect a few of you faithful readers are saying, “They’ve lost it for sure.” Probably, but I will say that it was fun to search these wells up, and have a little connection with the local history.

Posted in Ambles, Bois-le-Roi | 1 Comment

Gotta Love Paris – and We Do

This week we spent four days in Paris, certainly our last visit to the city on this trip. We’ve been coming to Paris for many years – our first time in the city was in 1983: two day-trips while we were staying with Mary and Gilles in Chartrettes. Our first stay in the city, probably four or five days, was ten years later. Since then we’ve spent time here on probably ten or twelve vacations. We loved this city from the start and have only grown to love it more each visit. So it was hard to walk back to the flat and then the train station knowing it will be a while before we’re back.

We had a great four days in Paris, though Tuesday started with an unbelievable downpour. After that, though, the weather turned clear and cold. We can always add another layer, so off we went. Here are some pictures of our time in our favorite city.

Notre Dame

You likely remember seeing pictures of Notre Dame burning in April, 2019, and I wrote a bit about it after our first stay in Paris in August. Restoration has just started; engineers worked two years to stabilize the Cathedral enough that the work of restoration could start. This beautiful building came close to completely collapsing in the fire; huge kudos to the firefighters who saved it.

After much discussion, the powers-that-be decided to restore Notre Dame to its pre-fire appearance (a decision with which I whole-heartedly agree). There will surely be some changes and it will be much more resistant to catastrophes, but it will look almost exactly as it has for 800 years. 

Restoration schedule: François Macron, President of France, wants it open for the 2024 Olympics to be held in France. It may be open then, but the schedule for full restoration calls for almost twenty years(!) of work.

From the east end. You can see the scaffolding that envelopes much of the central part of the building.

The entire south side of Notre Dame, from across the Seine. The towers at the left survived the fire by fast and smart work by the firefighters. The fire got into the towers and had the firefighters not stopped it almost immediately, the towers would have collapsed, bringing the entire Cathedral down with them.

Even in it’s “under-repair” state, Notre Dame still dominates the sky here, and keeps its title as an iconic image of Paris. I don’t know of a better known Church anywhere in the world.

Look Up!

If someone asks me about visiting Paris, one of my regular bits of advice is: “Look up.” Paris is full of beautiful buildings. Here are a few we saw this trip:

There is, of course, the occasional clunker. Don’t know what the architect of this building was thinking, or if he or she was thinking at all.

Two Favorite Churches

Within a five minute walk of Notre Dame are two churches that we like a lot. The first is Saint-Julian-le-Pauvre. This is a tiny church that holds a strong claim as the oldest church in Paris, having been built over a 6th century church. Since 1889, Saint-Julian-le-Pauvre has been a Greek Orthodox church; the first time I stepped into it four or five years ago a service was in progress. The church continues to hold Greek Orthodox services, and also presents musical concerts almost every week.

The other favorite church is Saint-Severin, just a hundred yards from Saint-Julian-le-Pauvre. This church has some Romanesque arches in the nave and about every type of Gothic known: early, flamboyant, neo-, etc. It, too, is not a huge Church, and it doesn’t draw crowds, so it is a place of beauty and peace. For us, it’s a lovely place to just sit.

Gotta love a beautiful organ.

River Walk

After visiting Saint-Julian-le-Pauvre and Saint-Severin, it was time to start back. We walked to the north side of the Seine (the Right Bank, as it’s known) and walked along the river.

Our first few trips to Paris, I whined about how few places there were where people could walk along the river. Fortunately, things have changed, as there are now several miles of walks along the Seine. Right next to the river runs a former two-lane freeway that transported tens of thousands of cars a day. A few years back the city closed the road to cars on Sundays and opened it to walkers, runners, skateboarders, bikers, strollers, scooters.  Then a couple years ago the mayor of Paris closed it off permanently, thus earning the ire of thousands of motorists. The payoff, though, has been fabulous for us walkers.

A heavily-used “highway’ down the Right Bank, turned into a walkers/bikers/runners paradise. Drivers are less enthused, but we think this is by far the best use of this road.

Some pictures of Paris from our walk down the river…

Lots of bridges, close up!

The Conciergerie, long a notorious prison, now a government office building.

School-kids enjoying the walkway and a beautiful day.

A corner of Ile de la Cité, home of Notre Dame. This is the only part of the island where residences were spared the clearing and rebuilding wrought by Baron Von Haussman in the 1870s.

Looking across at Ile St. Louis. You are seeing here some of the most expensive residences in Paris: a 230 sq. ft. studio apartment is listed for $400,000; a nice 750 sq. ft. two-bedroom goes for $1.4 million.

Nice place to eat lunch…

Then, it was on the bus, back to the flat, pack up and head for the train station. As we walked along the river, we said, again and again, how much we love Paris, and how we will always have a plan for the next trip there. Have to have something to look forward to through the approaching winter, and Paris is what we’ll be remembering and looking forward to again.

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Food – mmmmmm…

I haven’t taken a lot of pictures of food here, because I’m not 100% ok with pulling out a phone and taking pictures in a nice restaurant. But I’ve been talked into posting the food pix I have so here they are. You’ll notice that they lean to the dessert side…

(In 2015 I posted about buying food on a day-to-day basis here. If you’re interested, it’s at Buying Food Here . About the only thing that has changed is we have found great produce and fruit [and inexpensive wine] at a fairly new grocery store near us, so we don’t hit the street markets as often as we did that year.)

Produce

Here are some pix taken in the stores at which we shop. We think that fruit and produce here is fresher and tastier than at home.

Leeks. Big leeks.

Really fresh green beans, and lots of them.

Mushrooms – a tiny selection of the mushrooms available here.

Part of the produce section at our local store. Look at the size of that lettuce. The origin of each item is listed, so you know where it came from.

Laurie had to fight this head of lettuce for ten minutes to get it into a bag.

Desserts

Chocolate, four ways. All of them great.

We ordered this after we realized that “tarte de prune” isn’t exactly what we thought. “Prune” translates to “plum.” It was, of course, excellent.

Chocolate moelleux. This is cooked so that the chocolate on the outsides forms a cake, but the chocolate inside stays melted. It is another favorite.

On the menu (in Montreuil-sur-Mer) these were listed as “profiteroles authentiques.” Good thing, because I would not want faux profiteroles. The “authentique” means everything in them was made at the restaurant.

A rhubarb tarte.

Probably the most beautiful patisserie cakes we’ve ever seen. Also the most expensive: for a cake serving four people, $35 – $45; for a six-person cake, $40 – $70!

Miscellaneous Food Pix

France has taken to the hamburger in a big way, but not like American hamburgers. We have not seen one that we could pick up and eat; a hamburger here is a knife-and-fork endeavor. This one is probably the shortest we have seen, and I couldn’t have gotten a bite of it.

Lunch in Montreuil-sur-Mer. The bowl at bottom-right is not soup; it’s rarebit: melted cheese over toast. Next to it: a salad. Above the salad, beef stew. Next to the beef stew, frites (of course). Post-lunch naps required.

That’s nougat. A lot of nougat. I didn’t buy it, though I was tempted.

Not exactly a typical at-home lunch for us, but not far off. I suspect the French would castigate us for this, but we’ve had more than a few lunches of cheese and bread, fruit and a glass of wine. This is three cheeses and a slice of paté.

The cheese course at a dinner chez Charrier.

We had a fabulous salad at this restaurant in Amboise three years ago. We found the restaurant again this year and had the same salad. If we return to Amboise, we’ll have it then, too!

That’s my food post; not a lot of pictures for ten weeks, I admit, but if I took a picture of every good lunch and dinner we’ve had, this blog would be nothing but food pictures!

Posted in Culture, Food and Drink | 4 Comments

Cristo

I’ve often claimed that we’re not great fans of modern art – that it too often leaves us scratching our heads and wondering about what we were seeing. Over the last few years we’ve come to appreciate some modern art: outdoor sculptures and murals and paintings (and Banksy), and we’ve always liked what Cristo and Jeanne-Claude (his wife) created: “…site-specific environmental installations.” That is, they created installations that temporarily changed – in a big way – some place or building or structure. The installations remained only a few days and then they returned the place to its original condition. A favorite style for Cristo and Jeanne-Claude was to wrap huge things. Sound crazy? Yes, but they create a powerful effect.

Finally, we got to see a Cristo installation. Although he died last year (Jeanne-Claude died in 2009), Cristo’s team carried out his last project: wrapping l’Arc de Triomphe in Paris. Like most of Cristo’s installations, it has a short life: finished on Sept 18, it will remain in place for two weeks; fortunately for us that two weeks coincided with a visit we made to Paris this week. 


I have no doubt that some folks are scratching their heads and wondering “???” and I understand that. But we thought this was cool and interesting and beautiful and powerful. We’re glad to have seen Cristo and Jeanne-Claude’s last work.

P.S. When our son Craig saw these pictures, he asked why when he was a teenager and wrapped things with toilet paper, it was called “vandalism” but Cristo’s work is called “art.” We laughed at that!

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