Chartres

Sometimes you have to get out of Paris. I just love living here, but it's almost like it's too much of a good thing. One easy way to leave is to take a day trip to one of the many sites within easy reach by train. And one easy motivation is to have guests visiting so you've got someone to go with. During the month of August a friend I've known since high school, her friend and their daughter have been staying in Paris. Yesterday we decided to visit Chartres, one of the most beautiful cathedrals in France. I'm very proud of how we met up. The regional train to Chartres leaves from the Gare Montparnasse which was "renovated" during the 70s (poor thing) and is now monstrously huge. There was no way we could meet there - it's simply too big. So, we met on the platform at the station Pasteur (link virus I told them) because both our metro lines crossed there. Then we simply went back one stop, together, to Monstrous Montparnasse. After that, we bought our train tickets on the spot and hopped on the next train. No reservations required.

The train was two-thirds empty, so we had almost the entire car to ourselves. After a brief trip that took a little more than one hour, we arrived in Chartres. As I remembered, just before you enter the town, you can see the majestic cathedral sitting on a hill, overlooking the entire area that surrounds it (and is agricultural to boot). It was an easy walk from the station up to the cathedral - (I can truly say "it's awesome"). Since it was time for lunch, we started looking for a good restaurant. To the left side of the tourist office is a street with several restaurants, but they were all too expensive. Finally, on the right hand side we saw a bar-brasserie-restaurant with decent prices and full of what looked like neighborhood people. Bingo! We had a fantastic lunch, and when we found our table across the restaurant and outside, we were literally sittting in the shadow of the cathedral. Ahhh. We then floated inside and were mesmerized by the stain glass windows and sculptures. On the way back to the train station, we found the river where in 858 the Vikings arrived to burn and sack the town. I sometimes imagine telling a French medieval peasant to just be patient and that eventually the Vikings would found Ikea and H&M, but somehow I don't think that would have comforted them much.

Then by a long and roundabout route we finally got back to the train station and took our easy train ride back to Montparnasse in Paris. photos:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/jeanne-feldman/