Day 7 Saturday, September 6, 2025
Today I catch the metro about 12:30 to go drawing at the Académie de la Grande Chaumière and Bob stays home a bit longer before going exploring on his own. He caught the metro to the Gare du Nord and then walked all the way south to the Jardin de Luxembourg to sit and read for a bit.
Sadly the studios of the Académie are no longer in the same historic building. These three photos are from previous trips and visits to draw in the 121 year old studios where so many artists have been before me.
On the way to the new location which is only a couple of blocks from the old studios I see these flowers that had been placed on a window ledge….I wonder what iis the story behind these roses?
Here is the new studio. It seems rather sterile and bare, but at least the life drawing sessions are still in operation. I believe that they are trying to find a better studio but the lady who talked about all this spoke very quickly and I only caught part of what she was saying. My French has improved, but not enough to understand the whole conversation. You can see my spot in the foreground of the photo, with my sketchbook on the stool and my red bag on the floor.
The model was tall and my drawings weren’t great today, but it is all a learning experience. Four 5 minute poses.
a 10 and a 15 minute pose
A 30n and a 35 minute pose.
After drawing I walked to the Jardin de Luxembourg to meet Bob. Thank heavens for cell phones and texting or I would never have found him. The gardens were very busy today.
The Medici Fountain is a monumental fountain in the Jardin de Luxembourg that was built in 1630. I really like this fountain. 
In 2006 we saw a giant nose floating in the water as part of an art installation.
We walk toward the Jardin de Plantes, a botanical garden about 45 minutes away. We pass the Pantheon, which is a mausoleum containing the graves of many famous people including Victor Hugo, Marie Curie, Voltaire, Louis Braille, and Alexandre Dumas. It is closed and I don’t think we will have time to visit this trip…guess we need to return to Paris at least one more time!
I do not miss eating out in Paris. Sitting check by jowl beside smokers is not my idea of fun. I much prefer the meals we prepare at home in our bnb’s.
As we enter the Jardin des Plantes we see this huge Plantane tree which was planted in 1785 and is now classified as an ‘Arbre Historique et Remarquables’. It amazes me that someone knows exactly when this tree was planted… 240 years ago!
These little orchids are growing at the base of the tree. We have the same ones growing back home in Alberta.
Sue loved this interesting flower and wanted a closer look.
Another huge old tree. Can you tell I love trees.
We couldn’t find Sue but then Bob spotted her checking out this rather strange creature.
The Botanical garden was a bit of a disappointment, we had just started to explore some of the more interesting areas when we were told to leave as the park was closing, a half hour before it actually closed.
Everyday on our walk to the metro near our bnb we pass these beautiful Passion flowers. 
We got home about 8:30, another full day.
This is one of the building entrances that face the central courtyard. Les Invalides houses huge military museums with thousands of artifacts in its collection. We visited inside on a previous trip. It took a whole day to visit the numerous museums dedicated to all things military from ancient to modern times. Today Bob wanders outside, in the gardens and the courtyards.
Finally I headed home where Bob had supper waiting. Quite a lovely day.
The train station with all the tracks and overhead electric lines that power the trains.
There are also many sculptures in this church that retain their original polychrome finish. We are so used to seeing bare stone sculptures that it is easy to forget that many if not most sculptures were originally painted in realistic colours. These are some of the most beautiful that we have seen on this trip.
We have seen several tree sculptures in different towns by this artist, whose name I have forgotten! I quite liked them all.
We have a rather quick look a the rest of the museum and then we are told that they need to close up so we go outside to find the ruins of the Abbey. On the way we walk by a lovely medieval herb garden.
The basement of the grainery was used for storage.
but when I hold my camera up to a broken panel in one of the doors along the cloister walkway this is what is inside! Not what I was expecting. I thought these doors would open into rooms but at least some of them seem to be storage rooms…for what looks like junk.
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