Other sights in France
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Normandy American Cemetery & Memorial
The huge Normandy American Cemetery & Memorial, 17km northwest of Bayeux, is the largest American cemetery in Europe. Featured in the opening scenes of Steven Spielberg’s Saving Private Ryan, it contains the graves of 9387 American soldiers, including 41 pairs of brothers, and a memorial to 1557 others whose remains were never found. White marble crosses and Stars of David stretch off in seemingly endless rows, surrounded by an immaculately tended expanse of lawn. The cemetery is overlooked by a large colonnaded memorial, centred on a statue dedicated to the spirit of American youth.
Opened in 2007, the visitor center, mostly underground so as not to detract from the si…
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Musée Renoir
The city of Cagnes-sur-Mer is nothing to write home about. What is, however, is the exquisite Musée Renoir. Le Domaine des Collettes (as the property was known) was home and studio to an arthritis-crippled Renoir (1841–1919) from 1907 until his death. He lived there with his wife and three children, and the house is wonderfully evocative. Works on display include Les Grandes Baigneuses (The Women Bathers; 1892), a reworking of the 1887 original, and rooms are dotted with photographs and personal possessions. The beautiful olive and citrus groves are as much an attraction as the museum itself. Many visitors set up their own easel to paint.
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Musée du Débarquement
Down in Arromanches and right on the beach, the Musée du Débarquement, redesigned in 2004 for the 60th anniversary of D-Day, makes an informative stop. Dioramas, models and two films explain the logistics and importance of Port Winston. Written material is available in 18 languages.
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La Merveille
The buildings on the northern side of the Mont are known as La Merveille . The famous cloître (cloister) is surrounded by a double row of delicately carved arches resting on granite pillars. The early-13th-century, barrel-roofed réfectoire (dining hall) is illuminated by a wall of recessed windows – remarkable, given that the sheer drop precluded the use of flying buttresses. The Gothic Salle des Hôtes (Guest Hall), dating from 1213, has two enormous fireplaces. Look out for the promenoire (ambulatory), with one of the oldest ribbed vaulted ceilings in Europe, and the Chapelle de Notre Dame sous Terre (Underground Chapel of Our Lady), one of the abbey's oldest rooms,…
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Cathédrale St-Pierre
Beauvais’ unfinished Cathédrale St-Pierre is to church architecture what the Venus de Milo is to sculpture: a fantastically beautiful work with certain key extremities missing – in this case, the nave. When the town’s Carolingian cathedral was partly destroyed by fire in 1225, a series of ambitious local bishops and noblemen decided that its replacement should surpass anything ever built. Unfortunately, their soaring and richly adorned creation surpassed not only its rivals but the limits of the technology of the time, and in 1272 and again in 1284 the 48m-high vaults collapsed. Inside, at the end of the north transept, the oldest chiming clock in the world (1303) soun…
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Pointe du Hoc Ranger Memorial
At 7.10am on 6 June 1944, 225 US Army Rangers commanded by Lt Col James Earl Rudder scaled the 30m cliffs at Pointe du Hoc, where the Germans had a battery of huge artillery guns perfectly placed to rain shells onto the beaches of Utah and Omaha. Unbeknown to Rudder and his team, the guns had already been transferred inland, and they spent the next two days repelling fierce German counterattacks. By the time they were finally relieved on 8 June, 81 of the rangers had been killed and 58 more had been wounded.
Today the site , which France turned over to the US government in 1979, looks much as it did more than half a century ago. The ground is pockmarked with bomb craters, …
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Chantier Médiéval de Guédelon
Chantier Médiéval de Guédelon is 45km southwest of Auxerre and 7km southwest of St-Sauveur-en-Puisaye. A team of skilled artisans, aided by archaeologists, has been hard at work building a fortified castle here since 1997 using only 13th-century techniques. No electricity or power tools here: stone is quarried on site using iron hand tools forged by a team of blacksmiths, who also produce vital items like door hinges. Clay for tiles is fired for three days using locally cut wood and the mortar, made on site with lime, is transported in freshly woven wicker baskets. A very worthwhile guided tour, sometimes in English, costs €2 per person. Wear closed shoes, as the site …
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Librairie les Alizés
At 74 rue du Cardinal Lemoine is the 3rd-floor apartment where Ernest Hemingway (1899–1961) lived with his first wife Hadley from January 1922 until August 1923. The flat figures prominently in his book of memoirs, A Moveable Feast, from which the quotation on the wall plaque (in French) is taken: ‘This is how Paris was in our youth when we were very poor and very happy.’ Just below the flat was the Bal au Printemps, a popular bal musette (dancing club), which served as the model for the one where Jake Barnes met Brett Ashley in Hemingway’s The Sun Also Rises. It is now the bookshop Librairie Les Alizés, specialising in new and secondhand books by American writer…
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Centre des Monuments Nationaux
The aristocratic mansion, Hôtel de Sully, dating from the early 17th century today houses the headquarters of the Centre des Monuments Nationaux, the body responsible for many of France’s historical monuments; there are brochures and lots of information available on sites nationwide. Here you’ll also find the Jeu de Paume – Site Sully, a branch of the more famous Galerie de Jeu de Paume, with excellent rotating photographic exhibits. Visiting both galleries costs €8/4. The Hôtel de Sully bookshop is excellent, and the two Renaissance-style courtyards are worth the trip alone.
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Musée Départemental de l’Oise
The outstanding Musée Départemental de l’Oise is housed in the former bishops’ palace with its distinctive round bastions just west of Cathédrale St-Pierre. It has sections dedicated to archaeology, medieval wood carvings, French and Italian paintings (including a number of gruesome 16th-century works depicting decapitations), ceramics and art nouveau. Highlights include the Dieu Guerrier Gaulois de St-Maur, a slender and aristocratic-looking Celtic warrior made of hammered sheet brass in the 1st century AD; the early-17th-century funerary monument of nobleman Charles de Fresnoy; and a wonderfully complete, late-19th- century art nouveau dining room.
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Art Nouveau synagogue
Though the Marais has become a coveted trendy address in recent years, it remains home to a long-established Jewish community. The historic Jewish quarter – the so-called Pletzl – starts in rue des Rosiers, then continues along rue Ste-Croix de la Bretonnerie to rue du Temple, where expensive boutiques sit side-by-side with Jewish bookshops and stores selling religious goods and cacher (kosher) grocery shops, butchers, restaurants and takeaway falafel joints. Don’t miss the Art Nouveau synagogue designed in 1913 by Hector Guimard, who was also responsible for the city’s famous metro entrances.
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Château de Vaux-le-Vicomte Fountain Displays
Visitors swoon over the beautifully furnished Château de Vaux-le-Vicomte's interior, including its fabulous dome. In the vaulted cellars an exhibition looks at Le Nôtre’s landscaping of the formal gardens, where there are elaborate fountain displays in season. The collection of 18th- and 19th-century carriages in the château stables, included in the château visit, forms the Musée des Équipages (Carriage Museum). At weekends and school holidays, rent prince, princess or musketeer costumes for the kids (aged four to 12) to prance around in. Fun seasonal events include Easter-egg hunts.
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Théâtre-Musée des Capucines
The Perfume Museum, run by the perfumerie Fragonard (but under extensive renovation when we last visited), is a fragrant collection opposite the Palais Garnier, tracing the history of scent and perfume-making from ancient Egypt to today’s designer brands. A short distance to the south is the Théâtre-Musée des Capucines, a kind of branch located in an early 20th-century theatre that concentrates largely on bottling (for example, in crystal flasks from Bohemia) and packaging the heady substance. There’s a decent short film here and, of course, a shop selling Fragonard scents.
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Cité des Enfants
On the ground floor of the Cité des Sciences et de l’Industrie is the brilliant Cité des Enfants, with imaginative, hands-on demonstrations of basic scientific principles in two sections: for 2- to 7-year-olds, and for 5- to 12-year-olds. In the first, kids can explore, among other things, the conduct of water (waterproof ponchos provided), a building site and a maze. The second lets children build toy houses with industrial robots and stage news broadcasts in a TV studio. Visits to both last 1½ hours and are scheduled five times a day (seven on weekends), beginning at 10am. Reserve several days in advance.
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Gardens & Monuments
The Parvis, place de la Défense and Esplanade du Général de Gaulle – a pleasant 1km walkway – is an open-air contemporary art gallery. Calder, Miró, Agam, César and Torricini are among the international artists behind the colourful and often surprising sculptures and murals on Voie des Sculptures (Sculptures Way), the Quartier du Parc (Park District) west of the Grande Arche and Jardins de l’Arche, a 2km-long extension of the Axe Historique. Meandering around this skyscraper district in search of these works of art is fun.
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Centre de la Vieille Charité
Marseille architect and sculptor Pierre Puget (1620–94) was born in the house opposite 10 rue du Petit Puits, and designed the arcaded courtyard of the Centre de la Vieille Charité. Initially built as a charity shelter for the town’s poor, the stunning arched pink-stone courtyard now houses Marseille’s beautiful Musée d’Archéologie Méditerranéenne (Museum of Mediterranean Archeology) and Musée d’Arts Africains, Océaniens & Amérindiens (Museum of African, Oceanic & American Indian Art). The latter contains a striking collection of masks from the Americas, Africa and the Pacific.
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Phare de Verzenay
For the region’s best introduction to the art of growing grapes and the cycles of the seasons, head to the Phare de Verzenay, on a hilltop at the eastern edge of the village. Exactly 101 spiral stairs lead to the top of the lighthouse, constructed as a publicity stunt in 1909, which rewards visitors with unsurpassed 360-degree views of vine, field and forest – and, if you’re lucky, a tiny TGV zipping by in the distance. The Sillery sugar mill, visible on the horizon, turns an astounding 16,000 tonnes of beets (a major regional crop) into 2600 tonnes of sugar each day!
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Palais du Luxembourg
The Palais du Luxembourg, at the northern end of the garden, was built for Marie de Médicis, Henri IV’s consort; it has housed the Sénat (Senate), the upper house of the French parliament, since 1958. There are guided tours of the interior, usually at 10.30am one Saturday a month; advance reservations obligatory.
Top spot for sun-soaking – there are always loads of chairs here – is the southern side of the palace’s 19th-century, 57m-long Orangery (1834) where lemon and orange trees, palms, grenadiers and oleanders shelter from the cold.
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Château de Versailles Gardens & Park
The Hall of Mirrors peeps over part of the Château de Versailles gardens & park, laid out in the formal French style between 1661 and 1700. Famed for their geometrically aligned terraces, flowerbeds, tree-lined paths, ponds and fountains, they are studded with 400 marble, bronze and lead statues sculpted by the most talented sculptors of the period – winter visitors won’t get to see them, as these are covered at this time of year. Meandering, sheltered paths snake through the more pastoral English-style Jardins du Petit Trianon.
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Bibliothèque Forney
On the left, at 1 rue du Figuier is Hôtel de Sens, the oldest private mansion in the Marais. Begun around 1475, it was built as the Paris digs for the powerful archbishops of Sens, under whose authority Paris fell at the time. When Paris was made an archbishopric, the Hôtel de Sens was rented out to coach drivers, fruit sellers, a hatter, a glassblower and even a jam-maker. It was heavily restored in mock Gothic style in 1911; today it houses the Bibliothèque Forney. Temporary exhibitions here will allow you to explore at least part of the building.
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Abbaye de Pontigny
Abbaye de Pontigny, founded in 1114, rises from the lush mustard fields 25km north of Auxerre. The spectacular abbatiale (abbey church) is one of the last surviving examples of Cistercian architecture in Burgundy. The simplicity and purity of its white-stone construction reflect the austerity of the Cistercian order. On summer days sunshine filtering through the high windows creates an amazing sense of peace and tranquillity. Discovering Pontigny (€2.50), on sale in the gift shop, points out fascinating architectural details.
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Tours de Notre Dame
The entrance to the Tours de Notre Dame, which can be climbed, is from the North Tower, to the right and around the corner as you walk out of the Cathédrale de Notre Dame de Paris’s main doorway. The 422 spiralling steps bring you to the top of the west facade, where you’ll find yourself face to face with many of the cathedral’s most frightening gargoyles, the 13-tonne bell Emmanuel (all the cathedral’s bells are named) in the South Tower, and an absolutely spectacular view over the city.
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Musée Jean Moulin
Next to the Jardin de l’Atlantique the small Musée Jean Moulin is devoted to the WWII German occupation of Paris, with its focus on the Resistance and its leader, Jean Moulin (1899–1943). The attached Mémorial du Maréchal Leclerc de Hauteclocque et de la Libération de Paris shows a panoramic film on the eponymous general (1902–47), who led the Free French units during the war and helped to liberate the city in 1944.
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Écomusée d'Alsace
Écomusée d’Alsace is great for keeping little minds active. France’s so-called biggest ‘living museum’ is a fascinating excursion into Alsatian country life and time-honoured crafts. Smiths, cartwrights, potters and coopers do their thing in and among 70 historic Alsatian farmhouses – a veritable village – brought here and meticulously reconstructed for preservation (and so storks can build nests on them). The Écomusée is in Ungersheim, 17km northwest of Mulhouse (off the A35 to Colmar).
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Place Royale du Peyrou
Place Royale du Peyrou is a wide, tree-lined esplanade. At the eastern end lies the Arc de Triomphe (1692) and at the western end lies the Château d'Eau. Leading from this hexagonal water tower is the 18th-century Aqueduc de St-Clément, under which there's an organic food and second-hand books market on Saturday and pétanque (a game not unlike lawn bowls played with heavy metal balls on a sandy pitch; also called boules) most afternoons.
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