Category Archives: Paris streets

Silent witnesses

Early one morning, Norman and I dropped off our car for servicing at a local garage. We had breakfast at the Goat Café and then took a walk for an hour or so until it was time to retrieve the … Continue reading

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Astérix and the lost streets of Montparnasse

I am a latecomer to the adventures of Astérix, the hero of more than 30 bandes dessinés – comics, or perhaps “comix” à la René Goscinny, the creator of Astérix and all those other “x” characters. There’s Obélix, the pigtailed … Continue reading

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Up Stairs. Down Stairs.

One of our favourite walks starts close to the apartment we often rent that overlooks the Boulevard de Port Royal. It begins when you go through a hole in the sidewalk and down a set of stairs. Just west of … Continue reading

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Napoleon slept here

I don’t remember where I bought the postcard, although the price on the back shows that I lashed out a whopping 5 euros on it. It shows an undistinguished shopfront covered in advertising. It must have been the caption that … Continue reading

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Edward Hopper in Paris

Norman and I were browsing in a second-hand bookshop recently, when I came across a book about the American artist Edward Hopper that included this illustration: The caption read, “Stairway at 48, rue de Lille, Paris, 1906.” I shouldn’t have … Continue reading

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Paris Camino, part two

Here we are at the intersection of the rue St-Jacques and the boulevard Port-Royal (aka Carrefour de la Mort – our name for it; you won’t see it on the walls!), heading south. Once you have crossed the tricky intersection, … Continue reading

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Paris Camino

Paris is a city for walking – for tourists, for flâneurs, and also for pilgrims. For some, it is the conclusion of a pilgrimage. On the rue du Bac, you will see pilgrims from many countries entering the courtyard of … Continue reading

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Passage St-Pierre

We found this 1913 etching of the Passage St-Pierre by Caroline Armington in the Earls Court Gallery in Hamilton, Ontario, on St. Patrick’s Day in March. If you look up “Passage St-Pierre” in the index of a modern map of … Continue reading

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The writing on the wall, part two

After posting the last blog, I had a nagging feeling that there was a question I had not answered and a connection I had not made. I found the question by looking at the images again. It was that date: … Continue reading

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The writing on the wall

I once bought a book called How to Read Paris, which was really just a book about the city’s architecture. If I were to write a book with that title, I would talk about the words on the city’s walls. … Continue reading

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