Paris - the City of Light

I think I've seen that statue before. 

Yessir, there's only one with that silhouette -

It's Lady Liberty!

So then, when I turn around, how can I be looking at this?

Well, it turns out that some ex-patriot Americans living in Paris gave this smaller version of the original to the French as a token of gratitude, to be another beacon in the City of Light. 

Paris is lovely all the time, but especially so by nighttime illumination. Here is the dome of the Hotel des Invalides. 

The Musee d'Orsay by night reverts to its former life as a train station. 

The beacon from the Tour Eiffel swings over the Assemblee Nationale...

and then over the Obelisk at the center of Place de la Concorde

Pegasus rears atop the gates leading to the Tuileries. 

L'Arc de Triomphe at the center of the automobile carrousel that is L'Etoile. 

Edison actually attended the exposition that was the Eiffel Tower's debut. 

Eiffel and Edison - what a pair they made!

As Monet demonstrated in his painted studies of the cathedral at Rouen, not all light is the same - not even all daylight is the same. This is Notre Dame de Paris at midday. 

This is the west end of one wing of the Louvre, in the summer afternoon light. 

This is early evening, looking east toward the Petit Arc and I. M. Pei's pyramid. Note how the color of the gravel path is almost exactly the same...

as the color of the evening sky, looking west up the Champs Élysées. These pictures were taken within minutes of each other.

Here are two sculptural depictions of one of the greatest young women who ever lived - Jeanne d'Arc. After saving France by her courageous obedience to visions and voices from heaven, the young Maid of Orleans was convicted of heresy. 

As she faced the ordeal of burning at the stake, the girl we now know as Saint Joan of Arc put life and death into this perspective:  "To sacrifice what you are and to live without belief - that's more terrible than dying - more terrible than dying young."

Alors, Sainte Jeanne - Merci bien pour votre courage, votre travaille et votre vie.  

On the evening of 13 July, the eight Alpha jets of the Patrouille de France roared over the Seine near the Eiffel Tower, practicing their part in the Bastille Day festivities. They arrived as a very loud blur, and they left red, white and blue smoke as a souvenir. 

Thank you, Monsieur Eiffel, for giving this tower to the city of Paris. And thank you, citizens of the city, for deciding to keep it. 

"Allons, enfants de la Patrie, le jour de gloire est arrive!" 

The Tricolore, "by the dawn's early light" of Quatorze Juillet - Bastille Day. 

Vive la France!