I Love Touring Paris - The Fourteenth Arrondissement

The fourteenth arrondissement is located in southern Paris on the Left Bank of the Seine River. It covers about 2.2 square miles (over five and a half square kilometers) and is home to over one hundred thirty thousand residents and about seventy thousand jobs.

Some people will want to visit its famous Catacombs, Roman limestone quarries converted to burial grounds more than two hundred years ago. In all my years in Paris (actually less than two) I never saw the Catacombs and never felt that I missed them. But hey, that’s just me. The Catacombs were created because improper burials caused lots of disease in the famous Les Halles market district and in fact all over Paris. These quarries, by no means limited to the fourteenth arrondissement definitely reduced disease but did cause many safety problems. During the construction of Paris’s newest subway line an elementary school courtyard collapsed. What luck that no children were present.

You can take an authorized tour of the catacombs or strike out on your own. There’s a word for such people, cataphiles. Among the authors fascinated by the Catacombs are Umberto Eco and Edgar Allan Poe. With all the underground visits it is interesting to note that only a single death has been confirmed in the Catacombs during the last 250 years.

I Love French Wine and Food - A Saumur (Loire Valley) White

If you are looking for fine French wine and food, consider the Loire Valley region of central France. You may find a bargain, and I hope that you’ll have fun on this fact-filled wine education tour in which we review a white Chenin Blanc from Anjou-Saumur in the central part of the region.

Among France’s eleven wine-growing regions the Loire Valley ranks number three when it comes to the acreage devoted to vineyards. The Loire is France’s longest river running for 620 miles (one thousand kilometers) across the center of the country. In many ways the Loire Valley can be considered as a series of regions. Here they are running from west to east: Nantais whose primary grape is the white Muscadet, Anjou-Saumur whose primary grapes are the white Chenin Blanc and the red Cabernet Franc, Touraine whose primary white grapes are Chenin Blanc and Sauvignon Blanc and whose primary red grape is Cabernet Franc, and Central Vineyards whose primary white grape is Sauvignon Blanc and whose primary red grape is Pinot Noir. We will review at least one wine from each of these four areas.

I Love Touring Paris - The Thirteenth Arrondissement

I love touring Paris so much that I am doing a series on both the well known and the rarely visited tourist attractions of Paris's twenty arrondissements (districts). This article visits the thirteenth arrondissement in southeastern Paris. We suggest French wine and food to increase your touring pleasure.

The

thirteenth arrondissement of southeastern Paris is located on the Left Bank of the Seine River. Its land area is relatively large by Parisian standards, measuring more than two and three quarter square miles (over seven square kilometers). This district has a population over one hundred seventy thousand and is home to about ninety thousand jobs. Both population and employment figures are growing, largely due an influx of Asian immigrants.

Les Olympiades is a residential high-rise district built well over thirty years ago on a huge, elevated pedestrian esplanade complete with a shopping mall, the Pagode (Pagoda) at the center. To many people this complex looks like a smaller version of La Défense, Europe’s largest business district, situated just west of Paris. A driverless Métro (subway) feeds the complex, running every four minutes during the extended rush hour. Nearby is the huge Paris Rive Gauche project built on and near old railroad yards. Once again we are talking mostly high-rises. If that’s your bag, be my guest.

I Love French Wine and Food - An Alsace Riesling

If you are looking for fine French wine and food, consider the Alsace region of northeastern France. You may find a bargain, and I hope that you'll have fun on this fact-filled wine education tour in which we review a local white Riesling winetasted with several meals and paired with imported cheeses.

Alsace ranks tenth out of the eleven French winemaking regions in terms of its acreage devoted vineyards. But don’t be mislead by statistics; little Alsace is a major producer of quality French wine. Its wine growing area is barely 60 miles (100 kilometers) long, and at most 2.5 miles (4 kilometers) wide tucked between the Vosges Mountains to the west and the Rhine River and Germany to the east. But this relatively tiny area is famous for its distinctive wines. Their wine bottles are also distinctive; tall and thin with labels that feature the grape variety, not the usual practice in France. Chaptalization (adding sugar to the fermenting grape mixture) is allowed for many wine categories.

About 95% of Alsace wine is white. The major white grape varieties are Gewurztraminer, Muscat, Pinot Gris, and Riesling, reviewed below. Its secondary white grape varieties include Pinot Blanc, Sylvaner, and Muscat. The major red grape variety is Pinot Noir, reviewed in a companion article in this series.

I Love Touring Paris - The Twelfth Arrondissement

The twelfth arrondissement of eastern Paris is located on the Right Bank of the Seine River. It contains one of Paris’s largest parks, the Bois de Vincennes described below. Its land area is about 6.3 square miles (16.3 square kilometers) counting the park. If you exclude the Bois de Vincennes the land area is less than 2.5 square miles (about 6.4 square kilometers). The population is about one hundred thirty seven thousand inhabitants, and the area is home to over one hundred twelve thousand jobs, mostly in the Bercy area near the Seine.

The Place de la Bastille was the site of the infamous Bastille prison, destroyed in the early days of the French Revolution. The square is shared by the fourth, eleventh, and twelfth arrondissements. Nothing of the old prison remains, except the memories. At the center of the square is the Colonne de Juillet (July Column) a 154 foot (fifty meter) column commemorating the 1830 Revolution in which King Charles X was overthrown in favor of his cousin Louis-Phillippe.

The Bastille was built in the late Fourteenth Century to help defend Paris and was converted into a prison, mostly for political prisoners, in the Seventeenth Century. At the time of its destruction the Bastille was composed of eight eighty foot (twenty-four meter) towers and an armory. By that time the cachots (dungeons) had been abandoned and the prison was not considered the worst in the city. When it was stormed on July 14, 1789 the jail contained seven inmates: four counterfeiters, two madmen, and a young aristocrat on the outs with his father. During the storming ninety-eight attackers and one defender died. Others died afterwards, including the governor. During excavation for the Paris Metro the remains of one tower surfaced and are on display in a nearby park. The Bastille square is often used in political demonstrations, and the area is full of night life, in particular to the northeast.