A few blocks away is the Musee Marmottan Monet. This is a museum I had never heard of, but I decided to explore. It turns out Marmottan was a rich guy that died in the 1930's and bequeathed his town home to the French Academy of Fine Arts along with his collection of First Empire paintings and furniture as a museum.
Fortunately, the French Academy of Fine Arts has decided to add things to the museum, and they have relegated Marmottan's collections largely to the upstairs. I am sure it would be a little depressing for Marmottan to have his collection stuck in the attic, but without having done so I doubt anyone would see his collection. Seriously, anyone out there a First Empire fan? Anyone?
What now fills the museum's basement and first floor are a number of art collections. Most notably Monet's second son Michel donated his father's collection of paintings to the museum. They included representative works over Monet's entire career. A couple of the smaller ones that I liked are shown below; however, there were around 60 paintings by Monet of all sizes, eras and compositions.
Additional collections were donated by the heir of George de Bellio who was a doctor for many of the impressionist. Also two of the grandchildren of Berthe Morisot donated her works and art collection to the museum. Unfortunately most of these works were in a gallery that was being remodeled. I love Berthe Morisot, and luckily they had a few of her works sprinkled throughout the museum.
Following the museum I walked in the Bois de Boulogne for a while.
After the Bois de Boulogne, I ended up at Rolland Garros. Following that I made my way through the city toward the Arc de Triomphe. Along the way I decided to stop at a restaurant for lunch. It wasn't more than 2 minutes before I heard my name. Katie and her coworkers had come to the same restaurant! Following lunch, I made my way to Avenue Foch. I walked along Avenue Foch to the Arc de Triomphe.
The next day I dropped Katie off to work, and made my way to Sacre Coeur. Apparently starting work was more agreeable with her on her second day.
Tuesday morning was a much better time to visit Sacre Coeur. While there were tourists, it wasn't overrun to the point of being oppressive.
I decided to climb up to the dome, up three hundred spiral stone steps. One of the highlights of the top was noted by a couple of Australian tourists. A girl in her twenties had made the ascent in 4 inch high heels.
After Sacre Coeur, I wandered around and found another interesting church. L'eglise Saint Jean l'Evangeliste. The rest I will leave for Katie to fill you in about as those adventures included her.
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