Guillotine Archives - Page 8 of 11

YOU WOULDN’T. If you did or are thinking of doing so, we need to talk.

My series of books are walking tours and are centered on historical events or periods of time in Paris. A first time visitor to Paris would not buy the books. It is really the visitor who has fallen in love with Paris and returns multiple times to the city. They have done everything. You know, there are only so many times you want to go see the Eiffel Tower.

The reader of my books will be someone who is interested in history, buildings and places that were significant to that history, and would like to stand in the spots where these exciting events occurred.

Everyone goes to Paris for different reasons. Most go to cross off this city on the old travel bucket list. They go for one-week or a couple of days. That’s okay if all you’re after are the tourist sites. However, some of us like to dig a little deeper.

How do you like to travel? What turns you on when you travel abroad? What is the most pleasurable way for you to see what you want to see? How do you prepare for a trip overseas? These are just some of the many questions that first-time travelers and even the veteran travelers must ask themselves.

Sandy and I like to experience a city with our feet. We walk a lot. Our first time in Paris together was for one week. We walked and walked and walked. I can tell you that after one week, there wasn’t much we hadn’t done or seen (including a trip to Caen to visit the Normandy beaches). Several years later, we rented a house in Honfleur (Normandy) and spent two weeks there with our family. It included an overnight trip into Paris to give the kids a flavor of the city. Preparing the Paris itinerary for our children, I came to the conclusion that we had only scratched the surface on our prior trip to Paris.

We like to travel with a historical slant or theme to it. I am the type of traveler that likes to see ORIGINAL stuff. I get goose bumps knowing that I’m walking on the same wood floor that Shakespeare walked on as a twelve-year-old boy. I like to know that the building I’m standing in or next to was the original building. Some guides don’t like to take you to “places” where buildings once stood (they don’t think the current laundry mat is interesting). They think it’s a waste of time. I don’t. I’d rather see that than a replica of a log cabin (but show me where it originally stood – now that’s cool).

So to answer the original question, my book will be a supplement to your Paris trip. It will appeal to travelers like me. You can pick and choose the walk(s) based on your interests. And you can do it after you’ve had your fill of the Eiffel Tower.

Do we have a lot of stories? Of course we do. I’m looking forward to sharing these with you. Please continue to visit our blog and perhaps subscribe so that you don’t miss out on the most recent blog posts.

Thanks so much for following my blog and my little journey through this incredibly interesting process of writing a series of niche historical travel books and then getting the bloody things published.

Please note that I do not and will not take compensation from individuals or companies I mention or promote in my blog.

– Stew

Please note that I do not and will not take compensation from individuals or companies I mention or promote in my blog.

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The point of our coming back to Paris is to do research for my new series of books. The books are walking tours of Paris based on specific historical periods, events, or themes. The real reason to come back to Paris is to drink espresso in the little cups while sitting for hours outside at a bistro watching complete strangers go by (trust me, they’re trying to stare you down as well). By the time you’re ready to take that second sip, the coffee is cold. But since you’ve paid the premium price to sit outside, you take your time and don’t let on that the coffee is cold. I guess it really doesn’t matter since there are only two sips in the cup to begin with.

I don’t think they would ever allow the coffee to get cold at the Café Le Procope. Voltaire would sit there for hours drinking his daily 100 cups of coffee (if served in normal espresso cups, then it’s really only equal to three Starbuck’s Venti cups) while writing or holding audience with anyone who would listen to him.

Café Le Procope; this is where Voltaire drank his daily 100 cups of coffee. Photo by Dan Owen.

Nearby would sit the revolutionaries such as Danton, Desmoulins, Robespierre, and those other wonderful chaps who would ultimately die on the scaffold. Revolutions have a tendency to eat their own and the French Revolution was a great example.

Other visitors included the Americans: Benjamin Franklin, Thomas Paine, and Thomas Jefferson. When Benjamin Franklin died shortly after returning to the United States from France, the Café Le Procope was draped in black.

The Café Le Procope was founded in 1686 and several years later, moved to the location it still occupies in the Cour de Commerce. It was a time when Paris had just “discovered” coffee and it was the rage to sit around drinking it while arguing over some inane points such as feudalism commonly known in France as the “Ancien Regime.”

Back then, Paris was made up of small passageways or “Cours” and while some have survived Haussmann’s destruction, the Cour de Commerce is certainly one of the most interesting passageways if not the most historic. It was here that Jean Paul Marat printed his daily newsletters that incited the citizens to rebel (regardless of whether the news was truthful or not). Dr. Guillotine and Tobias Schmidt developed and tested the guillotine in the basement of a building on this small street (when the sheep’s blood ran too high down the center of the street, they were asked to leave). Danton and Desmoulins lived here on the Cour de Commerce. Marat’s house was just steps away from the original entrance to the passageway.

If you were standing on that small street in 1200, you’d be standing in the moat surrounding the city wall of Philippe-Augustus. On one side of the street you would be outside the city and on the other side, you would be in the city. Looking through the front glass of a restaurant in the passageway, you can see one of the surviving towers from the wall.

This plaque details some of the many fascinating events that took place here. Photo by Dan Owen.

When we invited Dan to join us (our nephew and a professional photographer), I told him that he would be learning a bunch of really useless information. I’m happy to say that I’ve upheld my end of the bargain.

Do we have a lot of stories? Of course we do. I’m looking forward to sharing these with you. Please continue to visit our blog.

Thanks so much for following my blog and my little journey through this incredibly interesting process of writing a book and then getting the bloody thing published.

-Stew

Please note that I do not and will not take compensation from individuals or companies I mention or promote in my blog.