Septième Jour

Today, we first went to the war memorial of Caen, a museum dedicated to preserving the memory of the second world war, so that its atrocities are never repeated. In a very moving way, the students learned about it from the butchery of WWI, the ill-digested peace of 1918, the rise of fachism, and all the way to the Nuremberg trial.
Bracelet making was a common way to pass time on the bus. Today, Caroline taught Ms. Limpert and a few of the other girls how to make a special knot. Haley provided the thread, so it was a real team effort.
We then visited the other big Normand city, Rouen, where we had some lunch on our own. We walked through its Gothic cathedral, walked its 15th century streets, and saw the place where Joan of Arc (Jeanne d'Arc) was burned at the stake. We also visited a museum dedicated to her story.




After this we drove to Paris, and put our luggage in the hotel.

We shopped in the Montparnasse district, and walked to our restaurant.



We then took the metro to see the Arc de Triomphe, and the tomb of the unknown soldier from close up. As we emerged from the tunnel under the place de l'Étoile, to our amazement, we saw the Eiffel Tower sparkle, which it does only for 5 minutes every night. From there, we walked down the Champs Elysées through the crowd, and shopped some more. We walked past the presidential palace, all the way to the Place de la Concorde, where Louis the XVIth and Marie Antoinette were beheaded, and where now stands a monumental Obelisk brought back from Egypt by Napoleon.

From there, we could see the Hotel Crillon, the church Sainte-Madeleine, the Navy Headquarters, the Tuileries Gardens, the Petit Arc du Carousel, in front of the Louvre, the French parliament, the Eiffel Tower, the Arc de Triomphe, and, behind it, in the distance, the Grande Arche de la Défense: we were at the center of Paris, and that is the last picture we saw, before going back to the metro for our last ride of the trip.