Everywhere you look, there is beauty. Majestic buildings line the Seine River. The Eiffel Tower stands straight and tall, looking down on landscaped and fountained gardens. Gold statues here, white marble ones there and gargoyles mixed in for fun. Domes of gold or greened copper or black and gold top buildings with coffered roofs and round columns. Miles of straight lined buildings with wrought iron decorations reach in every direction, broken only by fountains or column ornamentations in flower planted circular gardens and round abouts. Stately churches are strategically located with highly ornamented steeples, yet the twin towers of Notre Dame Cathedral call attention to its elegant setting on an island in the Seine. In my opinion, the walk from the Arche de Triomphe down the Champs Elysees with its tree lined paths to the Place de la Concorde and its Egyptian obelisk through the Toulouse Gardens lined with fountains, pools and statuary to the Louvres with its stately square is the most beautiful walk devised by humans. It is a completely straight line from the middle of the Arche to the obelisk to the center of the square. It is not a short walk, mind you, but every last step brings new beauty to behold. An amazing day in Paris the beautiful on Easter Sunday.

The Easter mass at Notre Dame was beautiful. Kathy and I stood in a very long queue as tens of thousands crowded around the cathedral for Easter. Stadium seating had been erected on the cathedral square with giant television screens to view the successive services being held. I wanted inside, since it was the last mass! So we stood in the line and it started to move forward. Just as we neared the barriers before the entry, the guards said something in French and began to close the gates. I put my hand on Kathy’s back and gave her a firm push past the guard and gate and looked at him with a “What can I do? look; she is a woman” and he let me past also. So literally, I was the last person allowed to attend Notre Dame for its 850th anniversary Easter Mass. A Lutheran to boot. WEG