le Vrai Paris

Sometimes the best things about a place, are the things never mentioned in a travel brochure. They don’t make the latest Crave guide, and you won’t find them in Eat.Shop books. None the less, you find them and they color your day far brighter than the tulips in the Tulieries, or the less frequented, Cite de Fleurs.

One fine example is the locks on bridges all throughout Paris. Small bridges over quays of the Seine, large famous bridges like that of Pont Alexander III, or just random padlocks left along some water walkway not much traversed. Jay and I stumbled upon this padlock horde near Notre Dame Cathedral-the most famous love locks bridge-Pont de l'Archevêché-and wondered what started it all. From what I could discover, it was a tradition started in China where you leave a lock on a fence and "throw away the key". All in all, the contemporary juxtaposed against the ancient architecture is such a perfect depiction of Paris. The old mingling with the new. The foreboding with the funky. The traditional with the trendy.

One thing is for certain, Paris will surprise you. Even with all the films, poems, songs, photographs, tour books, guides and postcards; until you come spend time here, until you wander, get lost, find a better bakery than the ones David Lebowitz rants about online, you haven’t seen Paris at all. And you will never know all it’s secrets. You won’t unravel it’s mystique. A lifetime would not suffice to crumble away its fromage façade, because Paris is through and through every bit as wonderful as you want it to be, and so much more than you could ever imagine.