Paris: A Night at the Opera

Hotel de Paris is very quiet and comfortable, with obliging staff. After 11 mornings on the boat, it was great to have a shower that you don't have to hold and unlimited hot water. We made the most of that, then headed out for breakfast at the nearby boulanger-patissier - same efficient two-door system that many of these have, good food and coffee. Most people just buy and go, but there are a couple of tables you can sit at and two more you can stand at, so we eat in.

From there we head toward the Metro, but find a market on the way so we walk through it enjoying the smells of fish, charcuterie and admiring the fromageries and the fruit and veg stalls. It's a very long market, after we've seen half we continue on to the Metro and go to Cite (on the Ile de la Cite). From there we meander along the river and through Le Marais until we reach our planned destination, Musee Carnavalet. This museum traces the history of Paris from mesolithic times to present day. It's a fascinating museum in a wonderful old building. After an hour or so we take a break for coffee and cool drinks sitting in the courtyard garden, then continue our journey through the ages.

By about 4pm we've reached the French revolution, but we're running out of energy and of time, so we return via Metro to the hotel for a brief rest and to change into opera-going outfits. Then it's back on to the Metro to go just one station past the one where we started our return journey from the museum. Paris Opera has a new building called Opera Bastille which is a minute's walk from the Bastille Metro. We arrive about forty minutes before the start time of 19:30, and decide to go straight in and eat there. We have to wait a few minutes before they let us in to the area where the bars are, but we have plenty of time to eat a focaccia, drink a glass of champagne and buy a program before it's time to go into the auditorium. We have quite good seats, but they get even better when it becomes apparent that the four seats to our left (closer to the centre) are unoccupied (surprising as the whole hall seems fully booked. We are thinking about moving up when the people next to us urge us to, so the entire row moves four seats left. I finish up on the aisle, so have a great view.

It's a great performance, especially by the orchestra under conductor Speranza Scappucci. An interesting production, with a bare stage and using very stylised Japanese movement. I'm not sure it will work, but it does, made one concentrate more on the music itself. I cry all the way through the second act. What a bastard Pinkerton is. 

Speranza Scappucci

When all the curtain calls are done, it's back into the Metro and return to the hotel, where we're finishing the cheese and doing some packing, ready for our flight back to Oz tomorrow.