Today was all about seeing the cathedral in Chartres. We managed to see some of the other churches in town, too. They definitely don't get as much "love" as the cathedral.
The town is very picturesque and charming. Definitely worth a visit. Since our innkeeper found me a free parking space, I'm thinking that it's going to work out well for day tripping to Versailles and Giverney, too. But today, is all about Chartres.
We started this morning taking a roundabout walk to the cathedral, retracing some of Laura's early morning run. Along the way, we stopped to look at the archaeology dig going on at the Porte Guillaume -- one of the original city gates destroyed by the retreating German Army in August 1944.
Chartres seems to be a city in love with its history. All over the town we encountered preservation, restoration and excavation work.
We visited Collégiale Saint-André, which was restored 10 years ago. It is used to house exhibits and when we were there, it was showing works of Christian Vallee (Kriki). They looked quite striking the the stark, stone space
After that, it was time to push on to the cathedral. We were in luck. There was one English language tour being given today and it was by none other than Malcolm Miller, one of the foremost experts on the cathedral. He's been given tours of the cathedral since 1958... over 54 years! His tours have been written about in countless guidebooks. In fact, we learned that none other than Rick Steves was coming to Chartres tomorrow to meet with Mr. Miller and they were going to film on Saturday. Sadly, we'll miss all that because we already have plans for tomorrow and Saturday, but it was interesting to hear.
Naturally, we joined Malcolm Miller's tour today and it was really good. Mr. Miller must be approaching 80, but he is still spry and quick witted and is able to recall many, many facts. We were able to appreciate the windows he explained much better. We learned that the windows tell a story if you read them from left to right, bottom to top.
After the tour we grabbed a quick bite to eat. My bad junior high school French is still surprisingly useful and getting a little better the longer we stay in France. I'm shocked. After lunch, we climbed the cathedral's north tower. It goes very high and from the top, you can see all around the countryside since the hill the cathedral is on is the highest point around.
Next up, the crypts. The girls were freaked out about seeing the crypts and Charlie didn't care. So, we left the kids inside the cathedral on their own for the 30 minutes it took to go on the crypt tour. That tour is interesting. It is only in French, but they give you a leaflet and you can tag along. Couldn't really understand anything the guide had to say, but the crypts were interesting nonetheless. At one point, they'd exposed part of the 6th century Gallic-Roman wall that formed one of the early churches at the site. There was some seriously old stuff down there.
After that, we headed back to our inn for some downtime. Along the way, we ducked into the Église Saint-Aignan and Église Saint-Pierre. They were both in sad shape and provided quite a contrast to the state of preservation/restoration of the cathedral they share a city with. Still beautiful inside and still inspirational. Both were in the midst of some restoration projects. It's encouraging to see the work to preserve and restore these things.
We ended up at the same place for dinner that we ate last night and the ordering went much smoother because we already knew what was on the menu. The kids and I played a rousing game of "Telephone" but they got mad at me because I kept intentionally embellishing and getting the message "wrong".
My girls, making friends with cats the world over.
Tomorrow is all about Versailles.
