On the Road is a weekday feature spotlighting reader photo submissions.
From the exotic to the familiar, whether you’re traveling or in your own backyard, we would love to see the world through your eyes.
Good Morning All,
Attentive readers may have noticed that my name is no longer “Alain the site fixer”. This is because for the next while, I won’t be; while the rebuild and associated changes are made, I’m not doing squat. Once the dust settles, we’ll see what’s what. So it made sense for me to remove that part of my nym. I’m still here and if things come up, I’ll jump in to help, of course, but for now it makes sense to remove this extra cook from the kitchen.
After the tragedy yesterday which still has so many of us reeling, we’ve got some pictures from Notre Dame. I’m so thankful for this community at times like this. I cannot believe that I’ll not visit this magnificent cathedral again and I feel like something has been ripped from deep inside me. I think my first visit was age 7. These pictures are such a salve – thank you!
Today, pictures from valued commenter JR in WV.
Thank you so much JR in WV, do send us more when you can.
Travel safely everybody, and do share some stories in the comments, even if you’re joining the conversation late. Many folks confide that they go back and read old threads, one reason these are available on the Quick Links menu.
One again, to submit pictures: Use the Form or Send an Email
OzarkHillbilly
As long as there is a Balloon Juice, a jackal will rise to the occasion.
JPL
Thank you for the pictures.
Spanky
@OzarkHillbilly: Amen.
Amir Khalid
This is a bit embarrassing to admit: these images are familiar to me only because I saw the Disney cartoon.
Elizabelle
It’s strange to think the restoration may not be completed in our lifetimes. But it will be rebuilt, and stand proud for many centuries forward. Writing this on a train in Germany, the land of bombed out and beautifully reconstructed cathedrals and city centers.
It’s actually more astonishing there has not been a catastrophe prior to this. And some jackal really made me think, with the comment that the French might have surrendered (some think prematurely) in order to save their architectural treasures.
It is a splendid cathedral. It can live again. For me, the Bataclan was the uglier tragedy.
Thank you, JR, for the wonderful photos.
And thanks always to “just” Alain, for all that you do and have done.
JPL
President Obama tweeted this yesterday
Notre Dame is one of the world’s great treasures, and we’re thinking of the people of France in your time of grief. It’s in our nature to mourn when we see history lost – but it’s also in our nature to rebuild for tomorrow, as strong as we can.
I was touched by this comment.
You came to visit the cathedral that time and the Notre Dame choir sang for you and your family during your visit. I was part of that choir and I still cherish that moment. Tonight more than ever. Thank you.
debbie
What a tragedy.
Eric NNY
@Elizabelle: We are but a blip.
Another Scott
Thank you for the pictures, JR and Alain. I have not been to Paris (yet). It is indeed shocking and unfortunate. I recall seeing a story just a few weeks ago about all the expensive restoration work that needed to be done because the exterior was crumbling…
I’m sure that the worker(s) who started the fire, and who were unable to put it out quickly, are devastated. :-( Thankfully, as far as I know, nobody was injured.
Hang in there, everyone.
Cheers,
Scott.
JPL
@Another Scott: Maybe they didn’t know. A spark could have started it and it might not have spread until they left. At least I hope that’s what happened.
Salty Sam
I am avowedly non-religious, with a particular ‘side-eye’ towards Catholicism. But when I visited Notre Dame many years ago, I was dumbstruck at the magnificence we can erect to honor our gods. As a practicing blacksmith, I stood at the entry doors for over an hour, marveling at the massive, yet delicate, ironwork on them. (Can be seen in pic #2 if you zoom in). I wondered how many, and for how long, it took just to produce that incredible craftsmanship. Then I stepped back and took in the whole of it, and cannot describe the feeling that came over me. The word awe does not do justice.
Thanks for the pics JR.
Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes
When I went several years ago, they had just started the Bright Monday Noon Mass. I stayed for a bit – it was neat.
They still had some printed Easter bulletins laying about. I picked one up and read it in my bad French. What struck me was I was looking at garden variety announcements – ladies’ club meeting, clothing drive, a building committee meeting, etc. There was a gravity to sitting in an 8 century old continuous worship space.
White & Gold Purgatorian
Thanks for these photographs. Such beauty and such a wealth of human workmanship to create it.
For any who can bear to look, Reuters photographer Phillipe Wojazer has incredible post fire photos of the interior. Here is a twitter link. Much is recognizable, some looks minimally damaged, but stone is funny and extent of damage won’t be known for some time. Hope springs.
OzarkHillbilly
@Another Scott: @JPL: Was working on one of the 100+ yr old mansions in Lafayette Park when a plumber sweating copper caught one of those ancient 2x4s on fire. Could. not. put. it. out. Nothing he tried worked. Finally, as the smoke from the 2×4 was getting thicker and thicker, he decides to call the fire dept but before he hits the last 1 of 9-1-1, a fellow carpenter walked over and kicked the 2×4 out of the wall and threw it out a window.
Duh.
So I’m going with JPL’s theory or some variation there of..
Gin & Tonic
I have visited many of the great cathedrals of Europe and stood in awe at the devotion it took to erect and maintain them, but I have to admit on my last such visit, to Andalusia, I was, in the end, revolted. All that treasure, at the price of how many dead Aztecs? Great artistic accomplishments built by destroying an ancient civilization are, perhaps, not so great. Or. for example, Cordoba, with its magnificent mosque (built by destroying a church) that was converted to a cathedral after the Reconquista and where Muslims cannot, to this day, worship, on orders of the Catholic Church. The millennia of death and destruction used to worship a God who, from what I understand, would be appalled at that are hard to ignore.
HeartlandLiberal
We got to visit Notre Dame and Paris in early 70’s, while we were living in Germany, we took a several week driving tour around Europe. Paris was an incredibly impressive city, and Notre Dame was the heart of the city. A great loss to culture and history. I read in the news that the timbers that burned were from over 12,000 trees cut down in the 13th century, to build the wooden frame for the roof. Think of of that: 12,000 trees. An entire forest.
raven
@Gin & Tonic: He came dancin across the water mon. . .
Spanky
AP reports the fire is completely out and they’re assessing the structure. The 8000-pipe organ is reportedly intact.
Cheryl from Maryland
Thanks for the pictures and the timeliness of this entry. WaPo has a good introduction on Eugéne Viollet-le-Duc, the Gothic Revivalist who in 1844 was responsible for the spire of Notre Dame, the statues around the spire, and much of the interior (it had no spire before Viollet-le-Duc). CF: https://www.washingtonpost.com/nation/2019/04/16/story-behind-towering-notre-dame-spire-year-old-architect-commissioned-build-it/?utm_term=.0dcb64bb79f0. Viollet-le-Duc (or Violet the Duck as we called him in graduate school) was an interesting fellow — a great friend to Victor Hugo and part of a 19th C European group of architects who felt medieval Gothic architecture (suitably improved) embodied the spirit of their country. Viollet-le-Duc’s counterparts in the UK were Augustus Northmore Welby Pugin sorta working with the Classicist Charles Barry on the Houses of Parliament. I say suitably improved as Viollet-le-Duc and Pugin had the typical Victorian character flaw that as modern men they were superior — epitomizing the Victorian pull between a love of 19th C technology with an understanding that the Industrial Revolution had societal issues. However, their solution to the societal issues was a dangerous nostalgia towards the Middle Ages, seeing it as a healthier purer society (of course, this was mostly for the lower classes who “needed to know their place”). As the Gothic Revival spread throughout Europe, it showed it’s ugly side — pro-monarch in France, pro-conservative in the UK, pro-traditional period as a symbol of pro-colonialism throughout (cf Leopold II, Victoria & Albert – especially in India).
ola azul
@Spanky:
When I’s a whelp round 20, got my USCG license n usedta work running a boat taxi service in Lake of the Woods, Minnesoooota. Lotta folk of Scandinavian heritage in them parts, n a-course Ole n Lina jokes is legion. Wish could remember the body of the joke, but yer post put me to mind a the punchline:
“Well, we *all* want a bigger organ, Lina!”
arrieve
Thanks for the pictures — strangely it helps to see that beauty again this morning. I’ve been to Notre Dame many times — it is (I can’t bring myself to say “was”) one of my favorite places in the world, and I’ve been lucky enough to see a lot of the world. The atmosphere of certain places that have long been regarded as holy can affect even the most secular among us, and I’m as former a Catholic as you can possibly be. It makes me want to try to bring a little beauty into the world today to try to make up for what we’ve lost.
OzarkHillbilly
@Cheryl from Maryland:
The more things change…
TaMara (HFG)
I was in awe standing under its beautiful stained glass windows. Thanks for the photos. History is imperfect, but it is important to preserve it.
J R in WV
@Gin & Tonic:
I totally agree about the death and destruction involved in Catholicism and many other ostensibly “Christian” church organizations. The Spanish cathedrals in particular were full of gold and silver torn from South America by enslaved Native American miners. And before our trip I read about the “crusade” against the French Cathars, where the armies of the Church forced whole city populations into their cathedrals, nailed the doors shut and set them on fire dooming whole populations to a “wholly appropriate” firey death, to the point where we don’t even fully understand the Cathar faith today.
Still, as I edited these photos a little bit, making them small enough to email, mostly, I was teary eyed, as Notre Dame in particular, was rarely the scene of all that much horror, nor filled with stolen Spanish gold. We spent one afternoon there, instead of the Louvre, which on the one day we spent in Paris was routinely closed. All these photos were taken with a Samsung tablet, so I was pleased with how they came out under those circumstances. Picture # 9 in particular came out well, there are sparkles of variously colored light on the painting from the stained glass window beside it.
I haven’t seen any mention of it on the news, but there is an underground archaeological dig of Roman ruins, that was discovered when construction was undertaken just outside Notre Dame. It’s dark down there, but they have lit the ruins well and have excellent discussions in multilpe languages. I think it’s underground where they had planned to build a parking deck. I have pics of that too.
Luthe
@HeartlandLiberal: When beams in the roof were last replaced 160+ years ago, they planted new trees because they knew the beams would eventually need to be replaced again. Those trees are ready to be harvested.
@J R in WV: That’s the Archeological Crypt. It’s right under the square in front of Notre Dame. It’s amazing to see the ruins and know how long ago those buildings existed and formed the basis of the city we know today. Barcelona also has some excellent ruins preserved in situ under its city museum; they have transparent catwalks that take you over the remains of warehouses and shops.
Ohio Mom
I never expect to make it to Paris, or elsewhere in Europe or overseas, a circumstance I have made my peace with (I’ve been a few other places previously, notably Turkey, Israel and London; I’m holding out hope for Mexico and Central America, and more traveling within the Lower 48).
Still, I find myself feeling cheated that I will now never see Notre Dame in all its glory.
retr2327
@Ohio Mom: Perhaps not in all its glory for some time, but much more has survived than one would have thought. Interior photos show much of the interior has survived, including at least one of the magnificent round stained glass windows. Apparently the burning roof was over an interior stone ceiling, which protected much (but not all) of the interior. And the facade and front towers are in good shape. There may be people viewing the interior w/in several years, even if the wooden (maybe no longer as such) roof and steeple take much longer.
Mart
@OzarkHillbilly: OSHA requires a fire watch with extinguisher or hose while hot work (welding, cutting, brazing, soldering) is taking place, and a 1/2 your fire watch after the work is done. As a result of loss history, NFPA and many insurance companies are increasing the after work watch time to up to 4 hours. Hot embers can be SOB’s.
Origuy
I hope that they will be able to display the artwork in another location while the restoration is going on. Especially the sculptures that had been removed from the roof. That would be a rare opportunity to see them up close. I’ve never been to Paris; I hope I’ll be able to see that at least.
I was in York Minster a few years ago. It had a serious fire in 1984, caused by lightning. It was nowhere near as bad as Notre Dame and was completed in 1988. When I was at York, the Great East Window had been removed for restoration and a full-size print was in its place. That took ten years.
Luthe
@Origuy: Right now the rescued works and relics are at the Louvre. Who knows, they may put them on display there.
(Though if they put them on display with the medieval art in the Richelieu wing I will tear my hair out; the medieval art area tends to be relatively free of tour groups and therefore a sanctuary from the madness of other parts of the museum)
Mnemosyne
@White & Gold Purgatorian:
There should be conservation things they can do for the stone, but they probably can’t guarantee that the stone will be able to remain in its current form or location. I would not be surprised if some of the damaged originals are removed to storage in a climate-controlled vault and replaced with modern cement reproductions that will be almost indistinguishable to visitors.
With any historical object or place there’s always a balance that has to be struck between preservation and access. I’m pretty sure that the conservators and restorers will be making their decisions by weighing both necessities.
Origuy
@Luthe: That’s probably the best place for the moment; the Louvre will have some of the best conservators in the world to handle them. I agree with you that they probably shouldn’t display them there; from what I’ve heard, the crowds there can be overwhelming.