
First thing on our agenda this morning was a thirty minute concert at the most well known and iconic cathedral in France,
Notre Dame de Paris. Though our schedule didn’t allow for much exploration of the cathedral itself, let alone time to hunt for Quasimodo, the hunchback of Notre Dame, the group marveled at this quintessential example of gothic architecture (it was one of the first structures to utilize flying buttresses) and could scarcely comprehend that we were were about to give a concert here.

Our last concert was a difficult one, given the echo within the church and the lag time between created by the placement of the choir and the distance to the organ, but we overcame these challenges and left the cathedral knowing that our mission as CCVA had been accomplished. We gave wonderful concerts and touched lives with our music.

After changing back at the hotel, we traveled by bus to the
Museé D’Orsay, the Impressionist art museum. The itinerary for the day couldn’t have been better. We woould be seeing Monet’s paintings of the very gardens we had visited the previous day. Once used as a train station, the museum is a beautiful experience, in and of itself.
Impressionist art is a "trip" for the brain. Up close, it is difficult to distinguish anything at all of such paintings. Lines and dots of color all blur together. But as one steps away from the painting, the dots and lines merge into more than themselves to create something extraordinary: a glimpse of a moment in time. There is just as much attention to detail in an Impressionist painting as in Realism, if not more so, and the emotion in Impressionist painting is just as clear. We had a wonderful afternoon taking it all in.


After freshening up and changing, we embarked on our last evening in Paris. We began with dinner on the Eiffel Tower: truly an amazing experience. We crammed into the elevators that took us to the first floor and had a wonderful meal together as a group, already beginning to discuss our fondest memories of the past two weeks. What a fantastic trip and what a great dinner with which to end it.

We took some time to gaze over the city of Paris before heading back down and taking a boat cruise of the Seine River. We passed many of the sights we had seen over the past three days in Paris, and remarked at how different and beautiful they looked lit up in the night. As we pulled back in to depart, we were treated to the beautiful sight of the Eiffel Tower sparkling in the night sky (it sparkles every hour on the hour once it gets dark).


We returned to our hotel energized by the great night we had shared together, yet a little saddened, knowing that we were all heading back to our rooms to pack for our flight the next morning. To say that these past two weeks were special would be an understatement. Yes, it had been the same trip I took with CCVA five years ago, but it had been an entirely different, unique experience: another never to be forgotten.