La Butte aux Cailles (1)

Yesterday, I talked about water sources, including one at La Butte aux Cailles (the “Quail Hill”), Place Paul-Verlaine. La Butte aux Cailles can be found a few paths from Place d’Italie (13th arrt.). In the surrounding you can find a lot of dull modern apartment buildings from the 60’s and 70’s, but this little area has been well preserved, probably due to difficult ground conditions.

A small river, Bièvre, used to pass by at the bottom of the hill (today the river is underground), limestone mining and dyeing industry seems to have been rather dominant and on the hill you could find a number of wind mills. The area was annexed to Paris in 1860. Important battles took place here during the Paris Commune (1871). It remained a working class area until rather recently, but... there is soon no more "working class" living in Paris - too expensive. This is in my taste a fabulous little area, a small Montmartre – without tourists. (Sorry, I have nothing against kind tourists, but…).

There are a number of things to say about La Butte aux Cailles and I will do it in two or three episodes.

You can reach the “Butte” in different ways, but I chose to climb some stairs just in front of the metro station Corvisart. The birches have got their first leaves. (See top picture.) You reach a small playground. I then headed for the central place, on top of the hill, Place Paul-Verlaine, where we find our spring water and the public swimming bath, built in 1924 (see yesterday's post). This is also the spot which was reached by the first ever human flight, by a “montgolfière”, coming from La Muette (16th arrdt,) some 9-10 km (6 miles) away. (See my post February 08). You can find a small memorial.Opening to the place is also a school, founded in the middle of the 19th century by the Sisters of Saint Vincent de Paul. It was originally thought for the professional education of girls of modest origin. They were taught the ladies' professions of those times; they prepared even dresses for Queen Victoria! Today, it’s just a “normal school”. The place is full of narrow streets, small houses, small private gardens … and of course bars and restaurants. I will come back to all this, but in the meantime, let’s celebrate Easter! (See you Monday – or Tuesday!)

Happy Easter!

Some of these pictures can be found on my photo-blog!

Water

Water supply is of course an issue for a big city.

Paris, within the city limits and not counting the suburbs, is actually not that big in surface and has hardly more than 2 million inhabitants. It becomes really big only when you include the suburbs.

Anyhow the city consumes something like 500 000 m3 (= some130 000 US gallons) of drinking water per day, which if I have calculated correctly corresponds to some 250 litres (around 65 US gallons) per person and day, of course not all swallowed.

In ancient times, water came from a few local sources and fountains and was also partly brought to Paris in aqueducts and partly taken directly from the Seine where a first hydraulic pump was installed during the 17th century (called “La Samaritaine”, which gave the name to the department store which later was built there). Water was carried to people’s homes by water carriers – the last ones disappeared around 1910. In my yesterday’s message I talked about the Bassin de la Villette as a fresh water reservoir where water was brought in via the Canal de l’Ourcq. This did not last long. The water distribution was finally correctly organized during the second half of the 19th century and houses began to get water supply at home.

Today the water comes from different sources up to some 150 km (100 miles) away, but part comes also from upstream the Seine.

You can also get pure spring water in Paris – and for free! Some 600 or 700 meters under the ground you can find some 25 000 years old fresh water from an underground river and you can still get hold of it at three places in Paris, quite distant from each other (see the map). It holds some 25-30 Centigrades (some 80° Fahrenheit) if you drink it immediately, but if you live fairly close you would probably bring some plastic bottles and then take them to your fridge. Many people do. If you are interested in the water quality, it’s checked regularly and you can find an updated report on the spot.One of the sources can be found at the Buttes aux Cailles, Place Paul-Verlaine, 13th arrondissement. It gives enough of water also to feed the local swimming bath. (I will soon come back to this area.) Another one is at Square Lamartine in the bourgeois 16th arrondissement.… and the third one is in the much more popular 18th arrondissement, Square de la Madone, today surrounded by a number of Chinese shops and supermarkets. (We are getting a number of China towns).

Another nice possibility to get rid of your thirst, free of charge, is to drink from one of the numerous Wallace fountains (of which I already made some posts). The water here comes from the normal distribution system, not from the underground river.

Chinese New Year

Last Friday I indicated that the last post on the Jardin du Ranelagh would follow today. Well, it will probably be tomorrow.

Yesterday I watched (together with kids and grandkids) a parade, which took place in the (major) Paris Chinatown (13th arrondissement), celebrating the Chinese new Year. The weather was perfect and the streets where more than crowded. A great success!
It was quite noisy with a lot of explosions!

Afterwards it was time to go shopping for e.g. a delicious Peking (Beijing) roast duck!




I already said it last week, but I repeat:
Xin Nian Kuai Le 新年快乐 and Gong Xi Fa Cai 恭喜发财!!!

I would also like to mention that I received another blogger award! An “E” for Excellence! It was given to me by Jessica. I would definitely recommend that you visit her very nice site! It’s called “artsmarts4kids” and is as the name indicates, basically but far from only, made for a young public; it gives a very good introduction to art and artists! There are so (too) many of you to whom I would like to give the same award, but for the moment I keep it egoistically just for myself!