The most romantic spot in Paris is not the top of the Eiffel Tower or on a Bateaux-Mouches on the river Seine at twilight when all of Paris is lit up or a tiny café over many glasses of perfect French wine with the perfect Paris sky above you, it is in fact in front of the Fontaine Saint-Michel, on the edge of the Quartier Latin overlooking Notre Dame de Paris. But first things first....
I became fascinated by this very statue over 10 years ago, when writing my yearly Tour de French Cuisine project as the riders would go right past it before hitting the Champs Elysees and just the short glance of it had me hooked. The grand statue sits high above the confluence of Pont-St-Michel and Boulevard St-Michel just down from Notre Dame de Paris. It depicts the patron saint of France the archangel Michel slaying the devil along side the statues of Prudence, Power, Justice and Temperance. St Michel can be seen many places in France from the walls of the Musée du Louvre to the gold gilded statue high atop Mont-St-Michel in Normandy.
Although Sacre Ceour and standing together to watch the Eiffel Tower light up or the street corner in l'Odeon at three in the morning under the perfectly clear Paris sky with nobody around and just the two of us as we tried to say goodbye, well that one is pretty amazing as well.