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I saw this thread and was going to piggy-back my question onto it, but decided to start a new thread rather than sidetrack the discussion.
https://www.physicsforums.com/threads/when-in-paris-or-amsterdam.970795/
I too am going to be in Paris later this summer. My "problem" is that I will have a few days to kill before my wife arrives. I'm finishing a conference early on a Friday morning and meeting my wife at Charles de Gaulle on Monday morning. I've been racking my brains trying to figure out what to do. I'm looking for things which would be interesting, perhaps with a science focus, hopefully uniquely Parisian, and probably wouldn't be as fun for her.
I will probably do at least one straight tourist thing, climb the Tour Eiffel. She is not much into heights or those kinds of tourist activities, so that's an easy one. But what else?
One thing I was pondering was the National Archives. I have been interested from time to time in the papers of two 19th-century scientists, Urbain le Verrier (who calculated the position of Neptune, which was found right away, and then Vulcan, which alas didn't exist) and Coulomb. I wondered if there would be an opportunity in some collection to see papers which are not available elsewhere. But in fact in both cases I have PDFs of the papers, and I think the entire collections are available online. But is there some unique scholarly activity I could take advantage of in Paris?
I'll add that while I'm not fluent in spoken French, I get along OK and I read scientific French pretty easily.
Perhaps any odd little science museums? Although she loves science museums and planetariums, she does not enjoy "bizarre science" such as the Mutter Medical Museum here in Philadelphia.
I thought I might try to get around a little to places we haven't seen on a couple of previous trips, away from the center of the city. I love walking and bicycling and she does not, so those kinds of activities would be good choices as well.
https://www.physicsforums.com/threads/when-in-paris-or-amsterdam.970795/
I too am going to be in Paris later this summer. My "problem" is that I will have a few days to kill before my wife arrives. I'm finishing a conference early on a Friday morning and meeting my wife at Charles de Gaulle on Monday morning. I've been racking my brains trying to figure out what to do. I'm looking for things which would be interesting, perhaps with a science focus, hopefully uniquely Parisian, and probably wouldn't be as fun for her.
I will probably do at least one straight tourist thing, climb the Tour Eiffel. She is not much into heights or those kinds of tourist activities, so that's an easy one. But what else?
One thing I was pondering was the National Archives. I have been interested from time to time in the papers of two 19th-century scientists, Urbain le Verrier (who calculated the position of Neptune, which was found right away, and then Vulcan, which alas didn't exist) and Coulomb. I wondered if there would be an opportunity in some collection to see papers which are not available elsewhere. But in fact in both cases I have PDFs of the papers, and I think the entire collections are available online. But is there some unique scholarly activity I could take advantage of in Paris?
I'll add that while I'm not fluent in spoken French, I get along OK and I read scientific French pretty easily.
Perhaps any odd little science museums? Although she loves science museums and planetariums, she does not enjoy "bizarre science" such as the Mutter Medical Museum here in Philadelphia.
I thought I might try to get around a little to places we haven't seen on a couple of previous trips, away from the center of the city. I love walking and bicycling and she does not, so those kinds of activities would be good choices as well.