At nightfall, John and his party arrived in Paris without incident. Pen | fun | pavilion www. ｂｉｑｕｇｅ。 InfoThis time, they chose to stay at the Ritz, located on the north side of Place Vendôme in the 1st arrondissement of Paris.

The exterior of this famous hotel is a restrained five-storey Baroque court-style building that can be found everywhere on the streets of Paris. The façade of the hotel is also very low-key, about three or four meters wide, and there is no eye-catching signboard at the door. If you don't notice the word "Ritz" on the window awning, you won't know that this is the famous Ritz Hotel, even if you stand in front of it.

The Ritz was founded in 1898 by Caesar Ritz, known as the "Father of the World's Luxury Hotels". Although it may not be very remarkable in appearance, it is known all over the world for its impeccable service, luxurious facilities, exquisite food and beverages, and the highest prices.

Now, the Duke of Windsor (Edward VIII), who does not love beauty in the United Kingdom, has been living with Mrs. Simpson in a luxurious suite in this hotel since he relinquished the British throne.

The Ritz has a total of 106 standard rooms and 56 luxurious suites, with old-fashioned palace service, with more than three dedicated waiters in each suite.

The walls of the rooms are covered with different colors such as light blue, beige and pink, and the paintings on the walls are framed by famous European painters of the 18th century. If you put together the paintings in all the rooms of the Ritz, it is almost the size of a medium-sized art museum.

Staying at the Ritz is like staying in an art museum, which is what makes Adele, who loves painting, the most satisfied. Originally, she was inclined to stay at the Morris Hotel. It is a favorite of many of Europe's top artists like Picasso.

For example, Dalí, the artist she likes, now lives in the Morris Hotel. However, considering that Dalí carried the pet cheetah that often made a mess of the hotel carpet, for the sake of Ella's safety, they finally chose the Ritz Hotel.

John's family opted for a luxurious suite on the top floor of the hotel. Ella loved the carpet in her room, and she began to roll on the carpet before the waitress could put her luggage away. These rugs are of the finest colours from Turkey and thick enough to bury your toes.

The suite has a Napoleonic fireplace, Louis XVI furniture in mahogany and a vase of Indian flowers with fresh roses on the coffee table and dressing table. It is said that there are so many roses used throughout the hotel that it takes three flower shops to supply them.

After a good night's sleep, John and the others began their journey in Paris. They will not leave for Lyon until the 19th after watching the World Cup final, and will have at least five days to visit the art capital.

The first stop on the John family's trip to Paris is naturally the Champs-Élysées, the Grand Arc de Triomphe and the Eiffel Tower. As for Monsieur de Garno, who had lived in Paris for many years, he chose to go alone and go to his old friend to catch up.

The beautiful and dynamic Seine River runs through the city, dividing Paris into the left and right banks. The city has developed two completely different cultural temperaments on both sides of the river, the left bank representing the avant-garde and the rebellious, and the right bank representing tradition and modesty.

Known as the cultural district, the Left Bank is home to a large number of bookstores, cafés, galleries and art shops. So much so that when people think of the "Left Bank", they think they think of poetry, philosophy, culture and art, and everything else that has a petty-bourgeois artistic mood.

The Right Bank, on the other hand, is the economic and political center of Paris. There are major banks, financial groups, insurance companies, stock exchanges, shopping malls represented by "Galeries Lafayette" and "Paris Spring" and the world-famous Paris Opera House. The Champs-Élysées, the Arc de Triomphe, the Louvre, and other symbols of French culture with a classical atmosphere are also gathered on the right bank.

John took a lot of pictures with his $2,600 (almost 300,000 RMB) Leica 15 camera. This expensive top-of-the-line camera was specially prepared by John for this trip to Europe. He planned to use this camera to document pre-war Europe. There are many beautiful European cities that will be in ruins in future wars, and these photographs of John will be very valuable for historical collection.

John's family of three had so much fun during the day that little Ella fell asleep from exhaustion on the way back to the Ritz Hotel. After settling his daughter, John had planned to visit the famous Moulin Rouge in later life. However, seeing Adele's meaningful eyes, he touched his nose embarrassedly and gave up this plan.

Paris is full of nightclubs, erotic bars and street girls. Many Parisians have realized that war may well be inevitable. Most people choose to escape this terrible reality with a drunken nightlife. The whole city is filled with an atmosphere of decadence and madness that says "the end of the world is coming tomorrow".

John is not a person who likes to mess with flowers and grass, and he wants to go to the Moulin Rouge only because he is influenced by the later films, and he is a little curious. Seeing her husband so "obedient", Adele was very satisfied and offered to accompany John to the hotel's small bar for a cocktail as a reward.

At this time, the bar at the Ritz Hotel had not yet been renamed the "Hemingway" bar, but it already had the famous Sinderka cocktail. This cocktail made with rare 1934 brandy claims to be the most expensive cocktail in the world, and was once sold for 400 euros a glass.

On their second day in Paris, John's family did not go sightseeing, they were going to visit John's cousin, Consuelo Vanderbilt. Cousin Consuelo had been living on a small estate outside Paris since she married the French pilot named Jacques Balleson.

John had no impression of this cousin of his. When she married Duke IX of Marlborough of England, John was not yet born. John only met her from the family photo album, and heard from Grandma Susan that this cousin was very fond of John's Bimore Manor before she got married, and would come to stay for a while every summer.

At the end of the 19th century, almost a quarter of the young British aristocracy would choose to marry the heirs of the property of the American "nouveau riche". Because the castles and villas they inherited needed money to be repaired, and their luxurious aristocratic life needed someone to pay for it. The newly wealthy in the United States have taken a fancy to their social status and aristocratic titles, hoping to shake off the hat of "nouveau riche" and enter the upper social circle of Europe.

Consuelo's marriage to her ex-husband, the Duke of Marlborough, was a classic "money" for "status" transaction. The Marlborough family owns the most luxurious private residence outside of the British royal estate, Blenheim Palace (also known as Churchill Estate). But by the time Marlborough IX inherited the title, the family had fallen into a state of dependence on pawning the jewels and works of art in the palace. Consuelo brought a dowry of $2.5 million (equivalent to $63 million today) to the Marlborough family, in return for which she became a noble duchess.

Cousin Consuelo, who was just 18 years old at the time, was very resistant to the marriage, and she had fallen in love with a New York diamond king. But her opinion was brutally suppressed by her mother, Alva, John's third aunt. It is said that on the day of the wedding, cousin Consuelo cried all morning to the point that her eyes were so swollen that she had to wear thick eyeshadow to cover them.

At times, it was really hard for John to understand what his first third aunt, Alvar Belmont, was doing. On the one hand, as a pioneer of the feminist movement in the United States, she was able to step on sewage and burrow into the slums to encourage women workers to fight for their own destiny.

Later, in order to promote women's independence, she also insisted on divorcing Sanbo. Even if the third uncle spent a lot of money for her (the cost was $11 million at the time, almost equivalent to more than $200 million now) to build the "marble" villa, it could not save her resolve.

On the other hand, she was fascinated by the life of the European court aristocracy, and was keen to get close to the princes and nobles, and held all kinds of extravagant social events. even did not hesitate to marry his own daughter far away from the United Kingdom. According to the marriage agreement at the time, Consuelo was not allowed to return to the United States without permission after obtaining the status of duchess.

Cousin Consuelo and the Duke of Marlborough had a very bad love life after their marriage. The Duke of Marlborough redeemed the family's jewels and works of art with that dowry, and resumed his extravagant aristocratic life. Although Consuelo lived in the Blenheim Palace, she rarely communicated with her husband. She even placed a huge vase in the center of the dining table so that she could eat without having to see her husband's face.

After her marriage, Consuelo devoted most of her energy to charity, helping to care for orphans in the countryside, building mother-child homes for unwed mothers, and sponsoring young students and artists who were destitute, all of which brought her a great reputation. Even after her divorce from her dukely husband, she was loved by the British people and regarded as a true duchess.

Interestingly, the diamond king that Consuelo fell in love with back then, Winthrop Rutherford, a wealthy New York businessman, married a 29-year-old woman named Lucy when he was 57 years old. This Lucy was the most famous of President Roosevelt's several "secret lovers". When Roosevelt died of a cerebral hemorrhage on April 12, 1945, he was accompanied by this lady Lucy (the White House Secret Service gave her the code name "Mrs. Jonathan"), not the first lady, Eleanor.

John couldn't help but sigh, this world is really small!