Midnight Moonrise Over Pont Neuf Bridge in Paris. This is my personal "Center" of Paris and my favorite location on this globe. An architechtural gem, bustling with activity and a view of everything 'Paris'... Per request I'm adding photo data: Canon 5D Mark II, Shutter 1.6 seconds, Aperture 9.0, ISO 1600, Focal Length 68mm. Cheers.
--- Interesting reading: A few tidbits about Pont Neuf's curious and sometimes deadly history:
All through the eighteenth century, the Pont Neuf was the center of Paris, lively with both crime and commerce: Czar Peter the Great, who came to study French civilization under the regency of the Duke d'Orleans, declared that he had found nothing more curious in Paris than the pont Neuf; and, sixty years later, the philosopher Benjamin Franklin wrote to his friends in America that he had not understood the Parisian character except in crossing the pont Neuf.
In 1862, Édouard Fournier traced its history in his lively two-volume Histoire du Pont-Neuf. He describes how, even before it was completed (in 1607), gangs hid out in and around it and robbed and murdered people. It remained a dangerous place even as it became busier. For a long time, the bridge even had its own gallows.
This did not prevent people from congregating there, drawn by various stands and street performers (acrobats, fire-eaters, musicians, etc.) Charlatans and quacks of various sorts were also common, as well as the hustlers (shell-game hucksters, etc) and pickpockets often found in crowds - not to mention a lively trade in prostitution. Among the many businesses which, however unofficially, set up there were several famous tooth pullers.
In 1701, Cotolendi quoted a letter supposedly written by a Sicilian tourist: One finds on the Pont-Neuf an infinity of people who give tickets, some put fallen teeth back in, and others make crystal eyes; there are those who cure incurable illnesses; those who claim to have discovered the virtues of some powdered stones to white and to beautify the face. This one claims he makes old men young; there are those who remove wrinkles from the forehead and the eyes, who make wooden legs to repair the violence of bombs; finally everybody is so applied to work, so strongly and continually, that the devil can tempt no one but on Holidays and Sundays.
With its numerous sellers of pamphlets and satirical performers, it was also a center for social commentary: In the 16th cent, the Pont-Neuf was the scene of the recitals of Tabarin, a famous satirist of the day, and it was long afterwards the favourite rendezvous of news-vendors, jugglers, showmen, loungers, and thieves. Any popular witticism in verse was long known as un Pont-Neuf.
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