Retired Executive Turned Art History Student Walks Readers Through Paris in ‘Learning Paris’

Cas Wonsowicz’s new travel memoir follows six days on foot with his wife, Adry, from the Louvre and Notre-Dame to a kangaroo enclosure in the Jardin des Plantes

DALLAS, OR, UNITED STATES, October 26, 2026 /EINPresswire.com/ — Cas Wonsowicz has published “Learning Paris: Discoveries Along the Seine,” a travel memoir about the six days he spent walking Paris with his wife, Adry Clark. Part memoir and part walking companion, the book is published by AMZ Publishing and is out now on Amazon.

Wonsowicz spent decades on the road for Unisys, Alcoa and Intel Corporation. When he retired, he went back to school to study art history at Western Oregon University. “Learning Paris” brings those two lives together. Each chapter covers one day on foot, starting from the couple’s hotel on the Left Bank, and Wonsowicz looks at the paintings, bridges and churches along the way with a student’s eye for who made them and why.

The book got its start in the Astoria Writers Guild’s fall 2025 workshop, led by Oregon Poet Laureate Ellen Waterston. Wonsowicz credits her encouragement with pushing him to turn his trip notes into a memoir. His writing has also appeared in the Winter 2025 and Spring 2026 issues of Northwest Passages, Western Oregon University’s literary journal.

“Sightseeing encourages us to collect places; attention encourages us to discover them,” Wonsowicz said. “Travel is more than discovering new places. It is learning to see the world differently.”

A lot of the book happens between the big stops. Walking along the Seine, Wonsowicz notices the booksellers’ green boxes, a couple leaning on the stone parapet, an accordion playing somewhere out of sight. The best sights on the river, he writes, were often the ones that “required no photograph.”

The book does cover the famous names, including the Louvre, the Musée d’Orsay, Notre-Dame and the Arc de Triomphe, but it lingers on the details. Readers climb the 424 steps of the Notre-Dame towers, stand in front of the “À mon seul désir” tapestry at the Musée de Cluny and walk through “Henry Taylor: Where Thoughts Provoke,” the 2026 exhibition at the Musée Picasso. Some of the best moments are the small ones: a group of kangaroos at the Ménagerie du Jardin des Plantes, one of the oldest public zoos in the world, and a tired afternoon spent asking Louvre staff for directions to Le Jules Verne, a restaurant that turns out to be inside the Eiffel Tower.

The last chapter leaves Paris for the Lascaux cave paintings in southwestern France, which Wonsowicz sees as the place where the story of the art in the city’s museums really begins. The appendices include his favorite walk, from the Left Bank to the Musée d’Orsay, and a guide to the city’s twenty arrondissements. Chapter 3 features illustrations by artist Bruce Beltz.

“Learning Paris: Discoveries Along the Seine” (ISBN 978-1-971558-23-3) is available on Amazon at https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0HB6QS532. More about the author is available at https://caswonsowicz.com/ .

About Cas Wonsowicz

Cas Wonsowicz has been traveling for more than fifty years, first for work during careers with Unisys, Alcoa and Intel Corporation, and later for the joy of it with his wife, Adry. After retiring, he studied art history at Western Oregon University. He lives in Dallas, Oregon. “Learning Paris” is part of his Learning series. Author inquiries: caswonsowicz@gmail.com.

Cas J Wonsowicz
Author
caswonsowicz@gmail.com
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