Europe - Part 3

Our second day in Paris was devoted to museums. We started out with a tour of the Louvre. Our tour guide Michel was fantastic. He was very knowledgeable about the art, and also knew all the shortcuts to take to get from one place to another in the Louvre. If not for him, we would not have seen near as much as we did. I am so glad I decided to splurge on this small group tour!!! We saw the Mona Lisa, winged Victory, Venus de Milo, and lots of others. Everything from ancient Roman sculptures to Ancient Asian art, items from times before Christ, and a lot of paintings that Christy had studied in her art history class in Luneberg. She was so excited to see them in real life! As we walked down the stair cases in Napoleon's apartments, I kept telling myself that kings and kings had walked on those same stairs! When we finally left the Louvre after almost 4 hours of non-stop practically running from one room to another, we had lunch at one of the little cafes in the area. Then decided that because it really looked like it was going to rain any minute, to head over and see the Musee D"Orsay. Christy and Sean both wanted to take a look there because that is where all the impressionists are. Unfortunately, we were not allowed to take photos inside. I would have loved to get some photos of the interior of the building at least because the architecture of the building is fantastic - it used to be a train station, and you can still see that in some places. After we were done there, we headed back towards the hotel, and wandered a little in the Tuilleries. We sat at a little cafe there and shared a bottle of wine and a crepe with chocolate sauce and ice cream. After another trip back to the hotel to drop stuff off, we headed out for dinner, and ate at the cafe on the corner by our hotel. Then Christy and I wanted to go see the Eiffel Tower all lit up, thinking we could use our bateau boat passes, only to discover that they had stopped running. So we walked - Sean was sure it wasn't very far - it took us 45 minutes to get there! But we arrived in plenty of time to find a spot to sit and see the lights come on and take some photos. The twinkle lights come on for 5 minutes on the hour at 11:00. It was worth the walk, and the wait, and then the 45 minute walk back. Though, I must admit the walk back was not as much fun - no one was in a very good mood about it! But, we did see our first (and only) Parisian rat on the way back!

The first photo is the Arc du Carousel outside the Louvre, the second is Christy in front of the Mona Lisa, and the last is the gorgeous Eiffel Tower. The photos that go with this post will be up on the Shutterfly site in just a little while.

Keep checking back for more!