France Day 5

We started out early today and took the metro to the Louvre (don't forget to pronounce the "r"!). We did a portion of the Denon wing of the Louvre. The whole museum is so big that it would probably take 3-5 days to see everything. We enjoyed it so much that we might go back at the end of the trip (we didn't get a chance to, unfortunately). Since the Louvre used to be a palace, the entire place is really ornate. The art was amazing, but the architecture was just as spectacular. This is a view of the ceiling in one of the rooms:

At times it was difficult to know what to focus on because it was all so amazing. One of the paintings Nick was most excited for was Napoleon's coronation:

This is actually only a small section of the painting. It was so huge!
Josephine at Malmaison:

Venus de Milo:

Mona Lisa:

Da Vinci's 3 generations painting (my favorite):

Lady Liberty:

The Winged Victory of Samothrace:

A good book detailing the tale of Richard III and the story of the princes in the tower is The Sunne in Splendour by Sharon Kay Penman, which is a wonderful piece of historical fiction. Penman does a very thorough job in her research and presents a more historically accurate view of Richard III, who was not a hunchback and did not spend two years in his mother's womb and was not birthed with teeth and long claws, as the Tudors would have you believe. The book is hard to put down and beyond interesting. Read it and learn the truth about Richard III!
Here is the painting of The Princes in the Tower:


There were many, many more paintings that we loved as well. The sheer size of some of these pieces was overwhelming, some over 15 feet tall and covering entire walls. Our guide (I think her name was Nina), was a wonderful older lady who made some of the pieces really come alive. We had headsets, which were great since there were quite a few other groups milling around. There is something really wonderful about seeing so many different cultural groups enjoying the artwork in similar ways. The beauty and history of these pieces bring a commonality between people that we can all appreciate.

By the end of the tour, which took about 2 hours at a very fast clip, I was entranced. We were able to go down into the lower levels of the Louvre to see the original foundations of the structure, which date back to the 12th century. After our tour, Nick and I bought a guide to the Louvre and I fully intend to become an amateur art history buff when we get back the states. The Louvre was far and away my favorite part of the day.

The second part of the day started well with a very good lunch in the Tuileries gardens. I had penne with a roasted red pepper pesto sauce and Nick had a delicious goat cheese and pesto stuffed chicken breast with saffron rice, micro greens, and a balsamic reduction. And café, of course!

Then we decided to walk the Champs-Élysées. It's a few miles from the Louvre to the Arc de Triomphe and my feet are throbbing just thinking about it! This image is a small arc at the Louvre. If you look to the middle of that arc, you can see the Arc de Triomphe all the way down the Champs-Élysées-many miles away.

We started out at the Place de la Concorde, which holds two beautiful fountains.

And an obelisk, which was given to France by the Egyptian government in the 19th century.

The obelisk is covered with hieroglyphics describing the reign of Ramses II. To me, it seemed a little out of place in this country that loves its language so much. The most interesting and historically significant part of the square was the plaque placed on the spot where Marie Antoinette and Louis XVI were beheaded in 1793. It was a little mind-blowing to think that we were standing on the spot where so many people lost their heads and the country and history were forever changed.

After we spent some time at the Place de la Concorde, we walked the Champs, which was a slightly unpleasant experience. Full of high-end, trendy, and designer shops (including the biggest Sephora EVER-did you know that 1 out of every 2 men and 9 out of 10 women in Paris wear perfume?), I felt distinctly poor and even more foreign. But then the gypsies come up to you begging for money. Or they prostrate themselves on the ground in front of you. It was very uncomfortable and proof, even more so, that we stuck out as tourists like a sore thumb. By the time we got to the Arc, I was in a pretty crummy mood.

But the Arc itself was amazing and overwhelming (my word of the trip)-as are most things in Paris. It is HUGE and set in the middle of a giant roundabout in which cars scream by you honking and merging in crazy ways.

Beautiful monument, head-spinning environment. We took a lot of pictures (none of which include the entire monument-it was too big to get in a shot!). Here's one that gives you an idea of the scale. Look at the size of the people in relation to the monument.

Here are some images of the detail:


One of the quietest moments we had all day was in front of the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier, which was beautiful.

We were both so tired, but we were leaving Paris the next day and I still didn't have a way to straighten my hair. Jared and Alicia (our favorite couple on the tour) loaned us a book on walking tours of Paris, so we went to a shopping center. It was so big that we couldn't figure out which stores were where, so we gave up! Fortunately, the metro was in the lower floors of the building, so we took it to the BHV (a GIANT Sears/JCPenney/Nordstrom/Macy's), which also conveniently has an opening on the -1 floor in the metro station. 4 floors and many hilarious attempts at explanations to French-speaking clerks later, I had a straightener and we headed back to the hotel.

P.S. The BHV had 8 floors. It was huge! I was very proud of us for finding the straightener, and in less than half an hour. Impressive! I wish we could have spent a little time shopping in the store too; it really seemed to have a little bit of everything.

After a 3-hour nap, we went out to dinner. Some of our tour buddies recommended a restaurant called The Nectarine in the Place de Vosges, but when we got there, they were closing up. It was about 9:30. We went to a place around the corner with decent food (Nick had an odd Caesar salad and I had a cheesy risotto with prawns), but the service stunk and they rushed us out the door. No tip for you!

Before dinner we tried a laundromat, but it didn't sell detergent. I decided to wash a few things in the sink at 11:30. Big mistake. The tee and socks were still soaked in the morning and my bra is a little damp too. Eh, it was an experience. And it was one of those things that made Nick and me laugh so hard we cried. Nick walked in the bathroom the next morning to take a shower and immediately said, "Steph, um, I think we have a problem." And out he came holding his tee, still wet and with a horribly stretched-out collar. And then the laughter started!

Writing this now, I realize this was something of a fiasco of a day. One of our big mistakes was trying to cram too much into our time in Paris, instead of telling ourselves that we will be back. And we will. I don't think we ever need to walk the Champs again, but we will go up in the Arc next time. We will also spend more time exploring the Louvre, which I wish we would have done on this day. Overall, as our last day in Paris, it reflected the tone of our entire time in Paris: busy and full. The next section of our trip was more to our liking in terms of the pace. I finished writing much of this entry while we were on the bus to Bourges, which I will write about tomorrow.