Paris

Again, sorry for the delay in postings. It's all Ashley's fault.

With the Paris trip we are now up to Thanksgiving. Unfortunately we didn't take any pictures during our return trip during Christmas in the US. I can just tell that if we did the first picture you would've seen is me biting into a Chickfila sandwich (w/ cheese). I got in 6 visits while home, along with 1 visit to the Bojangles. People ask me what I miss most and I say without hesitation, "fried chicken". They laugh like it's a joke. Anyway, on to Paris.

We purposely planned our trip to Paris in the off-season. We've heard about the Spring and Summer crowds. I think we were right to go during November. We got lucky in that it wasn't cold and there were still a ton of tourists. So many tourists in November that I can't possibly imagine being there in the busy season. If we have any guests during the Spring/Summer who just have to go, we'll let them borrow our guide book and wish them good luck.
Our itinerary there was basically to hit all the "must-sees", which include:

- Musee d'Orsay
- Louvre
- Versailles
- Eiffel Tower
- Notre Dame

We were in Paris for an 3-day weekend and it's hard not to miss stuff. Our advice to any other Parisian travelers is: Don't try to see it all in one visit and just accept you need a return trip.
As you can see, because the Musee d'Orsay has almost all of the famous Impressionist paintings, it actually has many more of the popular masterpieces you associate with Paris. Here are pictures of pictures:

There are also pictures from the Louvre, which has the Mona Lisa, and........some other famous historical paintings and statues. From my perspective, the Musee d'Orsay has more of the art we liked. And the Mona Lisa is tiny. Not to mention you have to stand 20 feet back because some guy tried to throw paint on it a couple of years ago. I'm sure it's historical and worthy of masterpiece status, but don't set your expectations too high or you'll be disappointed. Ashley had my expectations properly adjusted even before we got there.

Ashley speaking briefly: The Mona Lisa is, in fact, a marvelous painting. However, I have seen it millions of places, and while there was a "oh cool, so that's the real thing" reaction for me, I have seen the image so many times and the crowd was so intensely interested in it that I really didn't feel the need to be absorbed. I was much more interested in Winged Victory, which I walked all around and examined closely. I just thought it was the more "wow" thing to see up close. Ok, I'm finished interposing my opinion now.

Ashley's Winged Victory:

The famous Venus de Milo:In front of the Louvre:

More pictures of pictures, including many you've likely seen in your history books. The three paintings following the Mona Lisa are HUGE:

Our visit to the Eiffel Tower consisted of walking a block away from it on the first night to a river boat cruise and walking underneath it on our way out of town. Actually going up in the tower is supposed to be well worth it for the view alone. There are some night-time pictures of the famous sights of Paris, since we did take a Seine cruise.


Ashley again: Since neither Cary Grant (Charade) nor Jimmy Stewart (Take Her, She's Mine) showed up, I was a little disappointed. However, the cruise was lovely and since it was a small boat, we were sharing the view with only approximately 8 people, so that part was nice.

Waiting for Gene Kelly:

To begin Day #2 we headed to Notre Dame, which is required viewing. Afterward, Ashley knows me well and booked us on an architectural tour with a grad student that was our entire afternoon but very much worth it. I loved it and I think Ashley liked it. Since it was winter, the days weren't very long, so that basically completed Day #2.

Our entire last day was spent at Versailles, excluding a brief walk under the Eiffel Tower on our way out of town. Earlier I said that we had great weather the entire weekend. However, there was one time when the weather went south and it just so happened to be the only time we were stuck outside. We were walking the grounds of Versailles (rather famous for being huge) and got absolutely soaked. We were far away from any cover and a freezing cold rain storm caught us. Our umbrella was shredded in 2 minutes. So we ended our last day in Paris in a traditional French way......we found a Mexican restaurant on the way back to the train station ordered some spicy food and traded turns under the hair dryer in the bathroom. We then had time to go back to our hotel and I changed out of my wet clothes in the lobby (very discreetly of course).

In front of Versailles:

One last stop in front of the tower on the way out of town: