We went to the Louvre. It's one of the things that you have to do in your lifetime deal.
We started out in the Greek sculptures area
Tyler figured out the map so we would hit the Masterpieces
Onto Egypt
This is an actual mummy. Which is why there are so many people around it. The little boys horrified face is my favorite thing about this picture.
Our first view of the Venus de Milo
Venus de Milo surrounded by thousands of people
The courtyard
One of the many ornate ceilings in the palace
No idea and The Winged Victory
Mona Lisa - Tyler snapped this above a sea of people. It was insane.
I hate to say this but we were not enthralled by the Louvre. It was crowded, hot, and hard to navigate. There's simply too much to see and too many people there to see it.
We then started off on our walking tour from our handy little book. We toured the city birth center - Ile de la Cite.
Palais de Justice
Pont Neuf - the oldest bridge of Paris
These semicircular insets were originally used by merchants
Henry IV statue
The Conciergerie
This used to be the palace before the Louvre was built, and then it became a prison. This is where they kept Marie Antoinette prisoner before she was executed.
Also under some restoration. Beautiful stained glass windows all around it.
We then walked over to the Crypt du Parvis which is in front of the NotreDame cathedral. It's an archaeological crypt with the old city walls and foundations of homes from the 3rd century.
We stopped for a very late lunch/early dinner. This was the hottest day we'd experienced in Paris so far.
We are at a cafe across the Notredame and ordered more food than we could eat
This square has beautiful views of the back of the Notredame, very small compared to other squares and gardens in the city
We tried to go to the National deportation memorial. A monument dedicated to the memory of the 200,000 people deported from France to the German concentration camps during WWII but the memorial was closed.
We crossed over Pont St-Louis to the Ile Saint-Louis
It is full of quaint little shops. The only sad part is that we got to this area around 8pm and things were either closed or closing.
Number 29 is where Hemingway worked in manuscripts in the 1920's
Number 51 is Hotel Chenizot
We tried the famous Berthillon ice cream. Not crazy about it.
Hotel de Lauzun that has fish shaped pipes
A statue of the poet Rimbaud
We took the metro over to the next part of our walk. The pyramides station has an amazing view of the Garnier Opera.
Joan of Arc statue in front of Hotel Regina
Musee d'Orsay
Louvre
One of the many statues in the garden
This picture of Tyler makes me smile. He gives me that look often, and it's always when we're teasin each other.
Instead of walking the Champs Elysee, we took the subway up to the Arc de Triomphe. Our feet were hurting too bad.
We climbed the Arc, all 322 steps of it. This is the view from the top, looking down at Avenue Champs Elysee
Tour Eiffel
While we were at the top of the Arc, Spain and Germany were playing in the world cup. As soon as the game was over there were several police cars surrounding the Arc due to the insane celebration about Spain winning. We could hear all the buzzing, horns, and yelling of the people from the top.
All the steps... there's no ending I swear.
Inside the Arc they have slide shows about all the different arcs in the world, and a history of the Arc de Triomphe. We weren't able to spend much time there since we went at dusk to see the sunset and the Arc was closing.
The ground of the Arc
All the soccer fans. Celebrating. So much fun to watch this happen. We took the subway home and crashed. This was such a hot day in Paris we were tired!
