If you're all caught up, the next day we made sure to set the alarm. We took our time getting ready, stopped for a scrumptious breakfast across the street at a little cafe, where we had cafe au lait (coffee with milk, brewed awesome), a crossiont (I make no guarantees about my spelling in any way shape or form! -- hey, I'm an engineer :) ), a small baguette, halved with butter, the best strawberry preserves, and a tall glass of OJ.
Then we were off and running...across the river, up a few blocks and we landed at ... Notre Dame!
Outside of Notre Dame...look at the size of her!
Inside, a beautiful stained glass window.
We took our time wandering around Notre Dame, wandered about the outside and then headed off to stop number two for the day...Saint Chappelle.
San Chappelle is located inside the Hall of Justice complex. So we ended up waiting in line for about 45 minutes to go through a metal detector, then it was off to buy ticket to gain entry.
We actually ended up buying a 4 day museum pass. The museum passes are awesome, you pay for a 1, 2, 4 or 6 day pass and it gains you admission to dozens of muesums, some with accelerated lines, so you don't have to wait.
So anyways, we bought our passes and headed to the church.
The outside of Saint Chappelle
The inside. This picture does not do it justice in any way shape or form. It's a whole church of stained glass! Beautiful, beautiful, beautiful!
Afterwards, we ate dinner on the way home and headed off for another restful night (I think).
The next morning we were up and out again, I think we may have slept a bit later again, we ate a late breakfast, most likely at "our cafe" -- the place I told you about, and then we were off to put our museum passes to good use!
This is in the Louvre courtyard...but we weren't headed to the Louvre! We were headed to Musee d'Orsay.
The original VanGogh! Starry Nights...it was so cool, I never thought I'd get to VanGogh and Monet up close like this...of their most famous paintings!
A neat shot from the second level of Musee d'Orsay...what a fun museum...you know it use to be an old train station?
A room filled with scupltures at Musee d'Orsay...it was all right, but still pretty
After the museum we went to an "early" dinner, starting at about 6pm. That was the night of our longest dinner...it lasted 4 hours! And was probably one of the best dinners out there. It was located part way between Notre Dame and Musee d'Orsay on Rue Jacob (and the corner of something else -- I could tell you if I looked at map).
On the way we walked across the pedestrian bridge and came across a suprise. While hard to see below, the bridge was filled with 20 and 30 somethings! Just hanging out, drinking wine, eating dinner, cheeses, desserts, and enjoying the river. We had no idea!
So we did what any logical American girls would do...
...we ran home and grabbed our cheese, biscuits and wine from our fridge and came back to join the party!
Our "snack"
Here we are on the bridge having a grand 'ol time...the Louvre on one side, some palace or something on the other and the Seine underneath!
Turns out the couple seated next to us were American...
I'd like you to meet Justin and Rachel, a couple from Michigan. Actually Rachel's parents live in Switzerland, she speaks almost fluent French too! They were kind enough to elaborate on the "bridge gathering"...turns out it's basically an "artists' bridge", where the youngings and artsy types go to hang out.
We sat there and watched the light show of the Eiffel Tower, we finally headed back to our place about midnight...and yes, we did finish that bottle of wine!
The next morning we were up and at it again...it was time for the Museum pass to go to work again...this time at the Louvre! The most famous of museums.
This is a "small" back courtyard at the Louvre
The famous pyramid
Sitting in front of the fountains and the pyramid
We took a photo of a group of Japanese tourists, so they were happy to oblige by taking ours...not only with our cameras, but theirs as well, so we're also in a number of photo albums in Japan!
From inside the pyramid
One of the many hallways at the Louvre...look how small the people in the hall are!
Another large and long hallway, this is where many of the pieces from the 14th and 15th centuries were located...I believe!
The most famous painting in the place...Mona!
Proof, I was actually there, standing in front of the Mona Lisa...ugh...what a hair day...not the best photo of me. But then again, I was sandwiched between about 50 other people all with digital cameras.
We found a few people scattered about trying to recreate some of the pieces housed at the Louvre. Looks like he's doing a pretty good job, huh?
Yet another large room, filled with paintings. There are rooms upon rooms like this one!
A real live Egyptian...kind of creepy.
A hallway filled with Greecian and Roman sculpture, check out how small we all look in it!
The very famous Venus de Milo, aka Aphrodite. Now can someone explain how this lady, with no arms and feet can be so famous when there are hallways upon hallways of sculptures that have all of their extremeties! :)
Well, since we were there, we decided to go back and check out the Mona Lisa again. You didn't see it earlier, but right across from her is the famous "Wedding at Cana" painting...check out the size of this thing!
We wandered down after the museum towards the Carousel du Louvre...aka a mall. And low and behold we run across another famous pyramids...actually 2...so who's read "The DaVinci Code"?! Reconize this?
So that takes you up through Wednesday I do believe, what a packed week we've had so far...stayed tuned..Part 3, yet to come!
If it really was a "real live" Egyptian, then it would indeed be very creepy!
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