Paris Day 2- Notre Dame and Champs De Elysses

We started the day off with pastries and cafe creme's at a local cafe.  We took a casual stroll down to the metro and hopped on for a trip to Notre Dame.  We quickly found point zero, the point from which all distances in Paris are measured from.  

We entered Notre Dame and walked around marveling at all the chapels and detail.  After we toured the inside we used our museum passes for a free tour of the towers and bellfry's.  Can you say stairs?  But the views were amazing.

A quick tour of the archeological crypt and then 

we walked to the back of Notre Dame and across the bridge to Ille de St Louis.  We had a nice lunch at a little cafe overlooking Notre Dame.  Here John is contemplating what his seafood platter covered in cheese is going to taste like :)

After what seemed like an eternity getting our check we took a little walk along the left bank over to St Chapelle.  The stained glass here was amazing!  It didn't photograph well at all.  It is one of those have to see it in person kinda places.  A little further down the way was the Concergirie.  We got to see the cell Marie Antoinette was kept in.  Further walking led us to pont Neuf and then along the Seine to the Louvre where I picked up a Paris mug and a frap from starbucks and some postcard envelopes.  Since we were on a straight shot to the Arc De Triumph we decided to walk the entire Champs de Elysses.

 

 What fun!  We walked up more stairs to the top and were treated to amazing views of Paris.  We happened to be there when they rekindled the flame on the tomb of the unknown soldier.  

Dinner at the Cafe Bosquet where we ordered Escargot.  An evening walk to the eiffel tower with crepe in hand.  It was too late to go up the tower so we tabled it till the next day.

Paris Day 1- The Louvre

We landed in Paris, waited in a huge mass of people to have our passports checked, grabbed our bags and headed to the RER (trains) unfortunately the path to the trains was being blocked and pushed back by Police oh and wait armed military join in to block our path.  Time to use our limited French.  Ok really no French par le vous angles?  We ended up finding our way and bought tickets.  We found our lovely little hotel very easily.  We quickly got a quick shower and were on our way to the Louvre.  I had a nice chocolate croissant in front of the Louvre.  Inside I discovered a Starbucks but didn't partake until a later day.  After several language barriers we bought Paris Museum Passes and entered the Louvre.  SO MUCH TO SEE!  There was the Mona Lisa

Really a disappointment.  Its size was small compared to what you would think it would be.  Like the glare in my photo?  So many people viewing it I didn't feel like jockeying for a center position so I shot from the side.  It is impressive but small.  There are a ton of paintings and sculptures we took pics of but I won't bore you with those until I see you in person :)  Here is a silly one of me and some thing or other from ancient Iraq.  Hey I had to do something funny because my feet were KILLING me!  I don't care what the French think I should have worn tennis shoes!


Here is John in front of some Babylonian sculptures.  Pretty impressive.  

After the Louvre we walked all the way back to our hotel.  We came back to our room and changed our shoes and headed to Cafe du March for dinner.  After dinner we grabbed a crepe 

on Rue Cler and walked to the Eiffel Tower.  It was evening and we just walked around enjoying the light show and marveling at the enormity of the tower.  We headed back to the hotel once more removed our shoes off our aching feet and tucked them into bed, groaning like 80 year old men at how our bodies ached from all the walking.