Paris day 3 (part UN)

Things have been busy enough that I havent been as faithful to you my dear readers... but here is some catch-up

I wanted to hit up the Louvre since I did not see it when I was in Paris with my orchestra. I got there just after they opened, which turned out to be VERY wise.

I walked straight to the Mona Lisa to beat the crowd, so by 9:20am I was in front of it. It was in a HUGE room and had, literally, an entire wall to itself. It was also roped off so that you couldnt get closer than 15 feet. Honestly, it was so far away that I didnt feel like it even was worth seeing.

Despite that, I LOVED the Louvre. It was only 9 euros to get in, and I thought it was worth that fee just to see the building (it is HUGE HUGE HUGE and very beautiful, since it used to be a palace.) My favorite parts were the Italian paintings, the large format French paintings, and the Napolean III Apartments objects d'arte (furniture, palace rooms, etc.) I was very excited to go to the "Greco Ceramics" area which looked HUGE on the map, but when I got there that Gallery was closed. WTF.

I thought it was SUPER cool that there were real artists sitting there with big canvases spending hours meticulously copying some of the works. Right on, my artsy friends, right on.

I left the building through the giant IM Pei glass pyramid in the center. I kept looking for the tiny matching pyramid that was supposed to be pointing down underneath (a la The Da Vinci Code) but it wasnt there. Was it supposed to be??? Silly fiction novels.

After the Louvre, I met up with Sam in the Jardin de Tuilleries which is connected to the Louvre area. There were these weird outdoor sculptures with hands in all sorts of positions... I felt an odd sort of kinship with them.

The Tuilleries is also at the base of the Champs Elysees, which we walked that afternoon. The Champs Elysees reminded me a lot of Newbury Street in Boston, and I was suprised that it was just as short. It led us up to the Arc de Triumph (apparently this day became the Major Sights of Paris day for me) which we paid a few euros to climb. KIND of an amazing view of Paris

So, that got us to the early afternoon. I'll write more later - it's time to go out for wine and dinner on the town :)