The Louvre... oops d'Orsay

We had really ambitious plans for the day. We were going to wake up early, eat breakfast and head to the Louvre as soon as it opened to avoid the massive line. Since the Louvre opens at 9:00 we decided that we needed to leave the hotel by 8:15 to pull this off. However, I woke in the morning to Colleen sitting up and straining to read the clock. "Does that say 10:00?" she asked. "Yes" I replied. Rather than immediately change plans we decided to grab breakfast, Colleen got a croissant, Lisa had toast and I decided to go for a true Parisian breakfast... Coco Crispies.

We headed to the Louvre and were pleasantly surprised not to see a line out on the street as we did yesterday. But our elatement was short lived once we entered the courtyard. We took a couple of pictures in front of the controversial pyramid before heading off to find the end of the line. We walked and walked and walked and when it seemed like we could go no further we saw the end. We determined that the Louvre was not in our cards for the day. We thought it would be much better in 2010 anyway.

Instead we headed across the river to the d'Orsay museum. The line was quite long there too (doesn't anyone work in this city) but we decided to bear it anyway. After 16 or so switchbacks we finally made it inside of the museum. After spending the last hour or more in line, we decided to skip the line for the Van Gogh exhibit which ran the length of the museum and was moving very slowly. Very quickly we discovered why thing were moving so slowly. Apparantly everyone here takes photos of all their favorite paintings. Colleen and I always thought that photos somehow was bad for the art but now I've concluded that allowing photos just takes away from the experience. I could barely glimpse some paintings behind a wall of amateur photographers. It didn't help that everyone in Paris that was not at the Louvre was here with us at the d'Orsay.

Once we got our fill of Monet, Manet, Degas, Renoire and Rodin, we returned to the west bank in search of the Fauchon market. My Fodors guide described it as a "hyper-upscale mega-delicatessen" that sells food from all over the world. I was a little thrown off by the color scheme, hot pink and black, which seemed more fitting for a cosmetics store than an upscale market but it was fun peeking at all the food.

Notre Dame

Going through customs and immigration at Charles de Gaulle airport is a breeze. The immigration officer opened my passport, glanced at the picture, flipped to the only page with stamps and stamped right next to my other stamps. This was just minutes after Colleen mentioned that I would need to fill two passport pages per year in order to fill up my passport before the expiration date. I'm really going to have to step up my efforts at this rate. Customs was even easier since apparently France doesn't care what I bring into the country. After picking up our bags we proceeded to the exit, no red/green lights, no x-rays, no drug sniffing dogs, no one.


We decided to save a few euros and take the train into Paris. We made it to the station easily enough but after a couple failed attempts to purchase tickets from the vending machine a friendly Brit took pity on me and helped me out (perhaps he was an English-speaking Frenchman, but he was awfully nice so I assumed he couldn't be French). Given that the vending machine had English instructions, I'm a little embarrassed that I needed help at all. Unfortunately he wasn't with us when we attempted to transfer to the Metro. After several unsuccessful attempts at the ticket machine, we grabbed a taxi from the train station to our hotel.


We were really looking forward to taking showers before starting off in the city but alas, our room was not available. Instead, we settled for washing our faces and brushing our teeth in the lobby bathroom. After checking our bags with the bellhops, we headed off to see the city. We crossed over the Seine to the left bank and glimpsed the Eiffel tower to the left but decided to save this for another day and made a right towards Notre Dame instead. Before we could make it all the way to the cathedral, we popped in to a cafe for a bite to eat. I decided on the French Onion Soup (the just call it onion soup) and we each had a glass of wine because that what they do in France.

We made it to Notre Dame and waited in the long, but fast moving line under the watchful eyes of the gargolyes high above. Moments later I was happy to hear that Quasimodo is still hard at work ringing the bells. We strolled through the cathedral taking in the candlelight and insense while admiring the stained glass windows and artwork. We planned next to planned to climb the steps to the towers and become more acquaited with the gargoyles but once we saw the line decided that we would sit for a coffee in the shop across the street instead. Turns out, the coffee shop had plenty of gargoyles above the tables for us to admire over cafe au laits. Despite the coffee, the jet lag was starting to catch up to us so we returned to the hotel for a mini nap and showers before dinner. This is starting off to be a very nice parisian vacation.

Preparing for Paris

Today is my grandma's 90th birthday party and I'm going to miss it. Instead of celebrating with all of my aunts, uncles, brothers, cousins, dad and others I will be packing for my trip to France. I feel bad to be missing the big 9-0 in '09 it is really my grandma's fault that I'm going in the first place. Being born on her birhday comes with a lot of pressure to keep up. On last count she has been to over 50 countries in her 90 years and I'm not even close. I'm only at 16 (20 if I include countries that I've spent less than a day) right now and have a lot of traveling to do to catch up. The good news is she has assured me that she is done traveling over oceans which means her number is finally static.

This trip to France (and Switzerland - one night counts, right?) will get me a little closer to grandma's count. And it all came about thanks to Lisa Roth's birthday. Colleen and I were sitting across the table from eachother and I indicated that it would be fun to go to some other country over New Year's to go snowboarding. Colleen suggested France and before we could second-guess the idea, she booked us a hotel in Paris and we bought airline tickets. It didn't take much convincing to talk Lisa O. into joining us (although it did take some work for her to convince her boss). We will be spending a few very chilly days in Paris before hopping on a train for Chamonix. I will do my best to keep everyone that's interested entertained while I'm gone.