Paris: Days Quatre et Cinq

The fourth and fifth days of our Paris trip were quite possibly our busiest ones. On Sunday most of us took it a little easy in the morning, but we still managed to fit in a boat ride on the Seine, visits to two museums, seeing Napoleon’s tomb, and a great cocktail hour with Nathalie, followed by a fun dinner at a beer tavern near the Luxembourg Gardens.

Lizzie and Jenn woke up early so they could go to mass at Notre Dame, and the rest of us met up with them outside of the church afterwards. (This would become a theme of the trip: anytime we could walk by Notre Dame, Lizzie was all for it.)

We found the most central point in Paris, located in the open area in front of the church, and then we were off to find the Vedettes Pont-Neuf to see the city from the Seine. Lizzie decided not to join us and did a little exploring on her own instead.

 

After the {really cold but scenic} boat ride, we met back up with Lizzie and walked over to the Musee d’Orsay. I remembered seeing this place before, too. The museum is located in an old train station, and it is so neat. And it served as inspiration for the setting of the movie Hugo.

We ate lunch in the restaurant on one of the museum’s upper floors, and the room looked like more like a beautiful ballroom than a modern restaurant. I totally regret not taking a picture of what I had: the most delicious salad with arugula, caper berries, sundried tomatoes, olives, artichokes, buffalo mozzarella, and coppa, all drizzled with a balsamic glaze dressing. SO. GOOD.

Right before we left the Orsay, as I was waiting on Nola and Lizzie near the entrance, I spied the cutest little girl. She was with her mom and her brother, and she was dressed in a little denim skirt, pink cardigan, and bright yellow tennies. But what drew me to her the most was the fact that she was desperately trying to get this booger. This may be one of my favorite pictures of the trip.

Next up was my favorite museum in Paris: the Musee Rodin, located in the Hotel Biron. I declared on my first visit in 1997 that I wanted to be married in the gardens behind the house. The Hotel was built initially as a private home. Auguste Rodin later used some of its space as a workshop in the early 1900s. Rodin also donated his entire collection to France provided that the Hotel be turned into a museum dedicated to him. Turns out they were agreeable: the museum was established in 1919 and is still going strong almost 100 years later.

 

I opted to have a local wedding rather than make my guests fly 4000 miles, but I looked fondly on the gardens while we were there two weeks ago, remembering back 15 years to when I didn’t even know Kenny. There had been an outdoor function on the grounds recently (a wedding, perhaps?!?), so the view was partially blocked with the remains of the tent, but it was still just as pretty as I remembered it.

 

The Hotel des Invalides is visible from the grounds of the Musee Rodin, with its huge and gorgeous gold dome. Invalides is where Napoleon’s tomb is housed, and since Lizzie wanted to see it, we walked over there and snuck in just in time to take a quick peek before they closed for the day.

 

Nathalie met us at the Rodin, and she took us over to La Terasse, a lovely cafe with an upstairs room full of windows overlooking Place de l’Ecole Militaire, for a pre-dinner drink after we saw Invalides.

 

Nathalie unfortunately could not join us for dinner, but she put us on a bus that took us right where we wanted to go: La Gueuze, near the Luxembourg Gardens. Kenny would have loved it, with more than 150 beers from around the world on the menu. I tried two new beers, ate some wonderful mussels, had an unexpected laughing fit, and just generally had a really good time. My kind of place!

Oh, and remember Hotel de Ville that I mentioned yesterday? The Paris city hall? We walked by it on the way home, and it was even prettier at night, all lit up.

Moving on to Monday, the day we walked and walked and walked. And then walked some more. 37,000 steps and just under 16 miles, in ONE day. This is the day we climbed the Eiffel Tower and the Arc de Triomphe and walked down the Champs Elysees and went through the Tuileries and saw the Musee l’Orangerie and the Louvre. It makes me tired all over again just thinking about it.

We insanely decided to walk all the way to the Eiffel Tower from our apartment, which was just under 4 miles. And then we decided to climb all the way up to the second level of the tower, which was 669 steps.

The views were pretty, but I think I preferred looking out from the top of Notre Dame.

However, climbing the 284 steps to the top of the Arc de Triomphe provided some of the best views, in my opinion. From there the Eiffel Tower and Notre Dame (as well as many other famous sights) are actually both visible, and it is so cool to see the twelve main avenues of Paris radiating out from the Arc.

 

Once back on the ground, we wandered down the Champs-Elysees, stopped for lunch at a really good sandwich shop, walked through the Place de la Concorde, and then finally made our way into the Tuileries.

We split off to duck quickly into the Musee l’Orangerie to see the two round rooms of Monet’s waterlilies (gorgeous, but no photos allowed) and then continued to the Louvre at the end of the Tuileries.

 

I am sad to say that my first experience at the Louvre was far better than my second. Nola and QP decided they would rather sit at the adjoining Cafe Marly for a late afternoon drink, but the other five of us braved the gigantic museum. Suffice to say that it was supremely crowded, rather warm, and fairly hard to navigate. After seeing the Mona Lisa, Winged Victory, and Venus de Milo, Jenn went off to find her favorite painting, but the rest of us were done. Retracing our steps four or five times {in utter annoyance and frustration}, we finally found Nola and QP at Cafe Marly and collapsed into the booth with them for a much-needed rest. And a drink. And protein in the form of peanuts.

Our only saving grace was our waiter, who was so cute and so French. His co-workers teased him a bit after we made him get in a picture with us, but we didn’t care!

I think we all slept very, very well that night after a really long, eventful day.

We journeyed to Versailles on Tuesday, saw Pere Lachaise and Montmarte (including Sacre Coeur) on Wednesday, and did some shopping on our last day. Those recaps coming up next!