Paris Day 5, Musee d'Louvre

On day 5, the boys were finally done working, so we had LOTS of pictures...hence the mulit-part post for Day 5 -- I narrowed the photos down for the day, but there are still a LOT!

Poor Max was still a little tired from all the working and late dinners...



We decided to hit the Musee d'Louvre. We debated going inside -- to see the Mona Lisa and some of the other famous pieces, but once we saw just how much we could see on the outside (and saw how long the 'queue' to get in was), we opted for a leisurely stroll around the outside of this ornate old mansion, turned museum, and the adjacent sculpture gardens. We weren't disappointed...and while some day, I would like to see the Mona Lisa, I am 100% ok with not seeing it this trip -- there WILL be others! :)


Off the metro


Navigating a la 'dork book'


Views along the river...


Street View


Musee d'Louvre entrance


For scale


Courtyard # 1


Posing in front of the fountain


Courtyard # 2 -- home to the pyramids


Max and the pyramids


Inside the Louvre


This is just the 'sculpture' section of the museum...it was broken into different art 'types'


View of the pyramids from inside...


Entrance to the sculpture gardens...


Buildings along the gardens...


Not sure what she's doing...


View of the gardens from the main path


Poor guy...he forgot his wife's birthday....


One of the two pools in the garden -- pull up a chair and relax!

Up next -- the Arc de Truimph!

Sock Monkey Love

Because I know some of you read just to get your lil Max fix, I have decided to interrupt the Paris chapters with this small story.

Max was gifted this beautiful sock monkey by my mommy friend, Emily. For months, it sat on top of his dresser, watching over him while he slept.

For months, Max wanted little to do with any stuffed animal other than his 'pup pup', a small golden retriever stuffed animal that he kept in his crib with him.

On Thursday, he randomly started pointing urgently towards the monkey saying "nnkey nnkey". So, big Max took the monkey down, and lil Max started huggin on it something fierce -- like the sock monkey was his long lost friend or something.

Weird.

And since then, he's insisted that we take it with us everywhere.

I think he's in love.


Hello, monkey.


I love you.


You taste good.


I like to snuggle with you and dada.


You make me smile!


You are my new best friend.

PS: Sorry some of the pictures are blurry. Somebody doesn't understand the fine art of standing still to have their picture taken yet...

Paris Day 4

Day 4 -- the last days the boys have to work, so the last day that Jayna and I will venture out on our own!! I skyped with Carina from the hotel room, and we decided today to add a trip to Arpajon, the small town where the boys were working to the agenda (Carina coincidentally had a hidden agenda for the visit).

We decided to meet up by the Hotel d'Invalides and the Musee Rodin -- the ONE musuem I REALLY wanted to see -- it had come highly recommended by a few coworkers.

All was going fine, until we got off the RER B-line to hop onto the C-line. I had never seen lines like this before! Something was obviously going wrong. We waited for about 10 mins before we decided that something was , in fact, going wrong -- and then we left and decided to walk -- it was only two stops away, after all...

So, at first we thought this was the Hotel d'Invalides:



NOPE! :) But we were on the path to see some other Paris landmarks. Here is some of the view along the way:











The Musee d'Orsay -- which, in retrospect, I would have liked to go inside -- but that just gives me a reason (like I needed one anyways) to come back and visit. Here are a few shots of the outside:







Finally, after I made a wrong turn which probably added an add'l 1-1.5 miles to our jaunt, we reach the Hotel d'Invalides. And it starts to rain.











So we duck into a cafe -- poor us, right? Have a cup of coffee and decide to forego the Rodin (part of the appeal is the outdoor gardens, which we didn't want to do in the rain) and head straight to Arpajon.

The train ride was fantastic -- seeing all the houses along the way and 'almost' getting into the countryside.







We got off the train, and had NO IDEA where we were headed! All we knew was that where the guys were working was about 2 miles from the train station. We decided that this was too little information to find them, so we just wandered around Arpajon. There wasn't much to see, or to wander. It was still raining, and we were starting to get cold, and tired, and a bit hungry.

So, after walking around a bit more, having a cup of cafe au lait to warm up, we jumped back on the train, bid adieu to Carina, and went back to the hotel to warm up, rest up, and get ready for another dinner on the town.

Thank you, Arpajon.



Dinner was delicious again, at a small restaurant just across the street from our hotel. Restaurant Beajolais (or, as I like to pronounce it, Beau Jal Is...just to make my mom mad...). I had a smoked salmon appetizer, a DELICIOUS scallops and pasta dinner, and creme brule for dessert -- it was SCRUMPTIOUS!!!

Paris Day 3

Day 3, and Max still has to work. BOO.

Today I am joined by Max's coworker's NEW wife, Jayna. She and Aaron flew straight to Paris from Negril, Jamaica where they celebrated their first honeymoon (Paris being their second). What a treat for them!

Jayna and I planned to just take a leisurely tour around the city so that she could get accustomed to the metro and to get out of the Ya Mon mindset that she had been in for the past week lounging on beaches and soaking up the warm Jamaica sun. What a contrast for her to come to Paris, where it was unseasonably cooler than normal and RAINY. We survived... :)

We bought new metro passes at the Gentilly station, and the ticket agent was quite smitten with Jayna and gave her the royal treatment (a map of Paris). Who said Parisians are rude? Not if you're a LADY! :)

We got off at the Cite stop (the same stop we got off on Day 1), and walked around a bit more of the area.

Right out of the stop, we came across this huge federal building:



and next to it is the beautiful church Sainte Chapelle. We admired it from the outside...the queue to go in was up the street. (Note: this was the case for many of the top attractions in Paris, so this was a bit of a turnoff for us most of the time. Also, the admission cost was quite inflated. We all opted to view the majority of the attractions from the outside, and to go in only when we felt the urge.)



Afterwards we walked by Notre Dame (note the trend?) and did a bit of Souveneir shopping along the way.



We walked around Ile Saint-Louis (a quaint island section of Paris) and crossed over the Seine and did a bit of boutique shopping and just enjoying the scents, sounds and flavors of Paris. You just can't get enough of it!

We stopped at Cafe Beauberg for a coffee...and in the knick of time, before the skies opened up and started pouring! This is the same cafe I had met Carina at the day before...and I wanted to show Jayna the bathroom. She took a picture of her own :)

When the rain let up, we ventured out again towards the metro...to go see the other staple of Paris -- the Eiffel Tower.



And we walked back up the plaza again to see the Ecole Militaire and the other sites near the Hotel d'Invalides.



We grabbed a yummy sandwich from a street vendor and hopped back on the RER home...to take a quick nap before the guys got done with work. We just had the feeling that dinner was going to be another big work affair!

And it WAS! The whole group of us (about 20+ people) hopped on the metro and got off at St. Michel. There we dined at a quaint French restaurant right in the middle of all the hustle and bustle.

Dinner was:
Appetizer: French Onion Soup (OMG good!); Max had Escargots!!
Dinner: Salmon; Max had pasta
Dessert: Chocolate Mousse!! (can't rememeber what Max had....can't believe I can still recall what I had!!)

We grabbed these two photos of the buildings next to the restaurant as we left.





And then...Max decided he was tired and wanted to go home...and some of the others wanted to head out towards Moulin Rouge district...so I went along for the ride! I was the only girl along, so I'd like to say that I saved these honorable gentlemen from some of the disgraces that we faced along the way. All in all, the late portion of the evening was an adventure...for several reasons:

1. Someone else using my dork book resulted in his walking in the wrong direction.
2. We didn't make it quite as far as Moulin Rouge, so instead we crashed at the outdoor seating at a small bar along the outskirts of the district.
3. Some of the male company were upset that we weren't going to see Moulin Rouge (we had to explain to him what the place actual WAS).
4. We did finally get to see Moulin Rouge on our way home...from the cab window. It is right next door to Pussy's.
5. All cab drivers do drugs. Enuf said.

Max was still awake when I got home (which wasn't too late BTW). Poor guy was worried about me...awww!