Monday, October 2, 2017
We woke up around 8:30 and got ready in our tiny Airbnb.
We had a vague plan of all the attractions we planned to see, and we of course got distracted by multiple food stops along the way. Lenôtre was our first stop, and we shared a delicious French apple pastry called a chausson aux pommes and our first European espresso. Bitter but adequate.
One Parisian breakfast is never enough, so we also stopped at Eric Kayser for an éclair.
Between eateries, we just gushed about how French everything looked and how it was a quintessential fall day.
We randomly ran into two separate scenes being filmed as we wandered around the city (we were told to stop filming the second one). At one point, Francisco excitedly announced "look it, look it", and I looked up and gave a small shriek as I first laid eyes on the Eiffel Tower. It was still a decent ways away, and we would not be getting up close with it on today's excursion, but it was exciting nonetheless!
From there, we walked through the Jardin des Tuileries, a garden outside of the Louvre.
We couldn't pass up some gelato from Amorino, so we paused near a little pond to enjoy it.
Before heading into the Louvre, we had a tasty lunch at a vegetarian restaurant called Végét'Halles. We shared the Beignet de tofu avec sa Vegannaise (Tofu fritters with vegan mayonnaise) and a Burger Végét’halles with frites! We also spent a fair amount of time fighting over the water and whether we were going to be charged for it. The short answer was yes, so maybe we shouldn't have asked for any. 😛
You can check out the travel vlog of the first part of our day here:
We spent some time wandering around the grounds of the Louvre looking for an elusive ticket kiosk and an alternative entrance that I had seen mentioned online. I don't think the Internet was very clear on this one...when we were leaving, we took the connected Metro, and I think this is the alternate entrance referenced online.
The most famous piece of art for me (and many other visitors, I'm sure) was Leonardo da Vinci's Mona Lisa. This is in a very crowded room, and I imagine the scene below is what you would find during most visits. Literally just a sea of people holding up cell phones.
Other top works of art include:
Winged Victory of Samothrace (or The Winged Goddess of Nike)
Venus de Milo
Eugène Delacroix’s Liberty Leading the People
Admittedly, I'm not a huge museum person, but there was no way I was going to pass up seeing such a historical place filled with such world-renowned art.
We headed over to take the Louvre Metro, but there was only one ticket station and a long line, so this took a while. Our next destination was Sacré-Cœur, a Roman Catholic church and minor basilica, dedicated to the Sacred Heart of Jesus. It is located at the summit of Montmarte, a large hill and the highest point in the city. Be prepared for many, many stairs to reach this astounding viewpoint.
Also, I saw gargoyles for the first time ever here, and you cannot believe how excited I was lol.
Front of Sacré-Cœur & the view
We stopped at a little restaurant nearby called Grenouilles where we had our first French baguette.
There were actually a lot of little cute shops in this area, and we also stopped and got my first sweet French crepe (caramel).
Finally, we took some pictures of the Moulin Rouge on our way back to our Airbnb.
It was a long day of walking, and we were beat!
You can check out our second vlog of this day here:
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