Le Louvre

This morning we made a huge effort and got going by about 10am, heading for the Louvre. On the way, we stumbled upon a boulangerie (quelle surprise!) and had lemon tarts - divine, chocolate eclairs and pains au chocolat. Mmmmm.....

I had read on the web that there is an alternative entrance to the Louvre to the big pyramid, and dragged everyone around in search of it. Finally, Hugo said he remembered where our bicycle guide guy had told us one was, and we found it. Hugo has a super sense of direction!

The escalator to which he led us took us straight down to the Carousel du Louvre - the area beneath the pyramid, and we bought our tickets with virtually no line, whereas the people upstairs were lined up for over about 30 metres.

The bicycle tour guide also told us that someone calculated that if you spent 25 seconds in front of every exhibit in the Louvre, it would take you over 6 months, 24 hours per day, to see everything. That said, we saw hardly anything! Being somewhat obsessed with Leonardo da Vinci, I loved seeing his paintings. Predictably there was a crowd in front of the Mona Lisa. The Venus de Milo was one of my favourite things today, as were the French sculptures. We also went downstairs to walk around the moat of the medieval castle they uncovered when they were excavating in the late eighties. It was amazing. We saw the bits of towers that were left, and a room from the twelfth century. Fortunately, the medieval people threw out tons of broken crockery and junk into their moat, so when it was excavated, under tons of table scraps about 800 years old, they were able to find lots of information about daily life. We couldn't go inside the dungeon, but we'll see a dungeon when we go to Chateau de Vincennes. It was a great day. I have never seen so many naked men in my life.....

After we got home, David and Rachel went off the Champ de Mars to go running. That's the park opposite the Eiffel Tower. I was glad they went to a park to run, as it's not terribly safe around the streets. I don't mean they might get attacked, I mean they might get run over! Pedestrian crossings are a serving suggestion only, and everybody, including the police, jay-walks. Cars pay absolutely no attention the crossings. I've even had to stop for cars at crossings when the little green man was clearly telling me it was my turn to go!