I was doing pretty well for the first part. But being in Paris with a person who has never been there before and wanting to show them ALL THE THINGS takes a toll on your feet. Especially at the Louvre. Never again!

Although… it did amuse me to catch Magikarp by the pyramid fountain there. Maybe I’ll make an exception.

By the fourth day, I was sort of museumed out, but we still had more to cover. I had fond memories of the Picasso museum from the 90’s, though it didn’t seem to impress my hubby. He did, however, have a transcendent experience over Monet’s water lily paintings.

The Musée D’Orsay was the only museum that I really required us to go to, so I was completely exhausted but very happy to be there.

I tromped all over the museum until I found my favorite painting by Henri Rousseau. I was exhausted but I was not going to miss this painting.

Despite the fact that we were there for 10 days, it really felt like a whirlwind tour of Paris. I felt more like a tourist than I was used to feeling. I lived there for a while during school, so I was kind of accustomed to being more of a resident, enjoying la vie quitodienne. I don’t even know if I can recommend little out-of-the-way places in Paris at this point. We basically staggered home each night, ate in one of the little restaurants on the way to the hotel from the metro station, and then passed out in bed till we got up in the morning to do it all over again.

Oh wait! I do have one kind of an interesting fact to share; it seems that the iconic surly waiters of Paris have been replaced by adorable hipster waiters who laugh with you, make jokes, generally seem happy to be alive and help you with the menu. That was kind of cool.

But I really missed going to little grocery stores and looking at weird food packaging, sitting in cafés and sketching (as trite as that sounds I actually am an artist so I art a bit here and there ;)… also, COFFEE) and having random people talk to me about what I was sketching. The French are dear, lovely folks with a different set of priorities than North Americans. They won’t tell you their life story in the first 20 minutes that you meet them (like my happy Texan cohorts) or chatter aimlessly about life. They will ask you about your politics and expect you to be able to back up your thoughts and feelings with the reasons you think so. I understand that and can more or less do so in French, but I also find it super adorable when they get happy chatty about me sketching AND being able to speak French (despite the fact that I am an American who learned the bulk of my French in Texas.) It’s the little things in life, you see.

It was just going by too fast.

Oh well. I suppose I’ll just have to go back.

I thought it was going to be cold in October, but I was in short sleeves every day, which was really nice walking around the parks and made for some fairly striking pictures of the sculptures there, but seriously half the clothes I brought I couldn’t wear because they were too warm. I was frankly a little disappointed not to be able to wear my scarves. I’d worked so hard during my time in France to master the art of wearing a scarf all for it to be too sweaty to do so! C’est la vie!

And finally we ended up at the Eiffel Tower at night.

Beautiful… and still, to this day, startles me with how big it really is when you walk up to it.

Also new, and saddening, is all the security that they have around the base of the Eiffel Tower. The last time I went there in 1999 it was free and open, there were hotdog vendors who sold amazing hotdogs with the mustard that their grandmother made that morning (holy cow, so good) and now you have to go through a long line, a gate, and an inspection of your bags and generally cranky security folks who would much rather be drinking wine in a cafe enjoying the atypically beautiful October weather thankyouverymuch.

Dear human race,
Can we please get our acts together and be nice to each other so that we don’t have to go through this crap? Thanks ever so.
Love,
fredlet

Again, we got back to the hotel about 2 in the morning, so I was rather looking forward to parking my weary butt on the Eurostar for a few hours to get to London for a sneaky little trip-in-a-trip. 20k steps a day (according to my FitBit) can wear you out.

J’❤ Paris.

Also, J’ ❤ this bunny.

Next up, those London parts… stay tuned.