My Trip to France and Italy, Day 3

This is the Hostel we stayed in from Sunday night to Monday morning.

Here's a clip of the bathroom in our hostel. We were pretty lucky to have a bathroom inside our room, rather than just a community one on our floor. This was a rarity.

He we are, setting off for the airport on Monday morning.

Here I am. I was trying to do a few things with these pictures: 1.) get better at taking pictures of myself with stuff in the background (like famous buildings, paintings, statues, etc..) 2.) Document the growth of my beard. 3.) Satiate my Narcissistic desires.

Here we are on the RER train to the airport.

This is the McDonalds in the Paris airport. The important thing is the "Royal Cheese". Pulp Fiction rules.

I don't know... but if I see a guy wearing a Viking helmet, I take a picture. We're still in the airport here.

Here we have Maryrose (left) and Jacqui (right). They came in on the same day (Monday), and we spent the rest of the day going through Paris with them.

On almost every train ride, you had some person doing something for money. Here it was this accordian player. After he finished playing, he was asking for money, and seemed pissed that we didn't give him any money after taking his picture.

Here we have Maryrose with Jacqui's camera on the train leaving the airport.

Walking through the crowded downtown streets with our full packs on our backs.

We got to the Louvre, and in the first open courtyard was a fountain. So we stopped there for a while.

Here's a shot looking around that first courtyard.

Here we are, settling in by that fountain.

Here's the glass pyrimid that stands over the entrance to the Louvre.

Here's a look around the second courtyard in the Louvre.

This is a statue of Diana, goddess of wild nature and the forest.

Alexander the Great.

And here we have the famous Venus de Milo.

Here we have a better shot of the Venus de Milo.

They had a number of rooms like this one, filled with statues of Greek and Roman mythology. I was in awe. From here we headed off to see the paintings.

Points to the person who identifies who this center statue is supposed to be.

Here's another room filled with mythology statues. I really enjoyed looking at these, but we kinda sped by them to get to the paintings.

This statue was placed in an area of importance, so I'm forced to belive it's important.

Here's a look around at some paintings, and the decorated ceiling in the Louvre.

All the paintings were suspended from this giant metal framework attacked to the tops of the walls. I had assumed they were just attached to the walls for the longest time.

The statues and busts were usually just sitting out in the open, with no glass or anything protecting them. I found that interesting.

Here's the Mona Lisa. I took a number of pictures, as they all appeared to be blurry when I looked at them. I think there's something protecting the painting that's not heloing the photos at all.

That's about as good as it's going to get. The Mona Lisa itself was prolly about 2 feet high and a foot wide, which surprised Mindy and Becky (they expected it to be a lot bigger.

Me and the Mona Lisa

Here's a battle painting by Michelangelo. It was inside a room filled with Michelangelo's sketches.

Napolean.

Delacroix's Liberty Leading the People.

This painting is huge. That's Becky standing in front of it.

This was a painting of the Last Supper. Not the Leonardo one (which is in Milan), but this one was the size of an entire wall.

Here's a look around a room filled with paintings, and a really ornate ceiling.

A painting depicting David vs. Goliath

The coronation of Emperor Napoléon and Empress Josephine, by Jacques-Louis David.

Another painting of David

Mythology statues were seriously just everywhere in this museum.

These two seem to be having a good time.

Here's the entrance/exit of the Louvre, in the glass pyrimid.

We've finished with the Louvre, and are now headed to the Eiffel tower.

But first we decided to grab dinner. So we all got some beer...

I got a lot of beer.

I was quite pleased.

I got a steak covered in this wonderful sauce. It was really good.

This is the restaurant we went to : Le Royal.

After all that beer, I (and others) had to pee. But they charge you everywhere to use the bathroom. This is the cheapest place we could find. It's the restrooms right by the Eiffel Tower. It's still 0.40 Euro just to get in though. I thought that was cruel.

Here's a clip of us going up to the second level of the Eiffel Tower.

And here's a clip of us going to the top.

On top of the Eiffel Tower there are two levels: A lower, enclosed area, and an upper, fenced/open air area. Here's a view of the city from the fenced in area. It was goreous up there. Gorgeous, and crowded. [and yes, we had our packs on our backs at this point.]

Here's another side of the city viewed from on top of the Tower.

Here's a clip looking out at teh sunset, and the city from the top of the Eiffel Tower.

Here's the sunset from the tower.

Another clip of the city from the top of the tower.

Here's a shot of the river from the top of the tower.

Here's the Football [Soccer] field just below us.

A scan across another side of the city from above.

A third scan of part of the city from the top of the Eiffel tower.

A shot down at the lawns and gardens below the tower.

A close up of the garden just below us.

Here's Becky and Me on the top of the Eiffel Tower.

With this view you can see a lot of what we walked by the day before, including the Louvre and that bridge with the golden statues.

And there's the Arc de Triumph.

After sunset, the tower lit up. Here's a shot I took as we were leaving.

Here's a video of the Eiffel Tower at night.

We hopped on the Metro trains, and headed back towards the hostels/hotels.

We finally found a Comfort In, and crashed there. This is the room... they say it fits 3, but we got 5 in there.

Here's a look outside the window of our hotel room.