Paris--Day 2

Day two in Paris... December 30, 2011. We decided to head to the Louvre and to Notre Dame, since the Louvre would close early on New Year's Eve, and we had no idea how long we would want to spend in there.

 Getting ready in the hotel. 

 We started playing with the different functions with my camera, including black and white.

 We saw some cool postcards along this same line, so we tried it for ourselves. I wish I could have had someone videotape us, we were in all sorts of weird positions to try to get the right shot! 

 The Trocadero.

 Starting out our walk to the Louvre.

 This one is actually really cool... We walked past it, not knowing what it was. A couple days later (we were still in Paris), we found out it is a life-size replica of the Liberty Torch the Statue of Liberty in New York holds. On top of that, it is placed above the tunnel where Princess Diana died in 1997, and became an unofficial memorial for her afterward.

 Hotel des Invalides.

 Assemblee Nationale Palais Bourbon

 This bridge was a lot of fun to play with perspectives... Arron took this one.

 My mind's eye worked a bit different than his, and I took this one. :)

This one just made us laugh.

The Louvre!

It was a lot smaller than we expected.

 In the other courtyard, where our wait began. From where we got in line, it said the expected wait time was 2 hours. It ended up being an hour and a half, thank God.

 From inside the Louvre. 

 It was pretty crowded!

 I loved this statue.

 The real reason we went into the Louvre! It was bigger than expected, because everyone told us how "small" is was. According to Wikipedia, it's 30 inches by 21 inches.

 Arron really liked the colors in this picture.

 I loved this ceiling.

We did not realize how far away the Louvre actually was, and Notre Dame was even further past the Louvre. From our hotel, the Louvre was 4 miles one way, and Notre Dame was another half mile past that. Which means (not including walking around the Louvre), we walked at least 9 miles in about 7 hours. I dressed to look cute, not to actually walk forever and a day. By the end of the day I was limping from my boots (which are usually super comfortable), and my right knee had started to ache. It was a lesson for me to always Google Map how far away these things are, and to dress comfortably, even if it is like a tourist (jeans and tennis shoes).

We went back to the hotel and rested up, especially since we were still jet-lagged and wanting to nap in the middle of the day. Later that evening, we went to the Eiffel Tower again after dinner to try to play with some of the shutter speeds on my camera to try to get better pictures of the twinkling lights. :)

 The fog was crazy looking!

 Love me some black & white.

 A guy nearby offered to take our picture. It was raining, which accounts for the spots on the lens.

That's day 2, finally. Hopefully will get day 3 up soon! Ciao!