London & Paris for Two: First full day in Paris...

We started our day walking past a bakery.... oohhh la la.. we had to stop. People were walking out with baguettes and just taking piece off and eating it right away. So we had to stop in, we picked up a yummy croissant for Jim and a wonderful individual ham and cheese quiche for me. Oh my it was so good. We also picked up some little other puffs of something with sugar on top. Oh my...... it was fabulous. Puff type pastry with sugar. We were in the Louvre when we started eating them and I was taking pictures and Jim was encouraging to me take as many as I wanted.... little did I know that he wanted me to continue to he could continue to eat these wonderfully delightful treats. I caught on just in time. Here's a picture of Jim enjoying them. By the way.... we're going back tomorrow for sure!

This was when we were still sharing.

See what I mean.... just eating away.

So we went to the Louvre today...I thought the British Museum was huge... nothing compared to the Louvre. It is way beyond anything I've ever seen. You couldn't see everything if you went everyday, all day for a week. So we made our way to the Mona Lisa. I wasn't disappointed at the size because I'd heard it was small, so it was bigger than I imagined. It was a madhouse there though. People were crazy crowding around to take pictures.. it was mobbed to say the least. But I did manage to work my way up and snapped a couple. There were so many beautiful works of art, statues, paintings and on and on. We spent about four hours there and still didn't see all we wanted. It just all became overwhelming, so we took off for Notre- Dame.

Inside the pyramid

Outside the pyramid.

Our cute little donuts were no longer sustaining us so we stopped at a cafe and had wonderful chicken and mashed potatoes. Absolutely fabulous. I don't know what sauce they made for the chicken, but it was so good. And the mashed potatoes, the best ever. After fueling up again we headed off to Notre-Dame.

Jim and I found it to be so much more commercial than St. Paul's in London. St. Paul's is so much more reverant and respectful. Notre-Dame had many trinkets for sale and machines selling coins and prayer cards etc. Not people selling in little booths, but machines that lit up and looked more like Las Vegas. The cathedral itself was beautiful. All the stained glass, which we were allowed to take pictures of. Something St. Paul's didn't allow. The did not have any booklets available in English, they were out. The only thing I wanted to purchase. Anyway, it was beautiful. We couldn't climb to the top as it was too late, but we did take a walk around to see the outside.

All the stained glass was beautiful.

Outside the window

The window from inside.

We then headed back to the Arc de Triomphe for a trip up the stairs to the top, all 284 of them. When we got up there it was beautiful, but cold and windy. Fortunately, one of our stops today was to purchase gloves and a hat for me. It's been colder than either one of us had anticipated. By the way, whatever medicine I picked up last night at the pharmacy, is working because I feel much better.