You want more?.... Well OK then.

Musee D’Orsay

Converted railway station on the left bank. It was pouring down with rain as we walked along the river from the Pont Neuf, we were wearing all summery gear (T-shirts, sandals) but had stuffed a couple of plastic macks into our rucksack so we hastily put these on. Somehow there’s nothing that says “summer holiday” to me more than wearing a plastic mack and being rained on. The gallery itself is a wonderful space. There’s a cavernous central area with sculptures and older paintings with the real treasure (a big impressionist collection) housed upstairs. What I loved most here is I got to see the originals of some paintings which my parents had posters of when I was very small. They’re so familiar and yet I felt like I was really looking at them for the first time.

Notre Dame

We kind of “did” this one in passing. We’d just come from the Marais district where we’d had rather a strange meal (3 frankfurters on a piece of lettuce, and nothing else) in a deli-style restaurant. We were heading somewhere else but realising that we probably wouldn’t make the effort to come again specially we thought we’d pop in. It is undeniably a beautiful building and the two ‘rose’ windows are incredible. The crowds of tourists did have an impact though. It is hard to feel the peace or majesty of the building when you are shoulder to shoulder with so many people. We just kind of shuffled round the perimeter and then left.

Errrr.... what else. I can’t think. Obviously we saw all the bridges, like I said before, and we wandered around a few different areas. We went into a big department store next to the river and Kirsty had a manicure in a posh boutique. We had some very nice meals in restaurants - and drank beer and wine. One night Kirsty ordered a ‘White Russian’ (vodka, kalua and cream) but the waitress forgot to put the kalua in it, so Kirsty got a glass of vodka and cream. Yuk! We thought the cream must be off it tasted so bad.

Actually rather than trying to fit in the meals and stuff here I’ll save them for next time.