Alright, it seems I’m motivated to make an attempt at getting back at blogging! I have a lot of posts to catch up to, but let’s continue with last year’s Paris posts first! Since it’s been more than a year, I largely have to rely on pictures we took to bring back some of the memories, so forgive me if I can’t remember every single detail anymore… Here we go!
On Friday (July 6th) we woke up after a tough night of sleep. It was really hot and our hotel room’s air conditioning wasn’t exactly great. However, we challenged the day with courage! I took a lovely shower and then we went downstairs to have breakfast.
The breakfast room was positively tiny and filled with chairs and tables, but the offer of food was really nice. They even had my favourite thing to have for breakfast on holiday: Coco Pops Choco! That made me very happy.
The breakfast room also had a tv on the wall, that showed the news. At that moment, the big news items were the rescue of the boys stuck in a cave in Thailand and the men’s world soccer cup. It was nice to still be connected to the rest of the world, but not too much.
After breakfast we returned to our room, changed into our outfits of the day and relaxed a bit. We were going to the Louvre museum and had to be there by eleven, so we had plenty of time.
Once we were ready, we went on our way! As always, we took outfit pictures every morning, although my mom wasn’t always as enthusiastic about it as I was (even though she looked really nice every day).
We took the metro to Gare de l’Est, where we transferred lines to head for the Louvre. However, I spotted a very familiar and colourful girl at Gare de l’Est. It was Marina! What are the odds of just walking into her by chance!? I was happy to be able to hug and chat a bit with her. We soon said goodbye though, as she had to go to school and we would see each other later that weekend anyway. ♥
We arrived at metro stop Louvre Rivoli and exited the station. The Louvre was right next to us! Even though this was only a side building, it was so beautiful, filled with statues and details! We calmly crossed the street and entered the passageway to the Louvre entry. However, I noticed my dad had called us on my phone, so first we called him back. Turns out something was wrong with our bank account, but it was easily fixed. However, I had to urge my mom to get off the phone as 11 am was approaching. We said goodbye to my dad and walked on. We could see the glass pyramid in the distance.
The Louvre building looked beautiful as ever and the sun reflected in the glass pyramid. Usually I’m not into the ‘combining old and new together’ architectural thing, but I do love this opposition of styles quite a lot here.
As there was already a long line for the people who wished to enter without pre-bought tickets I was very glad we had done so the night before. We almost weren’t allowed to join the pre-bought tickets line because I didn’t have a ticket, until I explained I would only have to show my passport. Then we were allowed in, yay! I was glad we didn’t have to spend ages in the already hot sun just to get into the museum.
Our bags were checked and we were scanned for harmful objects, after which we found ourselves inside the glass pyramid. A huge, gold statue stood right in the middle. We followed the stream of people going down the nearest escalator and arrived at the ground floor, the heart of the Louvre.
I went to pick up a map at the information desk. As we had visited the Louvre before, back in 2012, we had made a plan for this year’s visit. We wanted to take things very slowly and make sure we would at least see my favourite painting and my mom’s favourite sculpture. As both were located in the Denon wing, that was where we headed.
We followed the route, which took us up a floor and right into… a gift shop! We looked around for a bit (as we are shopping addicts) and then continued our way to find the painting.
We wandered around some massive halls filled with the most amazing paintings. I particularly liked one of Napoléon named ‘Napoléon on the Battlefield of Eylau’, as I have a deep interest in Napoléon (as you will see further down too).
Finally we arrived at our first goal: ‘The Coronation of Napoléon by Jacques-Louis David. I completely fell in love with its size, beauty and impressiveness the first time I saw it and since they recreated it in one of my favourite musicals, I was thrilled to see it again!
We spent a (slightly ridiculously) long time staring and taking pictures, as we wanted to try and take pictures of it without other people standing in front of it. But I was very happy we did, as I love this painting so much!
Finally we went on and after some walking got to the famous ‘Winged Victory of Samothrace’. Even if you’ve never seen or heard of it, you can tell it’s famous by its prominent position and the hundreds of people gathering around it to take pictures of it. We hung around for a while and had a lot of fun recreating the pose of the sculpture.
I have no idea what sort of route we took, but we wandered the (hot) halls and looked at so many gorgeous paintings, sculptures, ceilings, walls, ornaments and jewels! The Louvre is just so amazing…
At last we found my mom’s favourite sculpture: ‘Psyche Revived by Cupid’s Kiss’ by Antonio Canova. My mom loves this sculpture so much, she has a smaller version at home standing on the piano! I understand her love for it though: it’s so beautiful and detailed.
We decided to go back to the gift shop, where I got some nice, Napoléon-related items, among which a clear file with my other favourite Napoléon painting: ‘Napoléon Crossing the Alps’. Since they sold clear files and posters of it, I presumed they’d have this painting hanging in the museum. That’s an understandable conclusion, right? I really wanted to see it, so we went to look around for it, but unfortunately we couldn’t find it and asking a guard didn’t help either, because at first he showed us a painting that wasn’t the same at all. After asking someone else, we were told we could find it at the Richelieu wing, which was on the other side of the museum, so we went on our way.
While crossing the huge Louvre, we came across the Cour de Marly, which my mom really likes, so we decided to have a look there first. It’s a really beautiful square filled with sculptures and with a glass roof that shines natural light on them beautifully. Despite the heat, we spent some time there.
When we finally got to the Richelieu wing, we walked right into the apartments of Napoléon III, which were absolutely stunning! Walking there was so strange, as it really felt like you had gone back in time. The rooms were decorated with giant chandeliers, gold, curtains and velvet chairs! I really loved walking around there.
Ah, just looking at the pictures we took reminds me of the scent and the atmosphere of thick carpets and curtains. I am really happy I got to walk around in the apartments. Everything was just so beautiful…
Unfortunately, the painting wasn’t at the apartments either. Even better: someone told us we could find it in the Denon wing, the wing we had come from! And so we went back there, but again: no one knew where the painting was. Finally I found two staff men who could help me out (and who were apparently also very interested in my cleavage x) ). Turns out the painting isn’t in the Louvre at all, but in Château de Malmaison, empress’ Josephine’s residence. Why sell items of a painting you don’t even have on display!? XD Oh well, we did get to see the amazing apartments, which I never would have if we hadn’t been looking for the painting.
By now we were super tired (duh), so we sat down at a museum cafe and had a coke. There was a lady sitting next to us who thought my mom and I were very cute together, as we were taking pictures of one another making faces. XD
Finally, we left the Louvre through the Carrousel du Louvre (which is a long shopping centre) and decided to rest by sitting in the shade of the trees in the Parc des Tuileries and have something to eat. My mom got us some delicious food while I guarded our things and we spent a long time eating, chatting, feeding the birds, glaring at an annoying kid, taking silly pictures and just resting.
According to the pictures, we walked by Angelic Pretty briefly when we left the park, but I somehow don’t remember this at all, so I don’t think we went inside. However, I do remember suddenly not starting to feel well at all, so instead of going to the metro, we re-entered the park and sat down in chairs in the shade of the trees again. When I felt a little better, we slowly walked to the nearest metro station and went back to our hotel.
Back at the hotel, we cooled off a bit and decided not to put in too much effort for dinner. We were quite tired due to all the needless walking and we wanted to spare our energy a bit. We ended up having dinner at the nearest McDonald’s, as it was close, easy and nice.
We spent the rest of the night attempting to cool off and resting. It had been a long and hot, but very fulfilling day.
Thank you for reading! ~☆~
