An Australian Girl in Paris - Part Deux: More Sights

This morning gets off to a slow start. My partner-in-crime is still under the weather and I've had a somewhat unstable nights sleep. You see, sometime in the middle of the night I rolled over and some of the slats on my bed came off their frame and I ended up half on the floor. Since I couldn't really fix it without power tools I was forced to try and sleep like this for the rest of the night. That didn't happen.

We're going to tour Paris by double decker bus today. We've rugged up accordingly since the best view will be on the top of the bus, which is all open.

Pretty much every building in Paris is photo worthy. To avoid making my few readers feel like they've been invited to a boring slide night, I'll keep it to the biggies.

The Louvre

Did you know that there are 2 Arc de Triomphe's in Paris? I didn't. There is the Arc de Triomphe du Carrousel, below, which right near the Louvre. The big mama (twice the size of this baby) is one of the most famous landmarks in Paris, if not the world. It's full name is the Arc de Triomphe de l'Etoile. I must admit I did a double take on this thinking for a second that it was 'the one', but then remembered that 'the one' was at the end of the Champs-Elysees and we weren't there yet.

Arc de Triomphe du Carrousel

So, thoughts on the Louvre:

1) it's freakin' huge

2) you'd to come here every day for a year to see everything properly

3) wow, 17th century painters really liked religion and boobs

4) my feet hurt

5) I'm so glad I did that.

Smack bang in the middle of what has to be the worlds biggest, scariest and craziest round-a-bout, the Arc de Triomphe stands in the middle of Place Charles de Gaulle, the meeting point of 12 (yes, 12) avenues. There are no traffic lights, no pedestrian crossings and apparently, no rules. I've heard horror stories of family trips to Paris with dad driving, mum navigating, kids in the back getting stuck on this thing for ages. I'm sure driving around it has caused more couple fights than IKEA furniture assembly.

Arc de Triomphe de l'Etoile

Louis Vuitton on Champs-Elysees

Now, I'm not really one for churches, but Notre Dame is absolutely spectacular. It's huge and the detail is just incredible. It took almost 200 years to be considered fully completed and boy, it has seen some action over the years (including being desecrated during the French Revolution, after which it underwent a restoration).

Notre Dame de Paris

And here is little old me doing the shameless tourist shot. Just be thankful I wasn't holding a gnome or doing that finger perspective thingy.