The Louvre is one hell of a massive building!  They say it would take years to see every piece of artwork – but I reckon we gave it a fair crack in 4 hours.

We picked out a couple of pieces we knew that we wanted to see – the Mona and the Venus and Napoleon’s Apartments.  Then it was just trying to work out how the hell you get from one side to the other.  I was the map reader and I unintentionally lead us into the old moat on the -1 level a few times….. I eventually had to give up the map and admit defeat.

Anyway…. we started out the front with some os the statues…

Then, thanks to some heavy-duty forward planning, jumped the humongous line and went straight into the glass pyramid and into the gallery.  There’s nothing quite like jumping a queue!

We first got to a room with some statues… This guard had obviously seen it all before, cause he was having a little nap whilst we imitated the art.

We found the Winged Woman statue (possibly not its real name) as did everybody else.

The best pictures were taken from this far back though…

The next find was the Mona Lisa.  It’s clearly a fairly popular one as there are direction signs everywhere.

She tends to be a bit of an underwhelming experience because she is so tiny and also because you have never seen people clamber over one another just to get a photo of a tiny painting like these people.

Look at these people!  There were small children being crushed in that mosh pit.  You’d think they would have a line up system or something better this every man for himself approach.

Anyway, this painting is the one that ‘people’ have been saying is just as good, if not, better than the Mona….. I don’t know why.

We stopped up the top for a spot of lunch and fresh air with a lovely view.

Then it was back to the art…. some people obviously consider themselves part of the collection.

There were some famous pieces, some weird looking ones and some were just plain creepy (are you seeing the hand on the back of that torso?)

“So, do you come here often? What do you think of the art?”

Then we finally made our way, following the crowd, to Napoleon’s Apartments – these belonged to Napoleon III – the nephew.  He clearly had just as expensive tastes as his rellies!

Once they have you inside the Louvre, it is very difficult to get out.  We went up and down so many sets of stairs that I wanted to cry.

After the Louvre experience, Tam & Matt needed a Bex and good lay down, so they toddled off whilst Fliss and I kept the pace going and made our way through the Tuileries Gardens.

And up the Champs Elysèes

Right up to the Arc de Triomphe!  The one that our tour guide in Rome reckoned was the fake one because the one at the Forum was at the original.

Only risking our lives a little bit taking the photo from the middle of the road.  But there are people behind us, so we wouldn’t be the first ones hit.  That’s something.