Out first destination of the day was BHV (again) so we took a different route than the other days, walking a bit through less touristy areas of the north of the Marais. Lots of interesting narrow streets and wholesale showrooms for jewellery, handbags, bedazzled motorcycle helmets, and…buttons.
At the BHV, I bought some shoes and we wandered through the four floors of men's clothing. Lots of nice things, and good deals, since almost everything was "en solde" for a couple of weeks. Based on our "research" it seems like stylish, good-quality clothing is cheaper here than at home. Of course, there's also way more selection. In a reversal of traditional roles, Danielle was the one following me around, getting bored and tired.
After BHV, we set ourselves up in a nearby green space - Place la Tour St-Jacques and ate our brown bag lunch. Lots of other people had the same idea, but we had no problem finding a shady bench, even in the middle of this busy area.
Our first stop after lunch was La Conciergerie on Île de la Cité. La Conciergerie was a royal palace and one time and then a prison where Marie Antoinette, Robespierre, and Danton, among others, were held before their respective visits to the guillotine.
The largest part of La Conciergerie is the cavernous gothic hall called "Salle des Gens D'Armes".
We also saw some prisoners' cells, including Marie Antoinette's, and the "Cour des Femmes" where female prisoners spent their days.
Afterwards, we meandered our way across Île de la Cité towards Pont Neuf. Along the way, we saw Paris' idea of public toilets, which we've thus far not been brave enough (or desperate enough) to experience.
We also caught sight of some typical Parisian scenes on Île de la Cité and along the Seine.
We crossed Pont Neuf and it started to rain, which we didn't mind, as we thought it might cool things off a bit, and it also made for an interesting backdrop for some photos.
Once we were across the bridge, we made our way under the covered awnings along Quai du Louvre to the Cour Carrée section of the Louvre where we took shelter in an archway from the rain for a few minutes.
The rain let up a bit and we made our way back to our private entrance to the museum. We started our visit with the "History of the Louvre" exhibit which was very cool and largely made up of walking through the excavated foundations of the original medieval Louvre.
Then we decided to follow the throngs of people to the Italian paintings area. You've seen all of the paintings there, so I won't share the few pics I took of them. I did get some interesting "detail" shots though.
The masses of people were driving us nuts, so we decided to bail out for dinner. The sun was a bit lower in the sky and the light made everything even more photogenic than usual.
We walked north a couple of blocks from the Louvre to Rue St-Honoré and ate at a place called "Coup d'état". Nice combination of a historic-feeling space but with slick, modern elements.
After dinner, we made a brief second visit for the day back to the Louvre. We spent less than hour in the Egyptians artifacts before being shooed out. We're learning that closing time has a slight different meaning in France than at home - it means "we're leaving at the posted time and you need to be out well ahead of that".
Amazingly, we still had some energy, left so we decided to made for the Tour Eiffel. We walked through the Tuileries gardens, which was very pretty in the low light, and there were still loads of people enjoying themselves.
It was dusk when we got to the Tour Eiffel. It was lit up and looking stunning. While we were there, the first "twinkly light show" of the evening happened, and everyone cheered
It was very crowded and we didn't linger, as it was also getting towards 11PM and we still had an hour or so of travel ahead of us to get home. As we walked towards the Trocadero metro, we realized that there was a huge public viewing of whatever World Cup game was happening that night. It was very cool to see so many people of all ages out at night, but we figured we should run to the metro before the ame finished as there were literally tens of thousands of them.
I think our instincts were right to leave the area quickly, as the metro station was crawling with armed police, police dogs, and other security personnel. There wasn't anything nasty going on, but the metro is crowded enough at normal times, so leaving before the masses was a good idea.
Home around midnight, very tired.
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