Weddingbee Blog

On our fifth day in Paris, Mr. Taffy and I braved the Louvre, one of the largest and most famous museums in the world. Although very excited, we were already quite intimidated by the museum before we arrived (the guidebooks we read while planning made it seem impossible to get through). Seeing the incredibly massive building in person didn’t make us any less nervous! Because of this, we blocked two days to get through the museum.

We arrived just before the doors opened, full of anticipation.

We entered through the museum pass doors and started following the signs to the Mona Lisa. To our surprise, we saw Winged Victory (Nike of Samothrace) almost immediately after entering the museum! It was just as amazing as I thought it would be… this piece was definitely worth the wait to see face to face!

We made a turn and saw more iconic sculpture. Who wouldn’t swoon after seeing this?

Right down the hall, we saw our first Michelangelo sculptures.

And very soon after, we stumbled upon the Venus of all Venuses!

Surprised that we had seen so much in so little time, we followed the signs to the Mona Lisa, which was much bigger than we thought it would be! For years, we have been hearing about how incredibly small the painting was in real life, so we were expecting something 8 x 10 inches or smaller. Although not large, it was a decent size, especially after all we had heard! I won’t post a picture here, so you can see for yourselves.

At this point we had been in the Louvre for around 40 minutes, and had visited almost everything on our “must see” list! Realizing we had the whole day ahead of us, we started wandering around at a leisurely pace.

Our jaws dropped when we entered the Apollo gallery, which houses the French crown jewels. It was so ornate! The ceiling depicted the signs of the zodiac.

Another ornate ceiling reminded us that this museum was originally a royal palace.

We stopped to rest in the Cafe Richelieu, which was a beautiful, affordable and convenient place to have lunch.

It also offered fresh air and an incredible view!!!

I enjoyed some much needed caffeine and sugar.

And admired the view again.

After lunch, Mr. Taffy did some sketches while I ate sorbet.

Then we went to look at the painting collection. I was thrilled to see three works by El Greco, one of my favorite painters.

We headed back toward the sculpture…

Where Mr. Taffy posed with his back up statues.

We also visited the apartments of Napoleon III. In my opinion, these interiors were even more opulent than those at Versailles (more on that later!).

As it got closer to closing time, the museum became very crowded with student field trips and tour groups.

We took one last view before leaving the museum. We were excited to see the Eiffel Tower in the distance!

It was super hot in the pyramid!!!

After the Louvre, we walked to the adjacent Jardin des Tuileries, which we had visited on our first morning in Paris. We were pretty tired after the museum visit, and happy just to sit in the beautiful park.

We decided to make a quick visit to the Palais-Royal, which was nearby. Mr. Taffy took my photo in front of these very French blue doors. We saw them everywhere and I became obsessed with all of the beautiful shades of blue!

We loved the quirky stools in the courtyard of the Palais-Royal.

We made a quick stop to the gardens…

And then headed to the Arc de Triomphe to see the sun go down over the city. We climbed all the way to the top…

And looked down on the heavy traffic, which consisted of cars, trucks, motorcycles, and bicycles. I cannot imagine driving any of those things with all of that traffic!

The view from the top of the Arch was amazing!

See the Sacre Coeur on top of Montmartre?

We waited in anticipation to see the light display of the Eiffel Tower.

I loved seeing the light on Mr. Taffy’s face!

Although it wasn’t completely dark, the tower started to sparkle!

And then lit up completely.

We watched the sun go down…

Saw the Sacre Coeur light up…

And watched light beams rotate from the Eiffel Tower.

After enjoying the night time view, Mr. Taffy coaxed me down the stairs. We were happy to see that the scaffolding had been removed on one side of the Arch.

We were excited that we had the next day free, as we initially thought that we would be at the Louvre for two full days. While we rode the metro to our hotel, Mr. Taffy researched other museums that would accept our museum pass.

Our sixth day in Paris was a significant one—the last day of my twenties! It began by taking in the view outside of our hotel.

We had a lovely breakfast at our local bakery, then headed to the Musee des Arts et Metiers, which was just a few blocks from our hotel.

(The weather was lovely that morning- this exterior shot was taken a few days later)

This awesome museum houses the National Conservatory of Arts and Industry. It reminded us a lot of the Henry Ford Museum, which we visit often in Michigan. Being the geeky product designers that we are, we loved discovering the unique collection here!

This bat inspired turn of the century aircraft is sure to melt any steampunk’s heart!

I loved this Telegraph!

And Mr. Taffy just about lost it when he saw these turntables.

My favorite piece in the museum was this Victorian spy camera that was very fashionably hidden!

The gears of this letterpress machine were beautiful.

I wish I could have the record player on the far right!

We had a wonderful time roaming the halls of this Museum. It wasn’t crowded, and is covered by the Paris Museum Pass. We highly recommend it if you are interested in history, science, art, or all of the above!

We left the museum and headed over to the Pantheon, eager to use our museum passes again.

The interior was breathtaking! It was also nice and cool… a great place to take refuge on a hot summer day!

We made our way up the many stairs to the top of the dome. Sound familiar?

We stopped to take in the view below…

And once again enjoyed the view of the city! It was really fun to see Paris from so many points.

This was the best view of Notre Dame…

We climbed back down the stairs and visited the crypt, which holds the tombs of many accomplished French, including Voltaire and Victor Hugo. Afterward, we went to the front of the building, where we admired the impossibly large front doors!

We walked over to the Jardin Des Plantes, which is located behind the Museum of Natural History.

On the way, we grabbed some food and wine, then found a lovely spot underneath this canopy of trees. The shade was so welcoming on such a sunny day!

We enjoyed our delectable French food…

And this wine! I may have put this bottle down a little too quickly. I have to admit, it felt odd to straight up drink a bottle of wine in a park! Hee.

By then we were full and a bit tipsy. We wandered over to the rose garden located in the park.

If you are planning a trip to Paris in late May or early to mid June, this garden is a must see! It was so charming and romantic. The colors were so beautiful, and the fragrance was incredible!!!

The flowers seemed to go on forever!

What a beautiful way to end my 29th year!

We take a lot of “self portraits” while traveling together… but somehow we had trouble getting this one started! (Of course the wine had nothing to do with this.)

Almost there…

There we go!!!!

Next, Mr and Mrs. Taffy spend her 30th birthday exploring Versailles!

See our first glimpse of Paris here!

Have you been to the Louvre? Was it as crazy / huge/ crowded as you expected? What did you think of the Mona Lisa?