Destination: France & Italy
Duration: 15 Days 15 Nights (Sep 02~Sep 17, 2014)
Day 2: Notre Dame, Le centre Grorges Pompidon &
Louvre
We have another long day planned thus we simply bought our
breakfast from the bakery to go. Our 1st destination was Notre Dame
Cathedral so we took Metro M1 from Gare de Lyon (towards La Défense) to
"Hôtel de Ville” Station.
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| Stairs in the hotel - imaging carrying all your luggage up & down... *sweat* |
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| Our Bakery |
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| Chicken Sandwich! |
There was a big park in front of Hotel de Ville so we sat
there to eat our breakfast. May I say Hotel de Ville looked so luxurious and
amazing! I wonder how much does it cost to stay there. We then cross a bridge
to walk towards Notre Dame Cathedral and managed to take tons of pictures
inside & outside of the Cathedral.
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| Hotel de Ville |
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| Walking across the Bridge |
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| This looks nice! |
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| Finally! Notre Dame! |
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| Sammy wants a picture! |
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| Inside Notre Dame |
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| Look at the Stained Glasses! |
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| More Glasses! |
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| A mini-model of Notre Dame |
We continued towards the rear of the cathedral and saw
one of the bridges famous with love locks in Paris - Pont de l'Archevêché. My
gosh! There were really lots of locks here!!!
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| At the side of Notre Dame |
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| At the Garden |
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| There it is! Pont de l'Archeveche!!! |
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| Look at all the Locks!!! |
We then circled the cathedral looking for the tower
entrance but sported a long line. According to the person in charged, we might
have to wait for 2 hours before it was our turn. Oh dear!!! We ended up
skipping this as we simply did not have the time to wait for 2 hours – not to
mention we were also quite ‘crippled’ after long walk yesterday. There are 387
steps (there is no elevator) to the top of the tower.
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| Another Side of the Building |
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| Finally found the Entrance! |
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| A Super Long Queue!!! |
Sainte-Chapelle was our next destination and it was
supposed to be a 5 minutes walk but we ended up walking a big round since we
were lost. Hehee… there was a queue to go in as well but thankfully it moved
quite fast. There were some restorations inside and outside of Sainte-Chapelle
which kind of spoiled the majestic chapel but it still looked amazing –
especially the striking stained glass windows at the upper floor.
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| Another Queue |
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| Sainte Chapelle |
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| Look at the Restoration at the top right |
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| Lower floor |
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| Beautiful huh? |
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| Look at this at the Upper Floor!!! Astounding!!! |
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| How did they even create this? |
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| Part of the Upper Floor is in Restoration Mode |
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| The Most Amazing Stained Glasses EVER!!! |
Conciergerie was closed today so we simply walked around
to take some pictures and ended up in a courthouse to use the free toilet.
LOL!!!
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| Look! Restoration!!! |
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| Inside the Courthouse |
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| Conciergerie |
We then walked to Chatelet station to take Metro line 11 to
Rambuteau station (Direction: Mairie des Lilas) to visit to Le centre Grorges
Pompidon. The building was definitely funky and we were lost again! After we
got into the building, we accidentally walked into the library rather than the
escalator to the top level! We finally found the correct entrance and went up
for a look at the view and the modern art museum.
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| Random Monument on the way to Metro |
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| One of the Towers survived from WW2 on the way to Metro |
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| Here we are! Le Centre Grorges Pompidon |
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| Queuing for entrance |
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| Huh? Library? LOST!!! |
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| Finally we found it! |
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| Going up! |
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| View from the Top |
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| I think that is Basllique du Sacre Coeur at the back |
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| The Square at Pompidon |
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| More views! |
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| I'm Hungry! Ham & Cheese Sandwich from Qia |
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| Into Museum Pompidon |
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| Tired - look at the lights on top! |
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| Small Ball to Big Ball! |
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| Round & Round |
The colorful Stravinsky Fountain was on our way when we
stopped for a late lunch in a Crepe Café. They have a lunch set of Cider, Crepe
with ham, egg & cheese, Salad & Dessert for just EUR9.70. The portion
was big and we were glad to only order one set along with another sweet crepe.
The meal was yummy!!!
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| At the Fountain |
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| It's time for Lunch! |
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| Cider |
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| Crepe with Ham, Egg & Cheese with salad |
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| Look at this!! YUM YUM!!! |
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| Dessert - Sugar & Butter Crepe |
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| Another sweet Crepe with Peach Jam |
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| Entering a Random Church |
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| Even Random Church look nice! |
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| Even when it's in restoration! |
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| Yet another Random Tower |
We then walked to Chatelet Station to take M1 (Direction:
La Defense Grande Arche) to Palais-Royal (Musee du Louvre) for our da Vinci
Code Hunt. We were at the underground level after metro visit and managed to
hunt down the inverted pyramid in no time! Hooray!!!
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| Inverted Pyramid!!! |
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| Let me lift the Pyramid |
We entered the Musee de Louvre with our museum pass at
the underground level as well since it was mentioned that the underground had a
shorter queue if compared to the entrance from Pyramid at the ground. Louvre is
a huge museum so there is no way to see everything in one day. Thus we roughly
followed the 3hours path suggested online (link)
to see the most in our visit.
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| Which way to go?! |
The place was so huge until we were totally confused on
which access to enter (I think there were 4 different access point after the
entrance). So we took the advise from the website and entered through “Denon
Access”. Remember to grab a museum map!!!
Anyhow, we managed to see some of the most famous artwork
in Louvre such as Winged Victory of Samothrace, Mona Lisa, Venus de Milo, Napoleon
III Apartments, the Lacemaker, Code of Hammurabi and the Winged Bull. The
museum is an artwork by itself even without all the paintings and sculptures as
every corridor and every room inside look spectacular! There were also lots of
chairs and sofas in each room for you to take time to admire the artwork –
which we used it to our advantage since we were CRIPPLED!
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| Winged Victory |
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| More artworks! |
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| Lots of artworks! |
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| Here is Mona Lisa! |
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| Look at the crowd at Mona Lisa at the back! |
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| Coronation Painting from Versaille Palace |
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| Everything in Louvre is so exquisite! Even the DOOR! |
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| Speechless! |
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| A view of Courtyard |
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| There is the Pyramid of Louvre |
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| Napoleon III Apartment |
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| Random Sculptures |
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| Code of Hammurabi |
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| Venus de Milo |
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| Winged Bull |
It was 3 hours+ before we left Louvre and took a rest at
the beautiful park around the pyramid. More photos were snapped before we walked
through the courtyard to see the famed Pont de Arts – famous for the love locks
which caused part of the bridge to collapse. A lot of the sections were
replaced with boards so I would say Pont de l'archevêché near Notre Dame
definitely was more beautiful than Pont de Arts.
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| A Picture with Pyramid! |
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| Sammy was there too! |
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| Idling in the Park |
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| Pyramid Pyramid |
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| I think i could fall asleep here |
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| Ponte de Arts |
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| Bye Louvre! |
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| Did you know the big pyramid is surrounded by smal pyramids? |
We then walked in straight line to Arc de Triomphe du Carrousel,
Jardin des Tuileries, Place de la Concorde before continuing to Champs Elysees.
It was a long long walk but the sights were peaceful and beautiful at dusk.
They even had chairs around the park for visitors to rest and admire the view.
=)
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| Walking through Arc de Triomphe du Carrousel |
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| In Jardin des Tuileries - look at the landscape |
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| A Lake in the middle with Place de la Concorde at the back |
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| Let's Chill! |
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| Place de la Concorde |
Champs-Elysées (Elysian Fields) is one of the best known
avenues in the world connecting Arc de Triomphe and Place de la Concorde but we
did not walked until Arc de Triomphe. ¾ ways into Champs-Elysées, we turned
left to have a look at Grand Palais & Petit Palais for picture. I must say
Petit Palais actually looked more impressive than Grand Palais. =P
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| Champs-Elysees |
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| Grand Palais |
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| Petit Palais |
We then walked pass Pont Alexandre III to L'Hotel des
Invalides to take a picture of the building from afar since we had no energy to
walk all the way there anymore. We finally called it a day and get to the
Invalides Station to take M8 (Direction: Pointe du lac) to Madeleine to
transfer to M14 (Direction: Olympiades) to Gare de Lyon.
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| Pont Alexandre III |
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| L'Hotel des Invalides |
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| Even the Metro is a long walk! HELP!!!! |
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| Finally a seat!!! |
It was late and we were too tired to even walk to a
restaurant thus we bought some salmon sandwiches, chocolate tarts and yoghurt
from Monop (bakery was closed already!) for dinner. The salmon was quite thick
but the chocolate tart proved to be most heavenly! FAT!!! Did i mention Evian Water was CHEAP? It cost only EUR0.36 for a big bottle!
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| Dinner + Supper |
Next Day (Chateau de Versailles, Arc de Triomphe & Night Train to Milan)
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