July 2010 b

And so we visited a beautiful famous city for a quick weekend jaunt. See if you can pick which city from this first photo...


Fri 23 July 2010
After work we hopped in a cab and 15 minutes later were going through security at London City Aiport. Gotta love the convenience!

Sat 24 July 2010
After a quiet evening at an airport hotel we bussed and trained into town. 

Thankfully tonight's hotel were OK to look after our small luggage before check-in time so we were able to stroll for 10 minutes and find ourselves here:

 
If you haven't figured it out yet, yes we were in Paris, and this is the Louvre. We decided to just focus on seeing the Egyptian stuff, which has always been closed every other time we've visited. Here's a fab egyptian chair with front and hind legs:

Below: Steve amongst the sculptures

 

The interesting this about this stone sarcophagus (of Rameses III) is the "lid" is in the shape of a cartouche. This lid is in Cambridge's Fitzwilliam Museum - so we'll definitely need to make a date to see that too. The body is in Cairo - talk about sharing the chap about!

Looking out the windows gave this lovely view of the church (right) across the street. Aaahhh Paris, you are so strewn with splendid architecture!

When you're not absorbed by the artifacts and artworks in the Louvre, it's the rooms themselves that are distracting. 

The winged Victory has such amazingly fine and delicate subtlety to the folds and curves - it is an astonishing masterpiece and what a shame she's so incomplete.

Before we knew it, it was 2:30 and definitely time to have lunch. Its just so hard to drag oneself out of the Louvre with the lure of more stunning artworks around every corner.
After lunch we tried for the national library, but the interesting museum stuff was just closing up (early) when we got there at 4:30pm. So we headed south, strolling down through the Palace Royal gardens.

With tired feet, we legged it back to the hotel for a nanna-nap and to freshen up. We had an early dinner/snack and headed off to Madeleine (church) for a performance of Mozart's Requiem. The performance was pretty good, although the venue was a bit too echoey for its own good.

 

 Then off to bed.



Sun 25 July 2010
After breakfast we had a 10 minute walk to the world's most extraordinary gift shop. Or that's how it seemed when we walked in.....

Yes this is the gift shop! Loved the details - the glass baubles and enamelled glass panels inset as part of these rondel/icon paintings. The little symbols on all the columns were also subtly relief sculpture. Lush!

 

 .....

Above: you can see the glass panels. This makes the walls seem to glitter and the colours are so intense it's crazy!

OK, so all this it is directly underneath the famous Sainte-Chappelle, early 14th century chapel for the King of France. It is gorgeous and extraordinary. We were really blown away by the lush rich colours and exquisite detail covering every square inch inside! Check this out...

Admittedly the rose window is a later addition - 15th century. Still pretty glorious nonetheless!

Eventually we dragged ourselves away. We wandered down a block or two and came across Notre Dame. Seen it here before, so we kept wandering about, heading roughly back toward the hotel. Check out time was midday so we grabbed the luggage and continued wandering.
Happened by Saint Eustache, stopped to get closer to take a look at it, then decided it was time to head to the airport and home.

 

Mon 26 July 2010
Steve went to work, while Jen had the day off for laundry and such-like. Had the plumber around to fix a tap and do the yearly boiler service. In the afternoon (once Steve got home) we spent a couple of hours in the garden together, trimming back the vines and planting some agapanthus. Sweet.