travel tuesday: paris museums and eiffel tower!

I am still feeling miserable after my wisdom tooth extraction five days ago and after napping, reading, and trying to cover my pain with around-the-clock pain meds, I am excited to escape a bit from my misery and reminisce on my second day in Paris this past August (see our first evening here).

My sister and I purchased the Paris Museum Pass for 6 days and we loved it. We were able to save a lot of time and money with the pass and ended up seeing more museums than we had planned since they were included in the pass. For those who love museums, look into it! You can choose between 2, 4, or 6 days and there are 60 museums that are included in the pass!

We started off at Saint-Chapelle,  one of the surviving buildings of the Capetian royal palace on the Île de la Cité. Although damaged during the French revolution, it was restored in the 19th century and retains one of the most extensive collections of 13th-century stained glass anywhere in the world.

We then walked over to the neighboring, La Concergierie. A former royal palace and prison in Paris, France, it is part of the larger complex known as the Palais de Justice. Hundreds of prisoners during the French Revolution were taken from La Conciergerie to be executed on the guillotine (Marie Antoinette is the most famous prisoner).

(This is what Marie Antoinette's prison cell looked like)

Our next stop was Musee d'Orsay, which was originally a railway station, Gare d'Orsay. It now holds priceless artwork from the Impressionism era (my favorite type of art!)

 

 We couldn't walk away from this area without snapping some photos on the Pont des Arts, aka Lovelock bridge, where lovers place a lock to signify their undying love. Apparently, the bridge is getting very heavy from all of these locks and they are cut-off every few months in attempt to lighten the load, but new ones always end up appearing. The guy who cuts the locks can't be a winner with the ladies ("Oh, what do I do? Umm, I cut off the lovelocks so the bridge won't be too heavy . . ." Unromantic, I'd say!)

 We soon headed to Musee Rodin, which contains the largest collection of the sculptor’s works at two sites, in Paris, at the Hôtel Biron (where he lived and created many of his works), and in Meudon, site of his former home. Auguste Rodin’s donated his works and collections to the French State and the museum opened in 1919. 

  

The Thinker

Eve and The Shade 

 

The Three Shades

We still had some more energy, so we walked a few blocks to Invalides aka Musée de l'Armée, the site of Napoleon's tomb. It had just closed for the day, so we walked around the beautiful courtyard.

We learned a lot and walked a lot, so we decided we were going to relax the rest of the evening.

And we did just that. We walked across Pont Alexandre III and headed towards . . .

Oh, bonjour, Tour Eiffel! Fancy meeting you here!

 

We enjoyed some delicious gelato as we gazed at the sunset behind the Eiffel.
We felt so blessed to have the opportunity to be in Paris and see all of this beauty!
It really just took our breath away.