More Museums, More Culture

We started our day walking through Jardin du Luxembourg while we pondered what to do for the day...eventually settling on visiting Musée Rodin. Located in the Hôtel Biron where Rodin lived, the museum was set up in 1916 when Rodin donated his works to the state in return for the for the state undertaking to preserve the building. It was a fascinating place to walk around with Rodin's major works throughout the gardens and smaller works housed inside.

The gardens of Hôtel Biron

Le Pensevr...The Thinker...perhaps the best known of Rodin's works

The original le Pensevr...part of la Porte de l'Enfer

The complete la Porte de l'Enfer...Gate of Hell

Other works by Rodin

We left Musée Rodin and made our way past the Hôtel des Invalides...which houses the Army Museum...to la Seine where we turned towards Musée d'Orsay. Our objective was to make another attempt to see the Impressionist galleries up on Level 5...and this time we were successful...just. Not long after we arrived, multi-ligual announcements started about some property left somewhere in the museum. These were repeated continuously for about 15 minutes before they stopped to ...and all the time we were half expecting the announcement to change "please leave the building". Fortunately they didn't so we were able to see everything that we wanted to.

Outside Hôtel des Invalides

Musée du Louvre from the roof of Musée d'Orsay

Jardin des Tuileries from the roof of Musée d'Orsay

A sneaky inside shot of Musée d'Orsay...sneaky because you aren't allowed to use a camera inside

The crowd in the Musée d'Orsay was much smaller than we expected so...somewhat foolishly perhaps...we decided to drop into Musée du Louvre. We had spent the entire day here three years ago and so this time went for a quick visit...not that any visit can really be quick as the place is so big...to see the Madonna again. Even though the museum wasn't particularly crowded, the Madonna is such a popular exhibit, it was still a "bun fight". After visiting that gallery, we then went to the other side of the museum to visit the Napoleon III Apartments.

Madonna...

...attracts a large crowd at any time

The Napoleon III Apartments

Having ended up walking further than we probably should have, we found our way back to our hotel for a much needed rest before going out to find dinner.

A Walk Around the Left Bank...and a bit more

On our overseas holiday three years ago we bought a Paris guidebook. It has a number of suggested walks in it, one of which travels around the Left Bank and finishes at Jardin du Luxembourg. This morning, finding ourselves at the finish of this walk, we decided to do it...in reverse. Our route took us past shops and cafes until it brought us to Église de Saint Germain des Prés, the oldest church in Paris...where we stopped off to have a look inside.

Église de Saint Germain des Prés

Inside Église de Saint Germain des Prés

Our walk continued on until it brought us to the Musée National Eugène-Delacroix...a museum dedicated to Eugène Delacroix that is set up in his former home and studio. After touring the museum, we had a pleasant interlude sitting in the garden courtyard before taking up the walking tour again...which finally brought us to its start and our end at the Bibliothèque Mazarine, a historic library by la Seine.

A typical narrow Parisian street

The garden courtyard of Eugène Delacroix's house

At this point we crossed over the river to the Musée du Louvre that was opposite and walked along the Right Bank looking for some lunch. We had walked this way three years ago and had found a quaint cafe off the main roads...and we found it again today. Café A la Tour...on the corner of Rue Saint-Germain l'Auxerrois and Rue Bertinn Poirée...a good place to stop for some simple and cheap food in the heart of Paris.

Crossing la Seine on the Pont des Arts

Courtyard of the Musée du Louvre

After our rather late lunch, we continued our not-so-little walk...going on to the Ile de la Cité and walking past Cathédrale Notre-Dame before crossing back to the Left Bank and walking back to our hotel, passing la Sorbonne on the way.

Cathédrale Notre-Dame

Cathédrale Notre-Dame

Another typical narrow Parisian street

La Sorbonne

Day stretching into Night

After a big day yesterday, we needed a more relaxed day today...especially as we had a booking for tonight. Although it isn't part of the Museum Pass, we decided that we would go to the Musée Marmottan Monet as it has a significant collection of works by Claude Monet. Out past Trocadéro, it is best accessed using the M9 Metro or RER C...but as our hotel isn't near either of those, we used buses instead.

Directly outside our hotel was a stop for the Route 38 bus directly into the heart of Paris...so we caught one to Châtelet. The Paris t+ tickets are really great...you can by them 10 at a time to save money and they can either be used on the Metro or the buses. If you use them on a bus, you can change buses as often as you like for 90 minutes from their first use. So at Châtelet we changed to a Route 72 bus which took us alongside la Seine to Trocadéro. At this point we probably should have caught another bus but instead we walked up through the la Muette area to the museum.

Tour Eiffel

Trocadéro

The streets of la Muette

Musée Marmottan Monet started in 1934 when Paul Marmottan left his house and artwork collection to the French Academy of Fine Arts. The collection has been added to over the years with the most significant being the bequest of Michel Monet, Claude Monet's second son. As a result, the museum has a huge and interesting collection of Monet's works and works by other artists that Claude Monet had collected. One of the most evocative paintings on display was Impression, Soleil levant...the painting that was to give the name to the genre.

Impression, Soleil levant...copied from the Internet because you weren't allowed to take photos

 

After we left the museum, we walked back to la Muette where we had lunch and then on to Trocadéro. Here we caught a bus back towards Paris but only went part of the way...getting off at Place de la Concorde so we could go to Musée de l'Orangerie...the home of Claude Monet's Les Nymphéas and the Walter-Guillaume Collection. It was particularly interesting to come here following on from Musée Marmottan Monet as there we had seen some of the works that had been the lead up to the final work of Les Nymphéas. Although it wasn't all that late, after the Musée de l'Orangerie we went back to our hotel for a rest...which would have been more of a rest if we had caught a bus back instead walking all the way.

Part of Les Nymphéas...copied from the Internet because you weren't allowed to take photos

Renoir's last portrait...on loan from a Japanese collection

Painting by Paul Guillaume

Just before dinner time, we were off out again...before leaving Australia we had pre-booked tickets for the top of Tour Eiffel at 8 o'clock. The plan was to head over to the tower and have dinner before going up. After studying the bus map a little more carefully, I discovered that we could catch a Route 82 bus across the road from our hotel and it would take us to Trocadéro without needing to change buses. Once there, we headed back into the la Muette area to find some dinner...and to avoid all the tourists.

On our way to find some dinner

At the appointed time we presented ourselves at the gate for pre-booked tickets and bypassed the crowds still queuing to buy theirs. It still took a while to get to the top as it was a very popular time...but we made it before sunset. It was all rather magical watching the sun go down and Paris slowly light up as it got dark. Eventually we had a fill of the sights and left the tower to go back to our hotel. By then the Route 82 buses had stopped running so we had to fall back to a combination of a Route 72 followed by a Route 38 bus to conclude a very long day.

Up there...that's where we are going

The sun goes down...

...and Paris lights up

Waiting for a bus