When you wake up and see a clear sunny morning, you think nothing can go wrong on this day. So you walk energetically all the way to the catacombs, and find a mile-long queue with no hope of getting in for 3 hours at least. 😦

Luckily, you’ve passed some Lebanese food shops on the way, so you are motivated to walk back, pick up some kebabs and falafel, and you realise you’re so close to Jardin du Luxembourg, so you go and have a repeat picnic. 🙂

Then you scramble to get a refund for the Eiffel Tower tickets because they are on strike, and suddenly you find that your tickets are for the next day, so you can jolly well hold on for another day! 🙂

By now you’re standing on Île de la Cité, but the queues are long for Saint Chapelle and the Notre Dame tower. So you queue up for entering the cathedral, and get in quickly enough. You’re tired and need a pick me up, and you walk right into a pretty alley and find a cupcakery. 🙂

The coffee and cupcake make you delusional, and you believe that the Paris Opera is close enough to walk. You hobble over, walk all around to the entrance and find that they closed 1 minute ago. 😦 You can barely move, you rest on the steps of the opera and watch a man drag and set up a piano all by himself, then play some classical pieces effortlessly. 🙂

You take a deep breath and decide to tackle the mighty Louvre, but not before peeking into a few shops, all of which have gone on SOLDÉS -50%! 😕

There is no queue to enter the Louvre, so you lower yourself into the base of the pyramid, use their lovely loos, then head straight for Venus de Milo. 🙂

You’re really there to see the most famous painting in the world, not for its art alone, but for the scandal generated when someone tried to steal it. You have to go past a whole lot of peintures Italienne and see that Leonardo had a few more beautiful portraits that nobody cares about. Mona Lisa has a wry smile watching all the people elbowing each other to get a photo with her.

You’re in the Impressionist phase and want to look at the French paintings, but to get there you need the stamina of a marathoner, to climb 150 steps. Then you need the stamina of a I-don’t-know-what to look at rows and rows of art, without finding a single Monet or Renoir. 😦 So you ask someone and they point you in the opposite direction from where you came. So you go back all the way seeing all those paintings all over again, and find what you want, and flop on the bench, not willing to move. You would like to see some of the Dutch paintings in the next pavilion, but your body really doesn’t want to move. 😦

After another deep breath (this is your 1264th), you haul yourself out of the pyramid and give yourself a foot massage at ground zero. :-{

You start the long walk home, looking for dinner that’s not (a) cold sandwiches, and (b) Nutella crepe. You jump for joy on spotting a couscous takeaway, and order a lot of food. You get home, eat a sizeable portion of that steaming hot food, chase it down with a glass of wine or two, and collapse into bed, dreaming about the gargoyles of Notre Dame :-O