Paris is full of museums, as anyone who’s been there can tell you, and many of them are so large that they can take a whole day (and more) to get through. Before you head out to see some museums though, check to make sure they are open. Some of the museums in Paris are closed on Mondays and Tuesdays, as we found out when we got to the Louvre. We actually heard someone mention this on our first day in Paris, but since we didn’t plan to visit any museums that day, we must not have paid much attention. Its not really a big deal if you’ve got a few days and are not staying too far away, but if you had planned to see the Louvre and only had one day, you would be disappointed to find it closed on your one day to visit. For the Louvre you can find their hours of operation at the Louvre website before you go, or just ask at your hotel.
The Musee D’orsay is only a short walk down the river from the Louvre, so we headed over to find that everyone else who had been planning on visiting the Louvre was now visiting D’orsey. Actually, the line moved quite quickly and we were soon at the ticket booth.
While you’re in Paris you may want to consider buying a Musuem Pass. The pass can be bought for 2, 4, or 6 days and costs 30, 45 and 60 Euros respectively. With the pass you can get into over 60 museums and monuments throughout the city. We opted to not get the pass because we had 3 major museums on our list and we were not sure we’d be able to fit any more than that in, so the pass didn’t really make sense for us. But if you were planning on seeing a lot of museums then you might want to consider it.
Two words of advice about museums. PACE YOURSELF. Now, if you’re a seasoned museum going pro, then this advice is not for you. But for those of you who are like me and don’t go to a whole lot of museums, you should plan your visits. If there are exhibits you really want to see, go and see them first. When you enter the museum don’t spend too much time on the first exhibits you see. Many of the Museums in Paris are so big that they can take hours to go through, and if you begin your tour by spending a lot of time on the first items you see, you may find yourself running out of time and energy. So take it slow, enjoy yourself, but give yourself the luxury of moving through the museum in a manner that will let you enjoy your the museum with enough energy (and not too sore feet) to enjoy the items you’ll see at the end.
Another suggestion is to get the audio guide where available. Most of the large museums offer them and they can really enhance your visit with detailed information on many of the larger and more famous exhibits. Also, when visiting a foreign country, much of the information available on signs is in the native language, but the audio guide allows you to hear about the museum in your own language.
The Musee D’Orsay is located in a beautiful, old train station. It has some very interesting sculptures made from several different stones, as well as some very large canvas paintings. Well worth a visit and easily completed in half a day.Well, with a visit to the Louvre (okay, just the outside) and the Musee D’Orsay, we were ready to head back to our hotel. We meandered towards our hotel, enjoying Paris’ narrow streets and inviting sidwalk cafe’s on our way. We also stopped at an internet cafe that I had located while using our hotel’s business center. As with our breakfast, internet at the hotel was very expensive, so I figured we could find somewhere cheaper to check our emails and look up any info we needed.
The closest internet cafe (cyber cafe as they call them in France) was a few blocks away at the Fat Tire Bike Tours office, where a group was just heading off for an evening ride to the Latin Quarter. While we didn’t take a tour, they really are a great way to see the city. The tours usually run for 4 hours, and you have a comfortable bike to get around on. Its a great way to see the city and they have tours that will take you to all the major attractions. Two years ago I took an excellent walking tour of Berlin and highly recommend such tours as a great way to see a city.
During our walk we stumbled upon Pastapapa, an Italian restaurant. The food is good, the prices are very reasonable and the portions are huge, so think about sharing. You can select pastas dishes form the menu, or make your own masterpiece by mixing pasta, sauces and meats. With 7 locations around Paris, there’s probably one not far from where you are. We liked it so much we ended up eating there twice during our stay in Paris.
a la prochaine,
the Travel Bum