Paris, the second day

So this morning Megan and I hit the streets with our usual zeal for attacking a new city. Or I should say, my usual zeal and a sleepy eyed Megan. But we had heard it was necessary to get to the Louvre early in order to avoid the large crowds. And we almost did! I mean we got there relatively early but it wasn't long before the place was swarming with tour groups. This coupled with the fact that we were feeling particularly goofy made for an interesting day.

We spent the former part of the morning looking at all the artwork for peculiarities. It is interesting to note, that while, yes, many of these artists are skilled beyond my abilities, it would almost seem that they (the curators of the Louvre) were just trying to fill the place with art, no matter what quality it took. And I imagine that it is difficult finding pieces to hang in the Louvre, but in all honesty, some of the stuff was not that great! I took a couple pictures of the peculiar elements, mostly saints and Jesus flying around the scenery in odd ways.

As we progressed further and further through the museum, and time continued to pass, the crowds of people turned into throngs. We decided the best technique would be to stay in front of the groups as best as possible which pretty much made us move at their pace. I described this as "body surfing on a wave of asians."

We finally felt we had seen the Louvre as much as we were willing to and pointed ourselves through the Arch du Carrousel and through the Jardin de Toulleries onto the Champs Elysee where we had lunch at MonteCristo. Boy, was that expensive! I think after conversion it was near 100 bucks for pizza, pasta and two drinks. Oh, I forgot the 12 dollar bruschetta. I thought it couldn't possiby be any more expensive until we stopped for a soda and it cost us $3.50 for a 12 ounce bottle! I think I can leave Paris behind until I have more money.

After snapping a few photos of the Arc du Triomphe, we headed over to the Eiffel tower where we eschewed the prospect of waiting for over an hour to go up to the top and satisfied ourselves by sitting in front of it and people watching.

We had a good morning of touristy stuff but by day's end we were pooped and we both were jonesing for Mexican for some odd reason (perhaps we were tired of bread and cheese in all its varieties?). We managed to find a pretty decent french-mexican restaurant! We were so excited! It wasn't the best mexican food but it was as good as one can expect from the French. The margheritas were spot on but Megan's burrito had swiss cheese in it and the salsa was a little vinegary for my taste. Still, it was Mexican and we were glad to have it. In addition, we seemed to be the only tourists amongst a packed house of Parisians in large groups (seemingly for birthdays and divorce parties)-- which was only made more interesting by the "house" band and its frontman, who gave shout-outs to "Tomas and Meget from Kansas City" several times. He also took requests; "La Bamba" was a no-go, but he certainly knew "La Cucharacha," which made Tomas incredibly happy (despite the guy not knowing all of the lyrics and singing the same line over and over again). It was definitely a fun night.

Anyway, sorry for the late post, we're great and moving to a Hotel in about an hour. Yay!