A trip to the Louvre

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Partly because of experience at the Uffizi, we got up early this morning for our trip to the Louvre. We booked our tickets online, hoping to avoid any long line ups.

On the subway, we had more buskers today, including a juggler which I thought was fairly brave on a moving train. It was a short walk to the entrance to the Louvre, through an archway and we were suddenly face to face with with giant glass pyramid. The design of the walkways through the reflecting pools makes it look like people approaching the entrance are walking though water.

It turned out the line for the Louvre was incredibly short and our hardest time was figuring out where to pick up our tickets. It turned out to be at a Virgin record store on the lower level.

From the lower level, we walked along through some passage to a place where you can see the original medieval foundations of the castle that would have stood here. It is quite cleaver how they have worked this detail into the modern gallery.

Even though we were relatively early, the gallery was already starting to fill up with school groups and tour groups so we decided to go the the Mona Lisa first and then to explore later.

We walked rather quickly though the Greek sculpture section to get to the Italian painting galleries. As you enter the room where the Mona Lisa is, you see it at the far end, behind what appears to be and inch of solid glass. With so many people vying for a chance to see it, it takes some effort to get close enough to get an unobstructed view. The painting seemed bigger than I remembered it. The colours are are very muted, which helps the Mona Lisa stand out. After seeing the restoration of some of the Rafael paintings in Florence, I can't help wonder if it has always looked this way, or if the colours were once more vibrant.

After seeing the Mona Lisa, we continued our tour at a more relaxed rate. Things that we have seen elsewhere seem to tie together now when we visit museums and we spent some time looking at architectural details that were taken from the Pantheon in Rome as well as Greek sculptures.

The Napoleon rooms that houses many treasures including the crown of Louis XV was quite crowded, but Joshua, who is quite interested in rocks, got close for a good look. Also in this gilded room is a huge painting showing Napoleon being coronated.

In other rooms, we revisited the religious art of the byzantine period which we had seen in St. Catherine's monastery at the foot of Mount Sinai. We didn't linger long in the Egyptian rooms, having had our fill of Egyptian artifacts in the museum in Cairo, though it never ceases to amaze me how much of Egypt's treasures are in museums around the world.

One piece that we had not yet seen here was the Venus De Milo. It took some exploring to find it and like many things, it is hard to believe you are standing and seeing something so familiar for the first time. Joshua found it more interesting to stand on the floor air vent and watch how big he could get as his clothes filled up with air.

Back at the apartment, we spent the afternoon doing school work and after a brief search, found a much needed laundry mat.

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