designed by Diana: My Paris trip: Part 2

Here is the second half of my week in Paris. There might be even more pics in this part, cause it includes my trip to the Louvre and Versailles.

On Day 4, we headed out to the Marais district. Elisabeth, our tour guide, explained the history and significance of this district. She was great at really making the history of Paris come alive.

The center house still has wood framing. Most of these were covered with plasted hundreds of years ago to try and pevent fires.

This is a Holocaut memorial. Paris was taken by the Nazis, but recently they have begun to post plaques and memorials to commemorate those lost.

I the Jewish district in Marais still has one Jewish Boulangerie.

These are some musicians we saw on the street. Pretty cool to have live music as you walk around.

This is the Place des Vosges. It's the oldest square in Paris. Many famous people have lived in these aprartments, including Victor Hugo.

I don't remember what this house was, but was just used it as a walk-through to get to the other side of the street. What a great walk through!

That evening we headed to the Louvre.

Before the Louvre was a ridiculously huge museum, it was a fortress. At the bottom of the Louvre you can see remnants of the fortress, including where the moat was.

Inside the Louvre was also Napoleon's apartment. These brocaded covered pigs caught my eye. They were so cute and weird.

Then we got to this room full of statues. It's made to feel like it's outside, cause the Louvre's designer wanted to make sure that the statues were seen in natural light, as it was inteneded for them.

And in one of the other rooms full of statues, we came across a goddess Diana statue. You know I had to take a picture with her.

And then we were off to meet some famous ladies. First was the Venus de Milo. She was beautiful.

Then we were off to see Winged Victory. She was truly impressive. I think she was my favorite.

And no stop to the Louvre would be complete without visiting the Mona Lisa. She was so much smaller than I thought. I just wasn't impressed by her (sorry Mona).

I had been singing in my head all week "Do You Hear the People Sing?" from Les Mis. And this painting, Liberty Leading the People (La Liberté guidant le peuple) totally made me think of the song even more. I just loved it.

The next morning, we took the RER train to head out to Versailles.

Just a cozy little hunting lodge in the country, turned into a huge palace.

This was the king's bedroom. I love those feathers at the top of the bed.

And this was the queen's bedroom. So girly and floral.

This is the hall of mirrors. It was a huge deal, because these mirrors were all made in France. And mirrors were something hard to come by back in the day of Louis XIV.

After touring the house, we headed out to the garden. Calling this garden HUGE is a total understatement.

Marie Antoinette hated staying thin the main palace and all of the dutires that came with public life, so she often retreated to the Petit trianon, a smaller home in the back of the gardens of Versailles.

By the Petit Trianon she had a little village built, cause she wanted to play "farmer's wife."

Marie Antoinette's hamlet was beautiful. I loved walking around it and looking at all of the little houses she had made for her country village.

There was even a farm with animals and everything.

How picturesque is this? I wouldn't mind spending my summers here.

The last day started with a with a walk, and we passed by the Place de la Concorde. During the French Revolution, this is where the guillotine was. Now there is an obelisk in its place.

We also got a view of the Champs Elysees from the other side.

We started the morning at the Orangerie, seeing Monet's water lilies, but there were no pictures allowed. The water lilies were amazing though. Then we headed to the Orsay Museum.

I snapped a few shots before I noticed that this museum also didn't allow pics. The Orsay museum used to be a train station. The main part of the museum is gorgeous.