So we’d best be up early, there was a lot to fit into today before we had to be at the airport this evening to start our long journey back home.
We’d packed last night so we were able to get out of the apartment by 8:30 or so. It was all too hard to arrange a taxi in Paris. Everything I’d read said booking a taxi could leave you open to having to pay for the taxi from their departure point, something that could turn out expensive if they taxi was coming in from the suburbs. The best way to grab a taxi is from one of the taxi ranks, however much searching of the internet the night before was reasonably inconclusive in respect to locating one nearby with any confidence. There was one somewhere on Blvd de Clichy, so we’d see if we could see it, but basically if we’d walked that far with our luggage, we were already nearly halfway to Gare du Nord anyway.
In fact the hardest trial was not worrying about a taxi or walking to the station, but rather getting the luggage down the apartment stairs without killing myself. The steps showed every bit of their 400 years of wear and they were steep.
It had rained overnight so the streets were wet as we walked through Montmartre to Gare du Nord station, past the shops just opening up for the day, and the early risers heading about their business.
We walked along Blvd de Clichy with no taxi to be seen, past the metro station, and then continued along Rue de Dunkerque towards Gare du Nord.
At the station we were able to drop off our bags with no problems at all, thank God, and we grabbed a simple breakfast at station café.
A lot of people come and ask for money in Paris. A lot of them do not look like beggars either, such as the lady that was asking all the clients while we ate our croissant and drank coffee.
We caught the metro to the Louvre, passing a beautiful violinist as we made our way out from the station and up to the Passage Richelieu.
Then there was the queue. It was long, really long.
Some people wandered off and came back with tickets, but they still had to stand in the queue, so I wasn’t quite sure what was going on there.
As long as this queue was, it was still moving reasonably quickly and eventually we passed through security to be inside, only to find I had to queue up again to get the actual tickets. Ah, now I see what those others were doing grabbing tickets outside.
The queues inside weren’t anywhere near as bad however, as there were many separate banks of ticket machines. It didn’t help though to find on arrival at the machine that it only took credit cards, and I didn’t have my card anymore. So I ended up queuing in that line twice before finally getting our tickets.
Michelle’s feet were killing her, and I of course wanted to see absolutely everything so we explored some parts of the gallery together, and other parts separately. There is just so much to see here, some 35,000 items on display, so it is impossible to see it all though I sure gave it a good try.
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| Marly Horses |
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| Seth checking out the medieval louvre |
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| 1st prize: Best wrapped mummy category |
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| Cat mummies |
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| 1st Prize: Most arrows in St. Sebastian category |
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| Can some-one please explain? Googling snakes and nipples is NSFW |
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| Catelyn Stark? |
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| Sisterly love |
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| The lion's got my baby! |
But eventually our journey home was upon us, after just barely scratching the surface of the Louvre, of Paris, and indeed of Europe. I am looking forward to when we will again have the opportunity and privilege to travel here again.
We made our way beneath the inverted glass pyramid, and caught the metro back to Gare du Nord to collect our luggage. I was not able to work out how to use the automated machines to get the train tickets to the airport; they required some sort of special card, so I bought them from the ticket office, and we were all too soon on the train towards the airport; a much simpler journey out of Paris than our trip in just a few days ago.We arrived at the airport with some hours to waste so wandered through the duty free shops and drank lots of coffee.
The first leg of our flight was pretty uneventful; it was quite uncomfortable, but I managed to sleep most of it. When not sleeping I watched the Lego Movie and did some reading. I find it quite useless watching movies on planes. The screen is so small, and at least where I was sitting, the plane’s engines make it impossible to hear the movie without turning it up so loud that my ears end up aching. So reading and sleeping is good.
Hong Kong was a good chance to stretch the legs for a couple hours before the 2nd leg.
More went on during the 2nd leg of the flight home, or maybe I was just more awake for it.
Up front was a very noisy baby, and I was dreading the flight thinking this poor kid would be screaming for the next 12 or more hours. The parents were playing with the little one, and she was laughing and giggling away. Much better than crying, but I couldn’t help thinking they were winding this poor kid up something shocking and she would be screaming instead of sleeping. But it was worry for nothing, as I never heard another peep from her the whole flight.
The guy in front of me, however mustn’t have been enjoying his flight, though was certainly enjoying the complimentary drinks. I counted at least 5 per hour when I wasn’t sleeping. He was totally drunk, and ended up spending a lot of time staggering to the toilets. He wasn’t any trouble though, unless it was him that farted continuously for the last three hours of the flight.
This other small group however were nothing but trouble: a woman with her two friends perhaps, certainly travelling together despite them booking separate seats in the centre aisles about 5 rows apart. Perhaps it was to try and ensure as many free seats as possible amongst them? When they weren’t moving around, which was almost constantly, or sitting in the wrong seats during take-off, they were spread out sleeping across 5 seats, and constantly getting told off by the airline staff for one thing or another. Those flight attendants have a lot of patience. Last I saw of the woman, she was walking towards Australian customs with a huge bag full of food and fruit. I’m sure it was undeclared, as well.
Passing through customs and coming into Australia was a real breeze, even if the facial recognition didn’t work on me. I’m sure it was because I forgot to take off my glasses, and nothing at all to do with the 6 weeks of hair and beard growth covering my head.
Coming through duty free I also grabbed my allowance of alcohol; who couldn’t love a 1 litre bottle of 70 proof Kahlua! Why can’t I buy this normally!?!
We made our way to the pickup spots: the sun just rising, icy cold, wet, the mist coming out of our mouths when we breathed. But it was good to be back home, to see my kids and friends again, to sleep in my own bed, to catch up on favourite missed tele shows, and to dream of the next trip.
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