La conquete de la Tour Eiffel

This is a shot of the little feet that conquered the Eiffel Tower. Yesterday, being the first morning that we woke up to a sunny day in Paris, we headed over to the Eiffel Tower. Unfortunately, every other tourist in Paris had the same idea so the queue for the lift was enormous. Given some of our previous experiences waiting in queues, like at the Statue of Liberty, we were not prepared to do this. So we decided to take the stairs - the girls got their walking feet ready and up we went! All 668 stairs to the 2nd floor (the summit was closed.) Both Pia and Ella were determined to walk them all by themselves with no help from Daddy (who had offered to pick them up a little if they needed assistance!)

We all agreed the view from the top was worth the climb up ....and down.






After the Eiffel Tower, we took the RER over to Les Invalides to see the tomb of Napoleon. The inside of his crypt is covered in reliefs of Napoleon, depicting him as a Roman god who bestowed great gifts on his people. The girls thought they reminded them of the statue of George Washington in the American History Museum, which they saw here.


When viewing Napoleon's tomb the girls were reminded of an anecdote told to me by my Dad. He recalls telling his father that Napoleon was encased in seven lead lined coffins in Les Invalides and he said "That's so the little b----r couldn't get out and start causing trouble again".(As you can see, I have edited the original word here for any children reading!)





And here is some of what we have been doing in the last few days:

A ride on the 'Paris Eye', the huge ferris wheel, from which we also got an 'eiffel'
of Paris (that joke is for my Dad!)










A visit to the Musee de l'Orangerie, in the Jardin des Tuileries. Thus is where Monet's Water Lillies are housed. Monet painted these scenes of his garden as a gift to France after the horrors of World War 1.





We enjoyed lunch in a cute little French bistro near Place de la Madeleine, La Ficelle.
The girls have been sampling 'un orangina' while we have been here, and also 'les jus de fruits'. Today it was 'un jus d'abricot'.

James and the girls on the Pont Neuf.

Le jardin de Luxembourg

We visited Le Pantheon,where the French bury their national heroes, and saw the graves of Victor Hugo, Alexandre Dumas, Emile Zola, Jean Moulin, Andre Malraux, Pierre and Marie Curie, Louis Braille, to name a few.

Le Pantheon

Pia and Ella contemplate a return to Paris one day to perhaps study at La Sorbonne...

I'll leave you with a few other shots of a beautiful sunset mixed with incoming rain clouds taken from our apartment balcony.







A bientot,