The (dreaded) 40th Birthday...

Sadly we had to wake to an alarm on my birthday because we had reservations to see the Renoir exhibit at the Galeries nationales du Grand Palais 11:30. Now 11:30 doesn't sound too early but we stay up until at least midnight...then have to shower, walk to the metro, ride the metro, and figure out where we are going upon exiting the metro...it's hard to get anywhere before noon.. And this morning was no different. We got there around noon. The exhibit was a bit crowded- and it seemed like they were all French. No obvious tourists (besides us). No one taking photos or speaking English. The paintings were fabulous, I'm not sure if I've seen many real Renoir paintings in my life..They had a lot of information on his life and photos of him (did you know he had crippling rheumatoid arthritis? I didn't).. Grace was a little impatient to go see the Mona Lisa so we didn't linger (besides, it was crowded) although I did stop in the gift shop for some cards. Of course my favorite painting wasn't featured on any of the postcards. Go figure. So we headed down Champs Elysee (walking since the sun was shining)- they are setting up a Christmas market with little white cottages all along the road (opening on Friday)..walked past the Obelisk in the Place de la Concorde and entered the Jardin des Tuleries. There we came upon a man selling pony rides (promenades). He had 4 ponies and 2 donkeys. Grace took a ride on a white donkey but two others got to go along for the stroll (see picture). I tried not to notice the horrible lameness the gray donkey had.. poor donkey. Then we picked up a tomato/mozarella sandwich and crepe avec sucre and stopped at a pond to eat.. Grace saw a man feeding the birds...so...well, you guessed it. She decided she wanted to join in. Suddenly she made a million feathered friends- the duck, seagull, pigeon and sparrow variety! She was squealing with delight.. The people trying to enjoy a rest by the pond were not as delighted.. The birds enjoyed our leftover crepe and bread. Then we finished our walk to the Louvre.. We were lucky; the line to get in wasn't long at all..First you go through the metal detector, then you can buy a ticket at the automated machines. We went straight to the Mona Lisa (of course).. And she did have a crowd around her but it wasn't horrible. They keep the rope pretty far away from her.. no one can get close. Grace was pretty psyched to see her nonetheless. Since there are 11 miles of gallery space in the Louvre I asked Grace what else she would like to see. She said "statues". So we saw some more marble statues. The Venus de Milo was closed though so we didn't see her. Then we tracked down the Egyptian Antiquities.. mainly because I am a fan of the cat mummies..and Egyptian art in general.
After the Louvre we went in the direction of the Metro..did you know there is a shopping mall underground adjacent to the Louvre? I didn't. The first thing I think we saw was Starbucks. Then the Apple Store and Virgin Megastore. Crazy. Grace kept saying "Mom, don't get extracted". She means "distracted" but I don't correct her because it's cute. We had to get back to our place before 7 because we had a tour picking us up... So back to the Metro we went and got off at Hotel de Ville and hiked back up to Rue Charlot.. Got some takeaway food (traiteur) at the Enfants Rouge Market on our corner (chicken kebab, couscous, etc).. At 7 our tour guide Eliza picked us up for our night time Illuminations tour and Seine cruise. Only one other person was on the tour. He was an Indian man in Paris on business.. He kept wanting her to stop the car so he could get out to take pictures but she couldn't- it was a driving tour. The traffic in Paris is ridiculous. There are World Cup qualifying soccer games going on this week and there were crowds out and police in riot gear. Anyhow, our tour drove us past many places we've already seen in the daytime (Grand Palais, Champ Elysee, Louvre, Opera, Galeries Lafayette, Eiffel Tower) and some we haven't seen yet (Arc de Triomphe, Notre Dame)..Then she dropped us off for a 1 hour cruise on the Seine.. That capped off a long but lovely day/birthday...