Day 3 in Paris and the sun is shining!

The first Sunday of every month is free museum day in Paris.  We have learnt during our time here that
a) the French will not walk any further than they need to - ie the closest possible park to the shopping centre/museum/bakery etc;
b) the French will not pay any more than they absolutely have to and preferably not at all;
c) they will drive like maniacs anywhere and everywhere, even when walking would be easier;
d) they will nonchalantly walk to the front of the queue without a care in the world because - generally they hate to queue UNLESS - it means that they can satisfy point a and b above.

So bearing all of this in mind, can you imagine the queue which had formed outside the Musee d'Orsay on Sunday when it was sunny and the entry was free???? Yup, people everywhere. and there was no way we were queuing up for possibly an hour or two, when we could just pay to go the next day!

So instead we decided to give free museum day a miss and make the most of an absolutely beautiful (albeit frighteningly freezing) blue sky day.  At the Place de la Concorde, the point between the end of the Jardin de Tullierie and the start of the Champs Elysee is a huge enclosed ferris wheel.  If you can fight your way past the beggars and the boys selling miniature eiffel tours, you can pay your 10 euros per adult and 5 euros per child under 11 to go on the ferris wheel.  On a clear day such as this one it really is worth it, you get an amazing view of the city in every direction and it stops often enough to get a few good snaps.  You have to take the photos through the perspex of the gondola but on the whole theyre not too bad.  I got some shots down toward the Arc de Triomphe and back up towards the Louvre, across to the Eiffel Tower and back up too Sacre Coeur.  The kids loved it.

We then walked down the famous avenue to the Arc de Triomphe.  We walked through the christmas market with the ice skating rink, mulled wine, churros, christmas nick nacks and souvenirs and gorgeous christmas decorations.  We stopped at the Louis Vuitton flagship store for a bit of a dream session and dodged ferraris and lambourghinis. We went under the road to the Arc but drew the line at climbing the almost 300 steps to the top!

We finished with a quick Metro trip back up to Abbesses, a gorgeous little enclave in Montmartre just up the road from where we are staying.  Its just one of those place that screams romantic old Paris to me!! And decorated for Christmas its even more beautiful.