Good Morning, Notre Dame

So jet lag does funny things. We both woke up around 7 am, and figured that it was as good a time as any to go explore central Paris and brave the french-speaking world. We ended up in the middle of the morning train commute, which was exciting. Fortunately trains don't get gridlock. We wandered around in the 1st Arrondissement and Ile de la Cité, and felt very touristy at Notre Dame. But I suppose that's what you're supposed to do there. It's really amazing what people could build way back when before cranes and bulldozers and all of our modern construction conveniences.

We also went to the Musée d'Orsay, which was a pretty amazing museum. We'd walk into rooms and see all sorts of famous paintings out of art books... except these were the originals by Monet, Cezanne, Renoir, Degas or Van Gogh. And even though the images were often familar, it's really neat to walk up to them, because you can see all the bumps of paint and the brush strokes. I'm not sure why, but I was surprised at how abstract all those paintings are close up, but I suppose that makes sense if you consider the impressionist style. Also, I think I would have liked to visit that museum with my Uncle Alain, because as an architect, I bet he could have answered my questions about the building itself. It was an odd mix of your classic old building/palace type place and super modern train station. Kind of odd.

By around noon the jet lag caught up again, so we headed back to St. Maur, got bread and coffee and wandered around the town a bit before taking a nap. Vacation pace is awesome. 
On to the pictures:

This fancy hotel had American flags all over. Happy 4th?

Obligatory picture in front of said fancy hotel to prove the previous one wasn't stolen from the internet. We were there!

On Pont d'Arcole, crossing onto the Ile de la Cité

All the bridges crossing the river are pretty.

Are captions necessary?

no, not really.

There were lots of pretty things today. The gardens outside Notre Dame were some of them.

So many roses! They all smelled wonderful.

We meant to also take a picture in front of the building, but forgot. It was covered in scaffolding, anyway.