Day 95. Leanne & Kyle joint blog.

It is cleanup day in Paris, which just means that we need to cover key sights we have missed on our last full day in Paris. Unfortunately we somehow left the two biggest ones for today - the world’s largest museum (Louvre) and Paris’ iconic Eiffel Tower.  

We arrive at Eiffel Tower at 8:45 am for a guided tour we have opted for because online ticket sales were booked up. Our guide Anna is from Moscow but has been in Paris for 3 years and is a freelance fashion journalist. We tell her about Richard (Kyle’s second best BFF in Paris) and the fashion brand he is launching.  She says that it might be a good piece to write about so we agree to make a virtual introduction glad that we could return a kindness to Richard.

Upon reaching the second floor, we are freezing with the wind whipping at unfathomable gusts and of course the California clan is completely under-dressed thinking everywhere in the world is like a sunny southern California day. Our tour guide is so nice that we sort of freeze our way through it.  However we learn the fate of the namesake builder of tower who actually lived in apartment at the top and died in his apartment.  “No doubt he died of pneumonia with this wind which will become our fate if we don’t get back on solid ground,” Kyle quips.

Our scheduled “skip the line” entry at the Louvre is between 12:00 and 12:30. It’s sort of like a fast pass for a museum but if we arrive after 12:30, we would have to wait on the normal line which Kyle’s estimating at 2+ hours. It takes forever to get down from the top of Eiffel Tower and we emerge at 12:05 onto the main street that is bumper to bumper gridlock in both directions.  Our only hope is to cross the street and get one turning onto the cross street that is light traffic. 

“Let’s try the taxi.eu app.” suggests Kyle so we each order one since we need 2 for 7 people.  After time ticks closer, Leanne’s car arrives and we sent 4 ahead but Kyle’s app says the taxi has arrived but there is no site of a taxi with his license plate. Kyle’s phone rings and upon answering, the driver asks Kyle a question in French.  Kyle reaches back to his one year of French in the 7thgrade and says “parlez vous anglais?” (do you speak English).  He is met with a click and Taxi app message “your driver has cancelled.”   He looks at his Google Maps and it’s 12:17 and the app predicts we will be there at 12:36. 

“We’re toast, get ready to wait two hours,” Kyle I says to Leanne.  Leanne says “just you watch, we’re going to make it.”   Just then Leanne spots a touristy tuk-tuk who Leanne has funny feeling can get us there in time so she hires him promising a big tip if he gets us there by 12:30 as we are completely out of options.  Three of us pile into the Tuk-Tuk and off we go.  Now this is no ordinary bicycle Tuk-Tuk, this is a motorized one that seems to have turbo boost blasters on each side.  We are flying through the streets of Paris.  With each bump, we have to hold on for dear life as you go flying half-way out of the thing.  Our driver is clearly focused on the tip and not the problems he’ll have to deal with if we end up as roadkill in front of the Louvre.  

I’m still showing 12:35 arrival time when the Tuk-Tuk drivers turns through a tunnel way that I’m not entirely sure was a legal driving maneuver but somehow manages and pulls up in front of the Louvre at 12:25pm.  We dart from the Tuk-Tuk after delivering the promised tip (this incentive structure clearly worked), meet up with the others, run to the entrance and scan in at 12:28.  Two minutes to spare and we avoid the fate of the long line of people staring at us jealously as our wait was a grand total of 5 minutes.  Kyle is so happy at having made it through, he even smiles when Leanne says “see, I told you we’d make it, Mr. Pessimist.”

Kyle’s Euphoria is short lived though as we get on the end of the line for the Mona Lisa.  The museum has temporarily moved the Mona Lisa to new location during renovations and the line extends back and forth throughout the center courtyard under the pyramid and snakes around the corner.  Who knows how long it goes on from there?  We have both, along with John, seen the Mona Lisa and gotten the requisite selfie but the other four kids haven’t so we have to brave the line.  After when seems like an eternity, we finally make it around the corner and are greeted with the continuation of the line around the first floor and up the elevator to the second floor. Well it turns out the line goes around the second floor, up the elevator, around the third floor, up the elevator…you get the picture. We’re not even sure what floor we finally got to the Mona Lisa but it seemed interminable.

The museum personnel have the operational logistics down to a science.  There is a rectangle roped off.  They let a group of ~40 people in to line up behind the tape of the long side of the rectangle.  They yell something in French (which I presume is “Go”) and drop the tape and the 40 people go charging in a mad dash to be the one in the first row of a three row deep configuration.  The start the timer and after 10 seconds start yelling “last picture, last picture,” and after 15 seconds start yelling “Out, Out, Out Now!”

Watching the group in front of us, we can only imagine our friends asking in Dec when we are back in the states for a break how the trip is going and us responding “the trip is totally amazing, perfect if only one of the kids hadn’t been trampled by an aggressive tour group trying to get a self of the Mona Lisa.”

I ponder the question of why no other exhibit has any line except the Mona Lisa.  I am thinking it is because everyone is scared to admit going to the Louvre and not having seen the Mona Lisa.  No-one is going to say to you “WHAT…you went to the Louvre and didn’t see the antique Roman helmet in section 405-F???” So this means the vast majority of the Louvre’s 24 million annual visitors are waiting online and seems like 2 million were on the line in front of us. 

Because we waited in lone so long in the ML line and the Museum closes at 5pm, we only have ~2.5 hours left. We ask the kids which areas would they focus on in their limited time. “Greek sculpture” one responds.  “I’m headed to the Egyptian Tombs.”  “I want to see the Roman antiquities” responds another 

We asked ourselves who took our children and replaced them with this group giving me these culturally perfect answers.  But then I start to get excited some of this induction into the world is creating a nice base of world knowledge for them.  Every day we jam pack with experience. 

Of course, we can’t just end the day there.  After the Louvre, John and Corey head back to the chateau while the rest of us go on a river cruise with crepes.  Last time we were in Paris and took the river cruise, we went by the replica Statue of Liberty that France created and giving the US their one.  Kyle decides to have fun and says to Ashley, “bet you 5 euros that we’re going to see the Statue of Liberty on this cruise.”  She eagerly responds, “I’ll take that bet, the Statue of Liberty is in NYC!” “Ok, we’ll see.” Well the river cruise ends and apparently they’ve modified their route since six years ago and the jokes on Kyle as we dock without having seen the Statue of Liberty and Kyle disembarks 5 euros poorer.

Frederic has a business dinner so we decide to have dinner in the city after the cruise with yet another French teen we hosted many years ago — Berangere who recently married and works in human relations for a technology company.  Great to catch up with her after nearly a decade since her stay with us!  Kyle bought Richard a thank you present at Disneyland and he also joins us for dinner.  We have a great dinner and bid our French friends au revoir.