Today, we spent the morning touring the Louvre. Although it’s my fourth trip to Paris, I had not yet been inside. I thought it was going to be too expensive and too crowded, but neither proved to be true. Yes, it’s 12 euros to get in, but that’s not outrageous for such an amazing museum. I loved the bright, peaceful covered sculpture courtyards.

And I have always loved mille-fleurs style tapestry from the middle ages, and there were rooms filled with tapestry, nearly empty of people:

In fact the only really crowded place in the whole museum was in front of the Mona Lisa, which — with all due respect — is mostly famous for being famous, in my opinion. Maybe it’s amazing if you can actually see it, but it’s certainly not my favorite painting. It’s small and dark and behind glass, and the area in front of the painting is mobbed. People shove you from all sides just so they can hold their smartphone up to snap a photo. Yeesh. No thanks. We went. We looked. We tried to admire (while defending our space from elbows and our belongings from pickpockets). We did not bother to snap a photo, and got out of that room as quickly as possible.

Later we crossed the Seine and found an open door to a beautiful courtyard:

Paris is full of beauty, no doubt, but not this guy:

Seriously? It’s maybe 55 degrees!

We made it to Paris around noon today (Thursday), rather travel worn, but happy to be here. We do keep dozing off even with an after dinner espresso. It will take a few days to reset the internal clock, but at least it looks like spring here.

Our hotel is housed in one of the buildings you see in the background below.

Looks sort of posh, but check out the elevator. A little sign warns that it can hold 5 people, max. I’d be stunned if three fit inside.

We tend to take the stairs, even though we’re on the 4th floor, which is equivalent to the American 5th floor, the ground floor not having a number, being called instead rez-de-chausée. Not so bad going down, but a bit of a workout going up!

Turns out our route would take us within about half an hour of Niagara Falls, so we decided to take the quick detour. We had both been there as children, and we’re pretty sure it was the exact same year, 1964,  either before or after visiting the New York World’s Fair. David was nearly 12, and I was 6. We may have even been on the same Niagara Falls tour boat, for all we know, but needless to say, we did not meet. I mostly remember feeling swallowed by a big smelly slicker and getting rather wet.

No tour boat running yesterday!

I know it looks like I published these in black and white for artistic effect, but these are regular color photos. This is how cheery and sunny it actually was. Brrrr. The mist flying up instantly turned to ice crystals which pelted us in the face. We lasted about 45 seconds.

Roads were dry though, and we made it all the way to New Hampshire last night. Not so balmy here either!

Flight to France tomorrow night, if all goes well . . . .

After Omaha, we were off to the Ramada Tropics Resort in . . .wait for it . . . Des Moines, Iowa. Isn’t the word “tropics” the first word that springs to mind when you hear “Des Moines”?

Not really our kind of place, had we been on our own, but we were meeting Courtney and our granddaughters (who are 7 and almost 6), and, although a mob scene most of the time, it was perfect for them. Look at these smiles!

We only stayed one night there, since we had to keep heading east, but today, just past Gary, Indiana, we got in the wrong lane at a toll stop and found ourselves heading back west on I-90 for a while. Ghaa-a-a-a-a! David managed to keep his cool and got us turned back in the right direction at a crazy, complicated cluster of exits, loops, and ramps–none adequately marked–nowhere near any major metropolitan area that seemed to warrant such creative engineering. Yeesh.

Once we were finally heading east again we passed a new-ish looking roadside attraction: the RV/MH Hall of Fame. I’m not making this up. (We did not stop.) What exactly does a motor home do to earn a spot in a Hall of Fame?

Tonight we’re in Erie, PA, and I’m gradually getting healthier with each day. Can’t believe we’ll be on a flight to Paris on Wednesday. I hope Spring has sprung there more convincingly than it has here on I-90. We heard a radio announcer today saying, “Here in Cleveland, we know it’s Spring when feeling returns to our hands and feet.” I don’t know about you, but I’m hoping for a bit more than that!