Walking 1000 miles from Lands end to John O'Groats in aid of The Air Ambulance (starts april 7th 2024)

Friday, 17 January 2025

day 3 A British kind of sunny

Yep the promised clear skies really didn't show today! 
Freezing cold and grey perfect for museums and brisk walks! No idea how many miles I walked today but the feet are complaining tonight! 
Up early and breakfasted, yes another cheeky packed lunch obtained, and I was walking through the mist back to Laumier metro station 
and heading on to the easy and now familiar metro, getting about this way got me to the Louvre nice and early where the queue for tickets was actually shorter than for the pre booked! Yeah they did move to the entrance more quickly but no great shame there, the architecture around me was gorgeous! 
Entering the museum via the glass pyramid I didn't see any sign of Tom Hanks or Mary Magdelane! I blamed the mist 😉
I can't possibly post all the photos taken in the museum so I'll keep it fairly minimal...love how the little old lady photo bombed the last image! 
In true metal detecting style I even found some gold staters! Greek ones tho, really makes you see the design and how the Briton tribes really messed up their designs over the years! 
After I've no idea how many paintings I reached saturation point and couldn't take anymore cherubs or voluptuous nudes or gallant french officers! 
A good dark piece by a British painter got through!devils outside the castle of Pandemonium..... Personally I thought it looks a bit too like the houses of Parliament! A concept a bit too accurate right now! 
I'll not get political tho.....
Out of the Louvre and walking through the gardens in the chilly misty afternoon I wandered on to the champs Elysee with it's avenue of trees, statues and column fronted buildings.and apparently vicious gulls if this particular statue was anything to go by! 
On down the Elysee past an Egyptian column/needle?with the arc du triumph in the distance, the Elysee continues here but starts to turn into a busy shopping street before hitting the hectic swarming of cars around the Arc d triumph rather than join the odd suicidal pedestrian crossing the rat race here I used an underpass to reach and a take a photo of the Arc.

Onwards with the late afternoon turning freezing cold my roads through Paris took me to the Eiffel tower which you can mostly see. 
They'd closed off the top of the structure due to zero visibility there so I took the lazy option and used the lift up to the second and farthest (currently) platform, just below the cloud level which was dropping relative to the temperature, still pretty good views from herecold but glad to have ticked off this bucket list item it's down and off to find the nearest metro to get me back to Laumier and the hostel..... More importantly to a warm meal and pint!