Monet, Monet...

... seems to be the theme of this trip to Paris for us. Having whetted our appetites at the Monet Exposition the day before we headed to the Museum de l'Orangerie to see the famous water lillies exhibit there. There are two oval purpose-built rooms in the museum for displaying the huge canvases. They were really beautiful. We are at odds as to which room was our favourite. The rest of the museum was also a delight. The straight-forward layout was a welcome change from the Louvre from the day before. There was a good mix of Impressionists - Renoir, Matisse, Sisley and Cezanne. There were some new names for us as well that we particularly enjoyed, like Derain and Soutine. Most of the exhibit came from the personal collection of Jean Walter and Paul Guillaume who had commissioned many of the pieces. The museum had tiny dioramas of one of Guillaume's flats in Paris and they showed where many of the paintings were originally hung. It would be our dream to have rooms with that much quality original art.

Next we struck out on foot across town to the church of Ste-Eustache. An amazing example of gothic architecture inside with voluminous arches. The sheer size of the church was impressive enough, but there were also incredible carvings, stain glass and painted walls. We have to agree with the guidebook that it is one of the most beautiful Parisien churches. It definitely put to shame the next stop on our tour, Ste-Sulpice. Although it has an impressive front facade, it is clearly in need of significant restoration and a good scrub.

We finished our across Paris walking tour by going through the Jardins du Luxembourg. While they are very pretty, even in this off-season, we were booted out by the gendarme within minutes of arrival, so couldn't quite take them all in. It is definitely on our list for the next trip.

Overall the day was great. We did lots of walking interspersed with stops in cafes for coffees and croque monsieurs. We were well tired by the time we got back to the hotel so we put our feet up for a while and then headed out for dinner. We have to mention again our favourite brasserie, Suffren, and their amazing roast chicken. No visit would be complete without it. It was a fantastic way to end the day.

We did have time for an in-room movie after dinner. Knight and Day has been slogged by many a critic, but we got our fair share of laughs from it. By no means should it be winning any Oscars, but we found it quite enjoyable in a silly, action-movie sort of way.

Finally, the PDC World Championship of Darts is now officially over for another year. In what must have been quite a match to watch, Adrian Lewis narrowly beat Gary Anderson to take the title. He even became the first person to throw a 9-darter in the finals, to boot. Not that I would have postponed or changed anything about this trip, but it would have been nice to see some of the final matches. We still have it on our to-do list to go see a finals match at some point.