Paris Adventure: Day 3

Yesterday was full of beautiful Parisian sights. We started out at St. Chapelle, which lots of peole recommended, and we are glad that we followed their advice. We got to go into the short line (because of Ben and the rain) and were slightly confused by the metal detectors and people jumping ahead of us in line until we realized that we were at the entrance of both the Palais de Justice and St. Chapelle. Anyway, it was worth the wait because the stained glass was AMAZING! Josh and I even took the time to look at the individual panels describing the story of Genesis and found the snake, apple, etc. We then took the metro to the Opera. Josh originally said that it was low on his list to see, but I love Chagall and remembered being awed by the ceiling. It was a good choice to go back--the building is beautiful and we changed and fed Ben. We stopped into the Galleries Lafayette to see the Art Nouveau dome and then followed our guidebook's not-so-good directions through the Opera district. We were starving by that time and ate a yummy lunch at Chez Clement, a French chain restaurant, but it was perfect for us. Josh even got to have a mini creme brulee. From there we walked past the Madeleine to Place de la Concorde and up the Champs Elysees to the Arc de Triomphe (with a quick detour past the Petit Palais and the Grande Palais). By that time it was really raining so we headed back to the hotel. But, the sun came out so Josh and I decided to take a walk around the Marais with the intention of going to a cafe that our friend Troy recommended for dessert. We eneded up skipping the cafe for a small French Jewish bakery that I couldn't pass up. Mmmm...bagels, rolls, rugalach...really, who could pass that up? By then Ben had had enough of his parents' wandering and we hurried home only to have him be awake until 9:30PM. Apparently he needed some time (not attached to one of us) to play.