It was raining and the sun was trapped behind a blockade of grey clouds, but I was in Paris, damn it, and I was going to walk the Champs-Elysees. I only had a hat and a water-resistant jacket, but at least this statue knew how to dress for Paris weather.

My two-day museum pass would expire tomorrow, so I declared museum mania on Sunday. I’d planned on waking at seven o’clock to finish my walk down the Champs-Elysees, through the Tuileries, and directly into the Louvre as it was opening at nine o’clock, but once again my body had other plans. I dragged myself out of bed by eight and had the hotel breakfast again because it was quick and easy, but swore I’d hit a patissiere for some pain au chocolat tomorrow.

Several runners jogged past me as I walked by the obelisk at Place de la Concorde and through the green gardens of the Tuileries. These people were running past famous landmarks in sweat shorts like it’s no big deal! There is so much grandeur and history and postcard material littered around Paris that it seems odd for people to be going about their mundane lives here like people in cities not mentioned in guidebooks.

On my boat tour the first night in Paris, the guide pointed to the large former palace on the river bank and said, “This is the Louvre.” Then the Louvre kept going and going and going and going. It is the largest building I can recall seeing and has more art than I’ll ever be able to see. This is why I downloaded another free Rick Steves audio tour and just hit the highlights like the Venus De Milo, Winged Victory, and the Mona Lisa. The only snag came when I discovered that the first room mentioned in the tour was closed, leaving me lost yet again trying to find room two. I wandered by ancient statuary and Chinese tourists and eventually ended up in the right place.

When I have visited museums before, my brain reaches information overload after about an hour and I leave without seeing many sections of the museum. Having the guide gave me the endurance to hit more sections by only visiting the highlights. Getting the background information on why each piece of art is considered as grrrrrrreast as a box of Frosted Flakes made the visit more memorable and meaningful even reflecting on it a few days later.

People always say that the Mona Lisa is smaller than you expect. So many people have told me this that I entered her gallery thinking I would see a postcard size image. Yet when I saw a portrait the size of a small poster smiling behind the glass, I was probably the only person in the room thinking, “Wow, that’s bigger than I expected!”

After I exposed myself to all that culture, I sat on the Pont des Arts waiting for Francine, my lunch date for the afternoon. As I watched for someone wearing a black cap, a middle-aged man sat down next to me and after a minute asked me something in French, which turned out to be, “What time is it?” He also spoke English, so we then talked about the “situation,” meaning the economy, good things to see in Paris, and he told the peddler trying to sell us a fake gold ring to go away. Finally, I saw a woman in a black hat approach and told this musician and geologist who was named Christophe, “Au revoir.” I greeted the woman in the black hat who looked at me strangely before I heard my name called from 20 feet away and turned to see the real Francine, also wearing a black cap which is evidently popular in Paris these days.

Francine is a friend of a friend who moved to Paris after meeting and marrying a Frenchman. We talked about the French philosophy of working to live, not living to work, and the seven nine weeks of vacation time she gets each year. She speaks French and took care of ordering this creamy, culinary orgasm on a plate for me at a crepe restaurant.

Before I came to France I was told most people here speak English, which they do, so I barely brushed up on my French because I didn’t see the point. I thought speaking in English here would be great, but instead every conversation makes me feel like a jackass who visited a country without having the respect to learn the resident’s language. Not being able to communicate well makes me feel vulnerable. I sometimes get the wrong food delivered to me. I get the wrong type of tickets from the metro office. It’s all a jumble and I can understand why babies cry a lot because it’s unbelievably frustrating not to be able to properly tell someone what you want. Water, food and shelter and basic human needs, but let’s add language to that list too.

Francine also led me through the curvy back streets of Paris to Laduree, the best place in the world to buy macaroons. We don’t really have anything like macaroons in America. The closest comparison I can think of is an Oreo cookie, but that’s not even close. Macaroons have a crunchy crust and gooey insides. I tasted chocolate, mint, coconut, and blackcurrant, all of which were yum.

Francine pointed me towards the Orsay, which picks up in the period of art where the Louvre drops off. The building used to be a train station and is quite easily the coolest museum building I have ever been in.

My museum pass once again paid for itself when I skipped a massive line for tickets and went straight to the security check. I could walk into the Indianapolis Museum of Art with a can of spray paint in my purse, but in Paris they are serious about their art museum security. There was much to love at the Orsay, including the model of Paris hiding beneath a glass floor, the large clock faces on the sides of the building, and the way the frosted panel in front of the 5 stairs of escalators lets enough light in for you to see the shadows of all the visitors walking back and forth.

I walked into the Monet room and instantly thought, I recognize those haystacks. They’re famous! Then I turned to my right and thought, I recognize that woman with a scarf. She’s famous! And then I turned again and thought, I recognize those cathedrals. They’re famous! I was so amazed that this much famous art was in one room that I stopped taking photos right there because I knew my memory card would fill up if I continued photography every notable work of art in this building. Again, I used a free Rick Steves audio guide to lead me toward the noteworthy exhibits since I had a limited amount of time.

Once I’d sucked up all the beauty my eyes could take at the Orsay, I waited for a bus to the Rodin museum for 10 minutes before walking there myself. My feet were beginning to get sore, but I had now become accustomed to this feeling since it was the sixth day in a row that I’d pounded them with sidewalks and sightseeing. Besides, pain and I are old buddies. It’s my really annoying friend who never goes away. I’ve learned to work around its quirks and habits to live how I want to, which today involved seeing some famous sculptures.

At this point, I was beginning to lose my steam, yet I made it all around Rodin’s old mansion and gardens looking at the art he freed from marble. The man was busy. There were a lot of rooms full of rocks. It really makes you think.

I dragged myself to the Metro and returned briefly to my hotel, happy to know I’d gotten about 60 euros worth of admissions for the price of 32, plus no waiting! Then it was off to Canal St. Martin, a recently gentrified section of the city, not known to many tourists. No one here was trying to sell me a miniature Eiffel tower. This was a more authentic Paris, a place where parents took their kids in the evenings to race on their razor scooters and play soccer in the parks sandwiched between the two lanes of roads. I walked only two blocks before coming upon the sounds of drums and this:

An orangutan? He or she was with his friends, a penguin, a polar bear, and about 20 drummers sounding out a rhythm and drawing a crowd to them like the pied piper as they slowly marched down the street. Soon we ran into some people with a sousaphone playing in a square next to some mimes. Yes! Real live French mimes! And no, they weren’t funny!

I had stumbled upon Le Priotemps des Rues, which was quite a lark that I left only to eat dinner at a nearby restaurant. On the way I saw a man wearing shirt that resembled the Starbucks logo, only it said “Starfucks here” and I wondered if he could get away with wearing that in America. Probably.

Then it was back to the hotel once more to vege out in front of an episode of The Mentalist dubbed in German and Cinema Paradiso subtitled in French before turning off the TV and turning in for the night.

I wasn’t sure why the train started playing accordion music on the way to Versailles, but on the ride back I figured it out when I saw a busker hop on at one stop and play us some tunes before collecting tips and hopping off at the next stop. He must hit a lot of trains a day and the man was just an example of how many more buskers and beggars I’ve seen in Paris than London. Twice at tourist spots I’ve had a woman come up to me with a card and ask, “English?” The first time I said yes and was presented with a card begging for money, but the second time suddenly, “Je ne pas parle anglais.” Some of the beggars sit on the streets with cute little sleeping dogs which they probably keep to increase tips.

I wanted to arrive at Versailles, the ornate palace of Louis XiV, right when it opened at nine o’clock to avoid the crowds. My body had different plans and I didn’t crawl out of bed until 8:20, probably because I lost an hour in the time change between London and Paris. I ate breakfast at the hotel because it was quick and convenient. When I filled my coffee cup I noticed yet again that Europeans use real sugar and real milk, not any of the artificial sweeteners and light creamers that you find in America. The sugar even comes in cute little cubes which I delight in plopping into my coffee and stirring away.

I bought a special RER train ticket to Versailles, but I think I hopped on the wrong train at first, so I hopped off at the next stop and felt better when I hopped on a train that said “Vick” on the front, meaning it was going to Versailles. I read up about the place on the 30-minute ride, got off at the station, and made the 10-minute walk to the palace, arriving at about ten o’clock. I was glad I had my museum pass because I got to skip the lengthy ticket line pictured here in the distance.

Once I was inside, I put on my headphones and let the Rick Steves audio tour guide me since it was free off the Internet and not 5 euros like the audio guides for sale at the information desk. His audio guides consist of Rick reading his guidebook chapter aloud, but listening to it is a better experience than walking from room to room with your nose stuck in a book. It frees your eyes for looking. It helped to have the book because the pictures helped me find the right room to go to.

All I can say of Versailles is that it is incredibly ornate and will make even a four bedroom house look like a cramped studio apartment. The gardens make you glad you aren’t in charge of mowing the lawn and trimming the topiaries. They are usually free, but I went on the weekend when the fountains were on so I had to pay a fee, but it was worth it.

I only went as far as the Apollo fountain, but the grounds extend even farther to another house. However, the sky was becoming overcast and I had things back in Paris I wanted to see before closing time, so I hiked and hiked and hiked back up the lawn and only got slightly lost in the bushes.

I got on the train back to Paris and got off without ever passing through a turnstile demanding my ticket, which means I could have bought the one-way ticket and saved myself half the fee since the Paris Metro doesn’t seem to mind if I ride for free. There have been two other times I have entered Metro stations and similarly found open turnstiles, which makes me wonder how much money the department of transportation lose every year and if that is why they can’t afford to clean the graffiti off the trains. On the train back I was again confronted by someone who wanted something, this time a guy with a petition I refused to sign because I wasn’t sure if it was really for more handicapped accessible laws or was something that would get me in trouble. I actually had to get up and move seats to get him to go away.

Sainte-Chapelle was next, a church whose walls are mostly stained glass. It must be absolutely brilliant on a sunny day, but even as rain clouds threatened to close in, it was gorgeous to behold. After visiting Notre Dame, I was expecting it to be bigger, but it was by no means a small church. Like a leggy woman, the ceilings went up forever.

I exited Sainte-Chapelle and stopped in the Conciergerie which is next door. This was a prison where they held prisoners before beheading them, such as Marie Antoinette and Louis XVI. After seeing the splendor of Versailles and Sainte-Chapelle, the plain walls and arches of the Conciergerie were a stark contrast. I also found myself a bit imprisoned when I couldn’t find the exit and looped through the second floor display twice.

I wondered over to Notre Dame because my museum pass includes a tour of the tower, but the line looked rather long and I wasn’t sure I wanted to climb that many stairs, especially considering my next stop. I took the Metro to the Arc De Triomphe and collected another mandatory tourist photo. Visit Paris and collect them all!

I am depending on the kindness of other tourists to get these photos, but it is remarkable how varying their photography skills are. Some people take 3 shots and go into crouches to get the best angle. Then there was the girl who cut off half the Arc in her photo of me and thought nothing of it.

The Arc de Triomphe has stairs, lots and lots and lots of stairs, spreading out one after another in an endless spiral.

I paused to catch my breath twice, but managed to make it to the top. There are two floors beneath the top which hold sweet, sweet, cushioned benches and exhibits about the arc, including a camera view of everyone standing below you.

It finally started to drizzle once I stepped onto the top of the tower, so I could not see as far as I would on a clear day, but the view was still spectacular.

The stairs looked a lot more appealing on the way down than the way up. Once I reached the bottom, the rain had momentarily stopped, so I started to stroll down the Champs-Elysees, a main thoroughfare that is the home to cinemas, shops and restaurants. I walked past Gucci, Peugeot’s car dealership, and too many famous storefronts to mention. I popped into Laduree for a few minutes since they are considered the place to buy macaroons. However, the line was long and so cramped that I was practically licking my neighbor, so I went back onto the street and decided I’d get macaroons later instead of getting claustrophobia now.

I stopped into a Monoprix to buy a salad and some prune yogurt, but forgot to buy a plastic spoon, so I ended up using my finger, which worked surprisingly well. I sat down on a bench next to a middle-aged French man because it was the only spot and he suddenly started talking me up. I was tired and not in the mood for conversation and when he asked if I was traveling alone I decided to travel two benches down instead. My paranoia tells me I saved myself from being sold into an Albanian prostitution ring.

Then the humidity broke 100% and the rain started to come down again. I had made it halfway down the street to Rond-Point, a traffic circle where the shops end. My feet hurt. I was tired. So I decided I would finish my walk tomorrow and descended into the closest Metro stop and headed back to my hotel. I rested my feet, but my stomach was moaning, so I headed out onto the street and in the hopes of finding something familiar to me I entered a McDonalds. I ordered a McFlurry and was elated to discover they have Kit Kat toppings in France. I sucked down the creamy deliciousness as I watched some French television. Word games like Password are no fun to watch when you don’t understand the language. I felt a bit guilty for sitting in my room and wasting any moment I was in Paris, but I also knew I needed to rest and take a break so I could be fully awake to enjoy my trip and not sleepwalk through the tourist sites. I settled into BBC and CNN until finally turning off the lights and turning in for the night.