Saturday: "Is your lucky day... to be in Paris with Amel!"

So, all that was written Friday night and the internet was working when I started writing but by the end it had disappeared (though oddly enough skype was working - right until I fiddled about and then I lost everything!) and THEN I then couldn't get to sleep until gone 3.30am because it was simply TOO HOT! (My clever-clogs clock read 29.6 degrees!)

Anyway, Saturday I woke and went to see Kamal, to get him to try and fix my computer and I bumped into Vanessa who asked if I was still going out with Amel (who is French-Tunisian) today. So I ran back to her room and asked if she wanted to see the Louvre and she said she'd love too, we then turned to see another girl walking up the stairs with a divine thai-smelling curry. Her name was Mona, she is from Lebanon and is evidently quite an amazing cook! We invited her along too and she said yes.

So about an hour later we set off, me deeply excited, and we WENT TO THE LOUVRE!

It was incredible, we came off the the metro and saw this mosaic from MEXICO on the wall:

and it was all done like being in the pyramids and we came out into the welcome area where we got our FREE tickets (God bless the French Minister for Culture who decided all europeans under 25 should get free access to museums!) and then we went off in search of the Mona Lisa, seeing many sculptures along the way.

It was all beautiful and I simply couldn't take it all in at all. Amel was amazing: we walked through the mythology section and she could tell me the stories for each and every painting! We also walked through rooms of Greek and Roman sculptures (a little scary having seen Dr Who!) and also an Egyptian exhibition, where I found an egyptian mirror! These are some of my favourites:

Here's Mona's room:

And here we are together!

This made me miss Mum!

Most of the ceilings were ornately decorated and had paintings like this:

Then we found ourselves in an exhibition about the Louvre itself! It used to be a fortress and this was the dungeon!

Amel thought it was hugely funny to growl and make Mona jump but just as we were leaving she did it again and it must have echoed because I swear it came from behind me and made me jump out my skin!

This was the mirror:

This is an ancient Egyptian game and it looks like Frustration on a frog, but it is in fact a hippo (?) but I have no idea how you play.

Around half three we left. The girls were tired and our legs and feet were aching so Mona went home and Amel invited me to come shopping with her. I had my first "Quick" burger (a french Burger King equivalent) and then Amel took me to the FNAC.

This shop is incredible. It's on three floors and we only went into the book section on the ground floor but I honestly could have spent all day there. I found a card which I loved and she told me it was from Petit Nicolas, a famous series of books which she then led me to. She also showed me this absolutely stunning book of photography of women around the world. The photographer was Olivier Föllmi and you can check him out here. I was astonished to see that everyone just stands around or sits down and properly reads the books. Amel and I discussed all our favourite authors and stories from when we were little (she SO loves to read, she works in a bookshop and I don't think I've ever met anyone more fanatical about books than her!) and she picked out some of her favourite french ones (one of which I ended up buying).

Amel was looking for a cupcake kit. Cupcakes are a new craze in France, they apparently didn't really exist before but now it's quite cool to make them and I cannot believe I left my stuff at home! Amel was looking for a kit for her sister because she cannot find one anywhere at home in Provence - she was especially after the cupcake cases and I was amazed that they aren't sold in supermarkets! (Mum, I need to remember to bring a couple of packs back with me for her!) We looked at a good many cupcake books and I suddenly realised I hadn't had cake since leaving home. We both had quite serious cravings which we vowed to see to upon leaving the shop.

In the BD (comic book) section there were little sofas and Amel showed me a series called Les Nombrils which is about a very normal teenage girl and her two boy-obsessed friends - really quite funny - and we sat and read and then all of a sudden it was 7.00!

So we went to pay for our things and then took a wander outside and Amel took me to the Centre Pompidou, essentially a huge free library with tvs which show channels from around the world, internet, a museum, cinemas, music, just everything you could possibly imagine, and she showed me round and we went and found more books by Olivier Föllmi, which were beautiful. I also saw this book which made me giggle:

Then we came out and saw this: (Dad bought something like this in France when we were very young and I remember playing exactly like these kids)

Amel then asked me if I'd seen Notre Dame. I said no, and since it was just round the corner, we wandered off to find it

- it was beautiful, we got it at sunset and were delighted to discover we could go inside!

We saw people up on the roof and Amel asked a lady if we could go up and she pointed one way and said if it was open we could. It was very firmly shut but on our way out the door I told Amel to ask the man there if there was any way we could go up. He hesitated and looked at us but then said if we hurried we could get round at the side gate. We found a diminished queue and were told it'd be free, thanks once again to the minister for culture, and began our ascent.

It certainly was a good work-out and what with the heat we were dripping by the time we got there but it was worth it:

This gargoyle pulled a funny face for the camera:
We live by that tower! (ish)

The Hunchback of Notre Dame lives here:

We continued round and then discovered we could even go right to the top if we waited! So we did and it was breathtaking. Amel pointed everything out to me and was very excited too since she had never been up there before!

There was a nice breeze round this side which was music to our skirts!

We got quite dizzy coming down but these are the legs...

..which climbed all the way up there and back down again!

By this time it was quarter past ten (time had flown!) and buoyed up by the wonderful day, Amel said there was still one thing she had to see. She'd heard tell of the most famous and exquisite ice-cream shop in all of Paris, Berthillon, and had always wanted to try an ice-cream from the shop itself.

We found it.

Along with a queue.

As you can tell from this picture, I had 1 scoop dark chocolate, I scoop cocoa - extra bitter, and one scoop white chocolate and each one truly lived up to expectation!

We then came home, tired but very, very happy.