Paris: The Louvre

We had to go. You cannot go to Paris and not stop by the Louvre. To be honest, it can be an unpleasant experience. You really have to work hard to make it a nice experience. But since there is just so much famous art there, we made the effort to enjoy it. We ended up going 3 times so as to not overwhelm ourselves--Wednesday and Friday night when it is open until 9:45 pm and Sunday morning. Here are my thoughts:

• Our guidebook recommended going on the evenings, saying it would be calmer then. We found that going at 6 pm on Wednesday was still crazy. But going at 8 pm on Friday was a significant improvement.
• Getting there 30 minutes before it opened was actually our best experience. The security line moves super fast once the museum opens, and then you're inside with only a few hundred other people for a little bit. But we made sure to get out by 11.
• The Mona Lisa is never not crowded. The first 50 people in line will always run there immediately, so unless you are one of them, you are not going to see that painting without a crowd. So see it, cross it off your list, and then get out of that room asap.
• The museum itself is so massive and so stocked that, if possible, you should cap the amount of time you spend there to about 2 hours. This is just my experience, but I have found that any more than 2 hours in the Louvre becomes completely overwhelming. And your feet will start to hurt.
• Speaking of feet, Napoleon had slippers made of real rabbits. Creepy.