Monet, 2 Louis, and a birthday!

Day 15

Today was husband's birthday. How wonderful to spend it in our favorite city on another brilliant day!

It was the Journees du Patrimoine weekend but we decided to visit the Musee Marmottan Monet. It was easy walking distance through gorgeous streets from our apartment on Rue Raynoard. Picture perfect buildings everywhere!

The Jardin du Ranelagh park looked inviting.

The Musee Marmottan Monet has long been a favorite because of my love of everything Monet. But the mansion itself is gorgeous and filled with incredible art.

Sisley, 1891

Gustave Caillebotte,

Monet, 1884

Renoir, 1881

The Monets take up the whole basement and are a chronology of Monet's career and his brilliance.

My favorite, the painting that gave the movement its name, Impression Sunrise, was back from loan and a joy to behold.

After this wonderful visit, we decided to get back to trying new things and headed out to the Louis Viutton Foundation in Bois de Boulogne. Uber was the easiest way there and very inexpensive.

We arrived and were immediately impressed with the Frank Gehri designed building. And we were surprised that entrance was free--because of the Journees du Patrimoine.

We were hungry and decided to have lunch in the Le Frank restaurant. It wasn't great but filled us up enough to enjoy our visit.

After lunch, we went up to the top and made our way down. The architecture is the star with the views as the costar.  We loved it!

We wandered in the garden and I was able to capture my favorite picture of us this trip!

We wandered through the Bois de Boulogne and could see how families would love this park. There was a long-ish line to get into the Jardin de Acclimatation.

We directed ourselves to the Metro and were treated to more pretty buildings.

I'd gladly trade my reno for this reno! :)

Back at the apartment to pack and then toast the birthday boy with wine recommended by the nice man at the wine store.  I loved the view from our apartment windows.

Tonight was a special treat: The night fountains at Versailles!

We were excited to return to Creperie Des 2 Portes in Versailles where we'd had a memorable dinner in 2012 with our niece (they gave husband free beer!). It had changed hands and was more "commercialized" rather than mom and pop-ish but the crepes were delicious and we had a nice table outside.

We made our way to Versailles were blown away! The sunset was magical, the fountains were gorgeous, the music was perfect, we loved everything.

We didn't stay for the fireworks because we had an early departure the next day. But, after one last peek at the Eiffel Tower as we walked home from the RER stop, we had decidedly had a wonderful last day and night in Paris!