Paris: The Louvre

The Louvre (Louv-ra) is the largest European museum, and it feels it.  This place would take days to cover, and after only a few hours I was hot, tired, hungry, and sore.  But I'd do it again.  It's best to hit the highlights, such as the Italian and French paintings, and other famous works.  Of course, the Mona Lisa is the most well-known artwork here.  But be prepared, although the work is speechless, the surrondings are not.  It is in a large room with a giganitc painting opposite it, and it is small and behind glass.  Hundreds of tourists stand in front of it, seemingly unable to move to let short and polite folks like me get near it.  The Coronation of Napolean is a neoclassical work that portrays this big-headed tyrant being crowned emporer.  The Romantic paintings contains one of my favorites:  Delacroix's Liberty Leading the People.  The boy in the painting was Victor Hugo's inspiration for Gavroche in Les Miserables.  Favorite statues include Winged Victory of Samothrace and Venus de Milo.