Jilly and I recently had the opportunity to spend a few days in Paris. One of the things we love to do together in a new city is set out early to walk, eat and drink our way through the unfamiliar streets. We usually tackle a different direction or neighborhood each day. This approach allows us to get a feel for the local culture and discover the pockets of communities that give a city its life. It’s amazing how quickly the streets become more familiar.

This recent trip to Paris was particularly wonderful. We were celebrating our ten-year wedding anniversary, the weather was perfect and some good friends from London made the trip across the channel to hang out for a bit.

I kept my camera close the whole time, and these are a few of my favorite shots from the trip.

A morning view of Cité, with the Eiffel Tower in the distance.

The Louvre was too crowded to enjoy or spend any quality time with the collection. This image captures that sentiment well. We saw the Mona Lisa because we felt we needed to, then promptly left to check out some other museums.

I didn’t realize how massive the Eiffel Tower was until we were underneath it. I mean, I knew it was big, but for some reason I was surprised by its delicate enormity.

I love this alley for some reason. It was super quiet and lovely. So Parisian.

The street art was great. Interesting stuff everywhere. I spotted these octopus pieces in a few neighborhoods throughout town. Anyone know who the artist is?

By chance, we stumbled upon 59 Rivoli, an amazing artist residence/squat in the beautiful neighborhood of Le Marais. There were so many great and friendly artists working when we stopped by. Reminded me a bit of the Mattress Factory.

A portable art gallery on the street of Montmartre. What a great part of town. It was quite a hike (we walked the whole way!), but well worth it.

And the Sacré Coeur! So beautiful. Quite a reward for making it all the way to the top.

The entire set of images is up over on Flickr. As usual, everything is CC BY-NC-SA.