Louvre, Paris, bout trip

The Louvre Museum in Paris, France, is the most visited and one of the oldest, largest, and most famous art galleries and museums in the world. The Louvre has a long history of artistic and historic conservation, inaugurated in the Capetian dynasty until today. The building was previously a royal palace, and is famous for holding several of the world's most prestigious works of art, such as Leonardo da Vinci's Mona Lisa, The Virgin and Child with St. Anne, Madonna of the Rocks, and Alexandros of Antioch's Venus de Milo. Located in the centre of the city of Paris, between the Rive Droite of the Seine and the rue de Rivoli in the Ier arrondissement, it is accessed by the Palais Royal — Musée du Louvre Metro station. The equestrian statue of Louis XIV constitutes the starting point axe historique, but the palace is not aligned on this axis.

With a record 8.3 million visitors received in 2006[1], the Louvre is widely seen as the most visited culture and art museum in the world. It is also the most visited monument in Paris.

The boat trip en Seine

The Seine (pronounced /sɛn/ in French) is a major river of north-western France, and one of its commercial waterways. It is also a tourist attraction, particularly within the city of Paris.

The name "Seine" comes from the Latin Sequana, which itself comes from Gaulish (Celtic) Sicauna. The name Sicauna is made up of Celtic sakw, which means "sacred" and comes from the Proto-Indo-European root *sak- (which also gave Latin sacer and sanctus, which in turn gave English sacred and saint), and from a Celtic (or more probably Pre-Indo-European) suffix -onna which means "source, river", and which can be found in the name of many rivers of western Europe (such as the Garonne or the Dordogne). The name "Sakw -onna" ("sacred source", "sacred river"), is also the name of several other western European rivers, such as the Saône River, and possibly also the River Shannon.

Another proposed etymology posits that Sequana is the Latin version of Gaulish Isicauna. Is-Icauna would be the diminutive of Icauna, which was the Gaulish name of the Yonne River. The ancient Gauls considered the Seine to be a tributary of the Yonne, which indeed presents a greater average discharge than the Seine (the river flowing through Paris should be called Yonne if the standard rules of geography were applied). Icauna comes from the Pre-Indo-European roots inka -onna. Further research will be needed to decide between both etymologies.
The Seine starts near Dijon in northern France, flows through Paris and into the English Channel.Further downstream in what is now Normandy, the Seine was known as Rodo, or Roto, which is a traditional Celtic name for rivers, and is also the original name of the Rhône River (see Rhône article for further explanations). This is proved by the name of Rouen, which was Rotomagos in Gaulish, meaning "field, plain (magos in Gaulish, whose meaning evolved into "market") of the Roto".

Notre Dame de Paris

THE ORGAN
Though several organs were installed in the cathedral over time, the earliest ones were inadequate to the building. The first noteworthy organ was finished in the early 1700s by the noted builder Cliquot. Some of Clicquot's original pipework in the pedal division continues to sound from the organ today, almost 270 years after being installed. The organ was almost completely rebuilt and expanded in the nineteenth century by Aristide Cavaillé-Coll. The position of titular organist at Notre-Dame is considered as one of the most prestigious organist posts in France, along with the titulaire post of Saint Sulpice in Paris, Cavaillé-Coll's largest instrument. The organ has 7800 pipes with 900 classified as historical. The organ has 109 stops, five 56-key manuals and a 32-key pedalboard. In December of 1992 work was completed on the organ that fully computerized the organ under 3 LANs (Local Area Networks). Among the best-known organists at Notre Dame was Louis Vierne, who held this position from 1900 to 1937. Under his tenure, the Cavaillé-Coll organ was modified in its tonal character, notably in 1902 and 1932. Pierre Cochereau initiated further alterations (many of which were already planned by Louis Vierne), including the electrification of the action between 1959 and 1963 (the original Cavaillé-Coll console, which can still be seen at the organ loft as a tribute to Louis Vierne, was replaced by a new console in Anglo-American style) and the addition of further stops between 1965 and 1972, notably in the pedal division, the recomposition of the mixture stops, and finally the adding of three horizontal reed stops "en chamade". After Cochereau's sudden death in 1984, four new titular organists were appointed at Notre Dame in 1985: Jean-Pierre Leguay, Olivier Latry, Yves Devernay (who died in 1990), and Philippe Lefévre. This was reminiscent of the eighteenth century practice of the cathedral having four titular organists, each one playing for three months of the year. Beginning in 1989, another restoration to the instrument was undertaken, which was completed in 1992.