The Louvre is one of the most famous landmarks in Paris. Every body has heard of the Louvre and it is one of the most-visited museums in the world. With good reason. The Louvre houses possibly the finest collection of artwork ever collected in one place. And from what I understand, even though the Louver denies it, they only ever have about ten percent of it on display at any one time. I personally find it mind-boggling that there is that much art in the whole world, let alone one place, because when you visit and then remember this is only ten percent, you realize that’s an awful lot of artwork.

I have visited several times and each time I felt rushed, overwhelmed and unable to appreciate what I was seeing. Although it’s always entertaining to listen into the well-to-do Americans complain about the fact that none of the signs are in English. Why on earth they expect them to be written in English is beyond me. Still fun to lean over and ask them if the signs in American museums are written in French. (I just can’t help myself sometimes.)

Anyway, back to the Louvre. After about three visits, I realized what my problem was – I was trying to see everything, and each time I went there was new exhibit, along with all the major stuff to see, and nowhere near enough time. At any time there are 35,000 works on display, so if I spent ten hours there and managed to see them all, that would be 3,500 works per hour, or 58 works per minute – less than a second each.

So, this time, I decided to only go and see one small part and not be upset if I missed anything. I chose a less popular part of the museum, the Dutch 17th and 19th century artists. I had never really taken a close look at this part of the museum before, I always got sucked into the more spectacular stuff around the Mona Lisa.

What a revelation! I practically had the place to myself, and if I am honest, I get rather sick of all the political and religious themed works in most of the rest of the museum. It gets to the point where I say to myself, “If I see one more image of Jesus Christ being crucified, I will crucify someone myself.”

I had a far more enjoyable experience this time and got to spend an afternoon intimately exploring some of the works of the lesser known Dutch masters who seem not to paint so many religious images. It was brilliant. Although, perhaps what I enjoyed was the amount of pictures with drunk people smoking pipes?

The Louvre is a must-see destination in Paris, if not the World. But, I would advise not trying to see it all. The museum has a spectacular website. Pay it a visit and make a realistic plan to allow yourself the time to enjoy what you do go and see. I hope you have as good a time as I did.

And no, these next photos are not my own, but they are available for free download at the louvre's website. This is a selection of some of the art I saw that day. The photos do not do them justice. You must go and visit the louvre.