THATLou

This past Friday night, thanks to a tip from Edna, I was able to participate in a really cool new event called THATLou, which stands for Treasure Hunt At The Louvre.  It's the brain child of a lovely American named Daisy, and I have to say - it was a heck of a lot of fun.  As an added bonus, it was a Blogger's THATLou, so I was able to meet a bunch of new bloggers and twitterfolk that I've recently started following.

We met up at 7pm and were split up into teams of four.  Daisy gave us a packet showing a picture and a description of each of the oeuvres we could find. Each one had a different number of points based on its location and how easy/hard it was to find - and some also had bonus points, which we unfortunately didn't figure out until near the end.  There was a total of 1000 points possible but given the time frame (1h15min), it was impossible to find them all, so each team had to come up with their own strategy for getting the most points.  Do you try to hit only the big ones?  Or the ones that are mainly grouped together?  Or the ones with the most bonus points?  No matter which strategy you choose, the goal is still to find as many as possible as take a group picture in front of the piece.  As a side note, have you ever tried to take a group picture of a work of art that's on the ceiling?  I can assure, it's not an easy task, even with the help of a friendly French janitor.

My team was made up of Edna, Jennyphoria, Annie and myself.  We got off to a little bit of a rocky start by going in the wrong direction (it's been ages since I've been to the Louvre), but we had a strong finish that included a major find at the end and race through the Louvre in order to get back to the final meeting point on time (think ANTM when the models have to go on all of those casting calls and then be back by X time**). It wasn't pretty, but we made it.

While we didn't end up winning (nor did we win the second place prize for the team that tweeted the most during the hunt), I think it's pretty safe to say that we all had a great time. Especially since the second part of the event involves a drink at a nearby bar to count up the points and chat with the other participants. Friday night's bar was picked by Forrest from 52Martinis - it was Why Paris, which is small bar near Les Halles with a big drink list. I've been there a few times now, and I highly recommend the Bee Sting - it is delicious!

For now, Daisy is running a Sunday series the first Sunday of every month. The April 1st theme will be "Fish & Water", which means (duh) that each of the pieces will be related to fish and water.  And she'll also be doing a Kid’s Treasure Hunt on Saturday 7 April at 14h30, and a Parisian Entrepreneur’s THATLou, for Wednesday 25 April, at 18h30.

THATLou definitely gets two thumbs up from me, and since the theme changes each month, it is likely something I will do again. I think it'd be really fun to do for a birthday party or a group get-together.  It'd also be great for school groups or families with teens who think they are too cool for museums - to quote Edna: "Running full-speed through the Louvre makes you feel like you're in the Da Vinci Code". Which is 100% true. It's also renewed my desire to go back to the Louvre - I'd forgotten just how grandiose and beautiful it was in there.


**Yes, I just admitted that I sometimes watch ANTM.  Don't judge me.