Paris, France: The City of Lights

What a dream come true! I have wanted to visit this fairytale city since I was a young girl. The cafes serving beautiful baked goods, the Eiffel Tower lit up at night, wine at whatever time of day you please, fashionable stores and people everywhere, it all seemed too good to be true.

I always get a little nervous coming to places I’ve dreamed of for so long. Sky high expectations are often a set up for disappointment. I am happy to say all my expectations were met and I will still dream of future trips to this city!

We had nearly a week in Paris. Like any big city, you could stay for months and still not see everything.

We were SO excited my parents were able to join us here! It had been 4 months since we were able to give them a big hug. We waited impatiently in our hotel lobby for them to arrive, drinking too much coffee only making the anticipation worse.

After some time of word vomit from the coffee, trying to tell them EVERYTHING we wanted to say all at once, we went for brunch.

We chose a nearby crepe spot- which was a wonderful decision. My mom had her first crepe hours after landing in Paris.

We were even given free shots at the end of breakfast. This sweet liquor was a perfect end to our first meal together in this enchanting city.

I love to find running paths when we visit a new place. There is an enormous park on the west side of the city called Bois de Boulogne. It has a horse race track, tennis center, golf club, hidden gardens, and so much more.

I stumbled across a botanical garden called Park de Bagatelle during my run through the park.

There were stone statues, small lakes with bridges, and royal looking buildings. The sun was getting close to setting so I saw as much of the gardens as I could in my short time here.

Since it was starting to get dark, I decided to take a main road to leave the park, still buried between 2-3 miles inside. What I found myself in the middle of was one of the most bizarre situations I have ever been in. Turns out there is a full road lined with prostitutes for over a mile long! These scantily dressed women with see through tops and knee high leather boots were everywhere in woods. I was not expecting to see 30 prostitutes in Paris and only 1 in Amsterdam.

There are many parks and paths making the city very pedestrian friendly to explore. Paris is HUGE though. This is a great city to see via bikes. We did the Fat Tire Bike Tour and would highly recommend it.

The guide was full of interesting information, explaining major sites we would have gone right past without looking twice.

One of the most interesting is the Pont Alexander III of Russia bridge. It is covered with gold statues and provided great views of the city. It is widely regarded as the most extravagant bridge in the city.

We learned that the olympics being held here in the summer of 2024 would use the riverside roads for the marathon.

We stopped at the armory/military school called Ecole Militaire. This gold covered building is where Napoleon attended military school in 1784.

Biking through the city, we noticed how organized and symmetric the buildings and roads were. This is largely due to most of old Paris being destroyed, allowing for the rebuild of beautifully designed city.

Paris truly has SO MUCH to see. We stayed in a really great Airbnb right in the middle of the city, near the Louvre. We were on the top floor of this 5 story building with no elevator. My mom had some fun hiding in the closet on the middle floor to jump out and scare Chad to the point he fell on the stairs. This happened more than once 🙂

Our location was great to be able to walk out our front door and wander around.

There was even a high-intensity techno parade that was happening one afternoon. My dad jumped right into the dance party.

The Louvre is an absolutely amazing place to visit. It is the worlds largest art museum and a historic monument.

It is recommended to buy your ticket BEFORE visiting the museum. The line to purchase a ticket can be anywhere from 30 minutes – 2 hours. There are 38,000 monuments in the Louvre. You could spend literally all day in this museum and not see everything.

We spent 4-5 hours in the Louvre. We used the audio guides to pick the most famous exhibits and built our tour around those. We went pretty quickly through the museum and still missed many areas.

It was originally built in the 12th century as the Louvre Castle. This palace was built to be a fortress under Philip II.

Due to the city expanding around the Louvre, the fortress eventually lost its defensive function and turned into the primary residence of Francis I in 1546.

In 1682, Louis XIV chose the Palace of Versailles as his primary residence, leaving the Louvre open to display royal collections.

The Champs-Elysees is the most iconic street in Paris. It is filled with high-end shopping and has the Arc de Triomphe at the end of the road.

It was a little less high-end than we originally thought it would be. It reminded us more of the Magnificent Mile in Chicago, and less like Rodeo Drive in LA.

The Arc de Triomphe at the end of our walk was well worth it!

The arc is a monument that honors those who fought and died for France. The names of the victories and generals are inscribed on the walls. We just so happened to find “Aubry” on the wall!

The views from the top of were unbelievable. We decided to go on top of the Arc de Triomphe instead of the Eiffel Tower. We decided we would prefer to see the Eiffel Tower from up high rather than be on top of it.

Right near this area is a great place called Bar Restaurant Sir Winston. We stopped for some drinks and a charcuterie board to reward ourselves for all the walking.

My favorite thing we did while in Paris was watch the Eiffel Tower light up at night! I’m sure you’ve seen it on tv or in pictures, but sitting on the lawn, sipping on wine, and watching the structure glitter was magical.

The Eiffel Tower starts the light show at 9pm and then on the top of every hour until midnight. I could have sat there all night watching every show.

Don’t forget- you are allowed to drink in public in Paris (and most of Europe). There are vendors selling champagne, wine, and beer if you don’t have time to stop before. Make sure to bargain with them! Our bargaining went something like this… “€30 for a bottle of wine”… “I only have €5” (walk away)… “Ok, €5 is fine”.

We met a group from Indiana who drove a hard bargain. They got 3 bottles of wine and 2 beers for €10.

The Notre Dame Church is another top attraction in Paris. The church is free to get in. Don’t be intimidated by the massive line that is out front! It moves very quickly.

The outside of the church was just as cool as the inside. There are tons of beautiful statues decorating the entire church.

One of the most interesting scenes on the front of the church is of St. Peter dividing the recently passed souls. To his right are the souls going to heaven. To his left are the souls heading to hell, escorted by devils with chains… Yikes!

The Palace of Versailles is an attraction we would highly recommend booking a tour to see. We got there with our tour right as the palace was opening and there was already a huge line.

This extravagant residence was built by King Louis XIV. He wanted all the attention for himself and lived a very choreographed life inside these walls. And yes, he is wearing heels in the picture on the right.

He would allow an audience of court members to watch him wake up in the morning and go to bed at night. If you were lucky, you could be picked to put on or take off an article of the kings clothing. Here is bedroom with a full viewing area viewing area behind us.

The Hall of Mirrors is probably the most famous room in the palace. Mirrors were incredibly expensive to make, so most people only had mirrors big enough to see their face. For most people, this was the first time they were seeing their full body reflection!

The hall is lined with full length mirrors, dozens of crystal chandeliers, solid gold decorations, and huge stone statues. Needless to say, this was an extremely expensive decorated room.

The entire palace was decorated with extravagant detail. Masterpieces painted on the ceilings, solid gold decor, priceless statues and furniture in every room. In fact, it is estimated that if this palace were to be rebuilt today it would cost $21 TRILLION!! I guess it makes sense why the French people beheaded their royalty.

As if the palace itself wasn’t enough, there is an enormous, well- manicured garden in the back. If you have a shorter period of time we would recommend getting a golf cart. We had an hour and that still wasn’t enough time to see everything with a golf cart.

The gardens have many fountains, statues, maze looking bushes, and beautiful scenery. There were many people using the area for an afternoon run or picnic.

The last night we were in Paris we went to Montmartre. This neighborhood is situated on a hill with tons of small restaurants and shops.

We decided to restaurant hop and get some appetizers and drinks in a few different places. Since we were in Paris, we figured we needed a meat & cheese plate at one of the artsy restaurants. We also got some prosciutto wrapped melon.

There was a small crepe restaurant with notes and pictures from customers covering the walls. Crepes and wine go great together in case you were wondering.

All the restaurants are small, locally owned places known be retro and edgy. The people in all these restaurants were incredibly welcoming and made our time here really great.

The feel to this area is much different than the rest of Paris. It was a former artists’ villiage once inhabited by Picasso. It offers beautiful views of the city from the top of the hill where the Sacre-Coeur Basilica sits.

This neighborhood houses the famous Moulin Rouge show! We booked our tickets weeks ahead of time and many of the show times were already sold out. Get there early if you book a ticket! They pack a huge crowd into the theater.

The tickets were around €100, so definitely not cheap. Also, make sure to order your alcohol when you purchase the tickets. They don’t wait on tables during the show.

The mix of burlesque with Cirque du Soleil was very entertaining. They even had a pool lift up on stage at one point and a topless woman swam with several boa constrictors. What’s more entertaining than that?!

We clearly enjoyed our time in this romatic city and hope to be back soon. Au revoir!