Tickets and passports have been packed, guidebooks read, and the excellent BBC mini-series watched. Arriving yesterday, Paris is a city I’ve most wanted to visit for the last 34 years (and always in the spring), and I don’t know why I haven’t made it before. For the same reasons, I had never travelled on the Eurostar either, so gliding into Gare du Nord after flashing past a white-lit Sacré-Coeur last night signalled the realisation a dream.
Eurostar is definitely the best way to travel, far beating flying and the rigmarole of airports. Supremely fast, comfortable, and fuss-free, there’s almost something surreal about leaving London, and whizzing along the tracks through a tunnel, and arriving just over 2 hours later in an iconic European city. I was spoilt, though, as we upgraded to ‘Leisure Select’, the new name for First Class, as it was only £15 more. So, as we quaffed our champagne and tucked into our three-course dinner, the countryside turned darker shades of orange as the sun set, and our workaday worries ebbed away.
Place des Vosges a less well-known Paris gem of 17th century brick and timber mansions
Our first full day has been exhausting. Staying near Bastille, we meandered through the heart of the city, and have walked all day. Starting the morning in the original philosopher’s café – Café des Phores – watching the world go by, we went to find place des Vosges, a 17th century square with four symmetrical fountains, and home to Victor Hugo for a few years. From there we crossed the Seine to the Institut du Monde Arabe, to see the mechanical eyes on the walls of the building change in the bright sunlight.
Mechanical ‘eyes’ adorn the glass walls of the Institut du Monde Arabe, and react to the sun
The first major landmark was Notre-Dame, which stands proud, guarding one of the islands that originally made up the city. Hôtel de Ville, the Pompidou Centre, and Les Halles followed, while the Louvre’s courtyard was a good place to take a breather. We then strode through the 28-hectare Jardin des Tuileries, which took us to place de la Concorde and the Champs-Elysées.
The Louvre by fish-eye
Deciding not to do any shopping, we instead visited Citroën’s innovative five-storey showroom, C_42. Looking like it had landed from space, the building is in reality a posh dealership, but with rotating levels arranged with a walkway around them, and the company’s latest models showcased. If you’re a car buff, you must pay it a visit. You’ll come away with the same question we did – just how do they get the cars in there?
Notre-Dame a favoured place for tourist portraits
The Arc de Triomphe was the final destination of the day. Hugely impressive in scale, it much have looked even more grand in the days of sparser traffic. Perched on a traffic island on Avenue de la Grande Armée with the mad French drivers whizzing and tooting by was quite frightening, so we were glad to get onto the Metro and let it speed us back to our hotel in the working class area of the city.
You can’t fail to miss the spectacular Arc de Triomphe
So, what are my first impressions of the City of Light? It’s much more beautiful than London (and cleaner, too), and being so compact, it can be walked much more pleasantly. The atmosphere seems more relaxed, and the people friendly. It’s definitely been worth the wait.
