Hello. I'll be arriving in Paris on September 6 and departing on the 11th. I will be with my daughter and her friend. I would like to visit the usuals. Arc the Triumph, Eiffel tower, Louvre, Versailles and Giverny gardens. I have never being in Paris.
My questions:
Do you recommend guided tours for any on these? if so any ideas?
Someone recommended to do a double decker tour on the first day, what do you think?
What about touring the Seine River on the Boto bus?
Thanks
If you are a person who enjoys city overviews on top of a bus then this is a way to see the city while sitting down. Not my thing, but something to consider for a brief visit like yours to orient yourself if it appeals to you..
The Batobus is not a good way to see the town or the Seine. Take a Seine Cruise in the evening with the city lit up and use the metro to get around quickly during the day. The Batobus is slow and often crowded and unpleasant. And it is expensive for what you get.
I would not do tours in Paris but you probably should get the Museum Pass so you can skip long lines and not have to worry about timing and tickets etc. e.g. at the Orsay museum, you use a completely separate entry which rarely has a line or at least rarely a long line. If your daughter/friend are 17 or under they get into the museums free and can just walk in with you when you use your pass; otherwise have them get passes as well. At the Louvre you can be in a shorter line. You may be too late for tickets ahead for the Eiffel Tower, but take a look on line and see if there are any available. If not you might book a back scenes tour to avoid the long line.
September is the busiest hotel month and the most expensive (except for Christmas) so you want to nail down your hotel asap.
for transport you should each get the Navigo Decouvert which will cost about 27 Euro each (including a reusable pass card ) It will take you everywhere you want to go including Versailles but not Giverny which is in Normandy and requires a train from St. Lazare to Vernon and a bus to Giverny. Get your tickets on line ahead for that to avoid lines at the site. This is an easy and fun day trip. Here was our visit:
https://janettravels.wordpress.com/2010/05/25/not-so-secret-garden-giverny/
for the ND pass, you will need postage stamp sized head shots; you can just print them off on your computer (25/30mm size) If you get them at the RER station at the airport you can use them to get into Paris (a 10 Euro ride) and you can use them to return on Sunday. The cards run Mon-Sun so your trip fits perfectly and they are great money savers. You can hop on a bus, tram, metro or train anywhere in the Ile de France with them -- it is nice if it starts pouring rain and you want to hop on a bus for a short stretch.
Have a great trip
The "usuals" you list are bound to be overrun with tourists in September, so take that into consideration. Quieter, less hectic experiences are to be had visiting the Ile de la Cite (Notre Dame Cathedral and other architectural gems) and some of the smaller museums. See, for example,
http://www.cntraveler.com/galleries/2014-11-07/paris-10-best-small-museums
and
https://www.lonelyplanet.com/france/paris/travel-tips-and-articles/69986
Janet, as usual, has lots of good info above. If the ND pass is too much hassle, you can buy packages (carnets) of 10 individual tickets good for Paris Metro and buses. They cost a little less than individual fares, save time, and you can split them up in your party. With three of your over 4+ days I'd get at least a couple of carnets to start.
The Paris Museum Pass would be a good deal, saving time and probably money. Not to be confused with the "Paris Pass," which is a different product and not generally considered a good deal.
With so little time you might want to skip Giverny, which is a long way out of town, and maybe even Versailles, unless you feel strongly about either of them. Paris itself has much more than enough for four full days. No need for guided tours, though you might want to check out Paris Walks to explore particular neighborhoods or themes. The hop-on-hop-off bus might be a good choice for your first day, to get an overview of the city, but these can be slow, crowded, and with audio guides that are hard to understand -- plus expensive. Consider some of the regular city buses for getting around -- slower than Metro but you see all the street stuff.
Finally, if you can't get up the Eiffel Tower, the Tour Montparnasse offers a similar view (one which includes the ET) for a lot less effort. Of course you'll miss the pickpockets and the guys selling cheap ET reproductions! ;-)
We are also arriving in Paris on the 6th, but are staying until the 16th. It is our first trip to Paris, too. Our plan is to do a hop on/hop off bus tour the day we arrive, just to get a feel for the city. During the rest of our stay, we will use the metro and city buses to get around. But I figured the HOHO will help us get oriented. We plan to buy a Museum Pass, as previous posters have suggested. The only guided tour we have planned is a food tour, but we are considering doing a Paris Walks tour of Montemarte.
Hopefully, we will both have great trips!
Rather than a HOHO which means sitting and waiting at endless stops, I'd just do a Foxity Paris bus tour if you want that sort of orientation. Not a bad choice for jet lag arrival day since you are out in the sun -- so long as you can keep from dozing off while sitting down.
Agree with all of the above and would personally skip trips outside the city. I would suggest a 1/2 day bike tour, great guides and you cover lots of ground. Also, do a little research and check out one of the numerous markets (marches) located across the city. In my opinion I would try and get in and out of the Louvre (or go on Friday night) and spend time at the d'Orsay, Rodin, and Marmottan Monet. Lastly, Notre Dame and Saint Chapelle should not be missed, the stained glass windows at St. Chapelle are worth and wait and the park located behind Notre Dame is an oasis (note that most public parks have free wi-fi). Also, my wife and I tried weekly bike rentals (Velib) last visit (2015) that she set up before hand, great way to get around the city.
Enjoy
Choose from sights along the daily routings below.
Purchase a 4 day Paris Museum Pass for Wed to Sat.
Using the bat-o-bus can see you wasting a lot of time waiting for the next scheduled boat. Make a round trip on Vedettes du Pont Neuf instead.
Tuesday 6 September ... arrive
sunset - Sacre Coeur & Montmartre
evening - Seine River Cruise http://vedettesdupontneuf.com/home/
Wednesday 7 September
Pont Neuf >> Saint Chapelle >> Conciergerie >> Hotel de Ville >> Pompidou >> Le Marais >> Picasso Museum or Carnavalet Museum >> Place des Vosges >> Ile St Louis
evening - Eiffel Tower
Thursday 8 September
Notre Dame (visit Towers first) >> Latin Quarter >> Musee Cluny >> Pantheon >> Jardin de Luxembourg >> St Sulpice >> St Germain des Pres >> Musee d'Orsay (closes 9.45pm Thu)
Friday 9 September
Invalides or Rodin Museum >> Pont Alexandre III >> Grand+Petit Palais >> Champs Elysees >> Arc de Triomphe >> (metro to) Place de la Concorde >> Madeleine >> Opera >> Place Vendome >> Tuileries Gardens >> Orangerie >> Louvre (closes 9.45pm Wed, Fri)
Saturday 10 September
Versailles
Sunday 11 September ... depart
Wow!! all this is wonderful. Thanks.
Unfortunately tickets to the Eiffel tower are sold out for my dates. I found some guided tours on Viator and Isango with great reviews that won't break the wallet.
Do you guys recommend the night tour which can only access the second floor or the day tour with the option of accessing the summit?
http://www.isango.com/paris/eiffel-tower-seine-cruise-and-illuminated-paris_2809
https://www.viator.com/tours/Paris/Skip-The-Line-Eiffel-Tower-Tour-and-Summit-Access/d479-9205P4
I also found a great looking bike tour to versailles, https://www.viator.com/tours/Paris/Versailles-by-Bike-Day-Tour/d479-3588VERSA. Any thoughts?
Also any recommendations for a Seine river cruise?
We just returned from Paris on Saturday. We were there for a week and decided to skip Versailles and Giverny because there was so much to see just in Paris.
We did go on a hop on hop off tour, that included a river tour. It was through Big Bus. The only downside on the bus was that later in the day it would get caught up in traffic took longer to get to the next stop.
We found no long lines anywhere, not sure if we were lucky or not.
I would definitely recommend Musee D'Orsay, the Louvre ( went later on Weds afternoon), Montmarte was awesome, we walked up the street that has Moulin Rouge on the corner, it was much less touristy than the street we came back down on.
We had Eiffel tower tickets that I bought before we left, but the lines weren't long there at all either. We found that we had the best times on the days we just walked and explored, finding cute little side streets that were less touristy.
One of our favorite things was to bring a picnic to Luxembourg gardens. It was beautiful! We went once around 7pm and it was full of other people having picnics, lots of places to sit and walk around there.
Be sure to check on the days different places are open, and which have later hours.
Have fun!
Have a great time!
Vedettes du Pont Neuf is an often recommended choice on here for a Seine River Cruise. http://vedettesdupontneuf.com/home/
Coco, I definitely wouldn't do the HOHO bus and the Vedettes du Pont Neuf and would personally find the Seine cruise far more enjoyable. If you like Monet, be sure to also go to l'Orangerie which has his Waterlilies. We took our son and his fiancée to the Orangerie one day then to Giverny the next day, a perfect combination. The Paris Museum Pass, pre-purchased tickets for Giverny, the Eiffel Behind the Scenes tour (on the actual site: toureiffel.com; "Preparing your visit" then on the left-hand side, "Booking a guided tour") are all "musts"! (I suggest the tour of the Eiffel because I would expect tickets to be no longer available.)
We used Vendettes du Pont Neuf. I purchased tix online beforehand to save a few euro...and they are good for any date/time (well, you can purchase a morning cruise or afternoon/evening cruise)...you don't have to pick a slot. Althought looking at their website, they really gotta change the start times for the afternoon cruises from 12:45 AM to PM. Oops!
Janet - on your advice, I took a look at the Foxity website. They have both a 2 hour tour and a HOHO tour, which seem to cover the same route. Is it your recommendation that we just do the 2 hour loop?
Unless you plan to use the HOHO for transport which I would not do, I would just take the tour. HOHOs are slow, you wait at stops -- I hate them (but you might not -- think about how you would plan to use them) All the Seine cruises are basically the same from Bateux Mouches to Vedettes Pont Neuf. The latter has smaller boats. Otherwise it is all the same stuff - same route with different start points. Just take the one that is convenient when you want to go. The Batobus is not a tour -- it is a crowded, stinky, slow water bus.
I would add that you shouldn't be that concerned about not having Eiffel Tower tickets in advance. We, in fact, chose not to purchase ahead of time because we didn't want to be locked into a particular slot, especially not knowing what weather would be like on a particular day and time. We were in Paris in early June last year as part of the RS Best of Paris tour, and ended up at the tower on a busy Thursday afternoon, if I recall, possibly after returning from Versailles. Yes, there were throngs of people and, yes, lines for tickets. But we waited no more than 40 minutes, and I'm sure there would have been other times of day when lines would be shorter (or much longer). Was that 40 minutes "wasted" time? Some would say yes, but we were, after all, standing in the shadow of the Eiffel Tower on a beautiful, sunny afternoon.
My wife and son went to the top, while I was fine shooting pictures from the second level. We never regretted for a moment approaching it the way we did, and had a great experience. Just don't get too hung up on making every minute of your schedule "efficient." Sometimes it's fine to just roll with it.
Cheers!
