Paris Museum Pass question

the PMP traditionally was for consecutive days, so if you started at 4:30 Monday it was finished at the end of the day Tuesday.

There have been huge changes in the pass recently including now limiting visits one to a site which greatly diminish its value; there is also now the requirement of a reservation for the Louvre.

It APPEARS that they have changed the validity from two consecutive days to 48 consecutive hours; if so then your plan works. We need to hear from someone who has done this. If you don't hear and try it and it works, write back and let everyone know.

Thanks so much for your quick reply! I am wondering if it's worth it for us to get the PMP. We are mainly getting it to gain faster entry to the sites (I think it is school holidays in France when we are there the week of February 17, so not sure how crowded it will be). Our plan is as follows:

• Monday, February 17, 4:45 pm: Musée de l'Orangerie (not sure how long the lines will be, but it looks like Eurostar has a 2-for-1 voucher which can be used here, so that would save a bit, plus the price is reduced because of the closures in the museum)
• Monday evening, Arc de Triomphe--we already have a pre-booked group reservation for 7:20 pm (just the timeslot is reserved as we are 7 people, so I was able to secure a group reservation; we will have to purchase tickets separately, either through PMP or regular ticketing)
• Tuesday: L'Open Bus blue & green routes followed by the Eiffel Tower, so the PMP won't be good on that day, but I thought it would be nice to have in case we want to run into one of the sites, though I think we will most likely stay on the HOHO bus & takie it easy
• Wednesday 9:30 a.m.: Musée d'Orsay (Eurostar 2-for-1 is good here if we don't have the PMP)--not sure how long the lines will be first thing in the morning & if it would be beneficial to have the PMP for that
• Wednesday 2:00 p.m.: Louvre Museum guided tour in English--from the Louvre website, it looks like if we have pre-booked the guided tour, we secure the slot for entry into the museum, so in that respect the PMP would not be helpful in skipping the ticketing line
• Wednesday 4:30 p.m.: Centre Pompidou--it looks like I should be able to book tickets online in advance, but I keep getting error messages when I try to do this; the website also seems to imply that you need a pre-booked time slot now, which I had read on a different post; again, I'm not sure how long the line will be at this time, so this is where I think the PMP would be beneficial

Any advice as to whether or not getting the PMP would be beneficial & would work in saving time for this itinerary would be helpful. It may be a slight cost savings, but as we are in Paris for such a short time, I'm looking more at the time savings.

Thank you!

Yes, I have done this and you can do what you have asked with the timing. I got the new passes when I visited in October and the person where I purchased it was specific to say this is for 144 hours, not actually 6 days. So a 2-day will be for 48 hours not "2 days". The time starts when they scan your pass at your first museum entry - not when you buy it.

And yes, they are just worried about your entry time. For my "last" day on one of my passes I entered d'Orsay in the AM - probably 9:30 or so and my pass expired at about 1:30 so there was no issue at all. No one indicated I needed to leave by 1:29!

As to your plan:

Orangerie - should have no line that time of day. The only rooms that are open are the 2 upstairs rooms that contain the Water Lilies.

HOHO - I'm not a big fan. I'd rather use public transportation. I know some on here recommend the Foxity 2 hour tour but I've not done that one either. My concern would be being stuck in traffic.

d'Orsay - get there early for your entry

Louvre - TBH, no way will you be able to do a guided tour at 2 and then get over to Pompidou by 4:30.

Pompidou - not sure about the timed entry need. It's been a few years since I've done this museum.

To me 3 big museums in one day is too much. I'd try to do the d'Orsay on Tuesday although the lines can be very long on Tuesday since the Louvre is closed.

We are mainly getting it to gain faster entry to the sites

You do NOT need a museum pass to gain faster entry into museums. Anyone who purchases tickets on line will generally use the very same entrances as do museum pass holders. In most cases, pass holders or those with advance tickets, simply pass the ticket lines which can save time.

Thank you Pam & Tocard for your help!

• The day with the HOHO bus is really just to get an overview of the sites. We’re planning on walking most of the places we’re seeing, so the HOHO is not being used as a means of transportation, just to see the general lay of the land. If strikes are still on when we’re there, I’m going to eliminate this from our itinerary because I’m assuming it will be a nightmare then!
• How early would you recommend getting to d’Orsay for the 9:30 opening if we wind up not getting the PMP & instead use the Eurostar 2-for-1 deal & then would need to buy tickets on-site?
• If the Louvre guided tour is at 2 & we are only planning on doing the guided tour & not seeing anything else in the museum, what is a realistic time to arrive at Pompidou? The guided tour is supposed to last 1.5 hours. (After Pompidou, we are hoping to grab dinner & then do the Vedettes du Pont Neuf boat tour at 9:10 p.m. So if we need to curtail our visit to Pompidou or grab a faster dinner we will.)

Thank you for the advice about moving d’Orsay to Tuesday. I was hesitant to do 3 museums on 1 day, but had read a lot of comments about how crowded it is on Tuesday because the Louvre is closed. I may try to move it to then. I realize that that day is a bit ambitious!

Thanks again!

Just wanted to report back about the PMP & the Louvre. I had reserved the PMP to be picked up at Gare du Nord. As I didn't have the PMP in hand when I reserved our time slot at the Louvre before we left for our trip, I put the original order # for the PMP into the area required on the Louvre website instead of the PMP serial # as suggested elsewhere on these travel boards.

Once in Paris, I logged into my Louvre account and clicked through the steps on my original order to modify the name of the person on the time slot. I didn't actually modify our names, but I did change the order #s to the PMP serial #s. There is an option to download the passes to your phone, so I didn't need to print out the reservations, though I did have the original paper backups from the original order & I wrote the PMP serial #s in by hand.

After all of that work, when we got to the Louvre, they didn't even ask for our time slot reservation! We went in through the Carrousel du Louvre entrance, so it wasn't terribly busy; we waited about 10 minutes, I think. I'm not sure if they would have asked for our timed reservation if we had entered through the Pyramid entrance--the lines there were much bigger.

We followed the Rick Steves Louvre Guided Tour & my entire family enjoyed it. It provided a great intro and tied everything together really nicely.

Thanks everyone for your help!