The Eiffel Tower for Scaredy Cats

I was there last year right before they installed the glass floor so I can't comment on that. The top is crowded but there is like a 5 foot or so wire mesh fence that encircles it. If I remember correctly, you can see out of the elevators. I took the stairs from level two to the bottom but can't recall if they are enclosed or not. All in all a very safe experience. Don't worry. Go and enjoy!

Here is a link to a 7 minute video of someone climbing the stairs to the 1st level. The stairs are well within the massive legs so you won't get the feeling that you are near the edge of a great height, something I don't like either.

http://youtu.be/AS8JILDfwc8

Thanks! The video is very helpful, and from there I found a few others--this may indeed be do-able.

I am not sure what time you are planning on visiting but a word of advice about the stairs. We descended at night and the floodlights from the base reflected off the stairs which was sometimes distracting. But it is an awesome experience. I enjoyed the stairs more than the elevator as you get a feel for the tower.

Well, I hate to feed anyone's anxiety with my own, and please know I could hardly watch the youtube link, in spite of the great music, lol! I don't like heights. I don't like the open and yes, insubstantial feel to the Eiffel Tower. I know it's been there for years. Very silly, but there you have it. I have not gone up it in about 40 years and no, I'm not going. I love to look AT the Eiffel Tower. I love to catch glimpses of it in random places like from a window at the Louvre.

I don't know if your plans include the Pompidou Center for the Museum of Modern Art, but if so, stand out in the plaza in front of it first and decide if the glass enclosed escalators will work for you. I came around the side and didn't see them until I was riding up and did not enjoy that experience.

I am deathly afraid of heights to the extent that I have never been on the roof of either of the houses I have owned let alone on tall ladders. However, I have been to the top of the ET twice. The first time was about convincing myself that I had come all the way from Seattle to Paris and the ET so I HAD to find a way up to the top. After talking to several folks who were just coming down I decided to go for it. I entered the elevator and stood at the back facing inward up to the next level and did the same going up to the top without looking out while changing elevators. On the top I kept my back to the inside face of the tower and only looked straight out. Was I ever impressed with myself for pulling it off. Years later I returned to Paris and did the same routine which worked just fine the second time. I list these two events as milestones in my travels.

I have the same fear and I did it. I just looked at my feet the whole time in the elevator. Yup, I got twitchy, both in the elevator and on the platform, but I did it. And you will too. I only feel the need to do it once, though.

Hard for me to understand how one can go up in an airplane and arrive in Paris but not be able to climb the tower. But to each their own!

Alexander...it does not make sense does it? Anxieties rarely are a matter of being sensible, though. However, being in an airplane is a totally different feel for me and one that does not bother me at all. It doesn't even bother me to get on the little bitty commuter planes in to my home airport.

Pam--in fact, the tentative plan for my first afternoon is to visit the Pompidou--now I have THAT to worry about! I will just have to close my eyes, that worked when I found myself in a glass elevator at the Wien Stadt museum

Charlie--you were indeed quite brave to go all the way to the top considering your fears. I felt the same way about the Riesenrad, big Third Man fan and knew if I didn't ride it I'd be forever disappointed in myself.

For some reason the airplane trip is fine with me, thank goodness.

Well, I missed picking up a floor plan, then got rattled with the escalators so went all the way to the top not realizing the main gallery is on 4 and just special exhibitions are on 5. So then I had to come back down a floor to start going thru the permanent collections. Descending was not quite as bad as you are on the inside.

Hi Christa,

I also have the same open-feel anxiety - no issues on planes, etc. but I had to think twice before considering the Eiffel Tower. Definitely purchase an advanced ticket reservation, so you can just walk up to the tower and get on the elevator. Think about it being a fun adventure, so mentally you want to do it. I went up at 9pm in June, so it was dusk. We stayed up there for an hour and were able to enjoy seeing the city lights. There's a little shop in the center of the 2nd floor, so you can take your time before standing near the edge.

I was up before the 1st floor glass floor was finished, and I would advise you to just stay on the elevator up to the 2nd level. The view is good from the 2nd level; no need to experience the glass floor if it wouldn't be positive for you.

My wife and I both have some fear of heights, she worse than me. Nevertheless we have been up in the Eiffel tower 3 times with no really bad experiences. I don't recall walking up the stairs to the first level, although we did it on our first visit. Since I don't remember it clearly, it couldn't have been all that bad.
My wife does not like glass elevators and looked only at the other people in the elevator to avoid looking out. The ascent doesn't bother me enough to keep me from looking out the windows, although it's nerve-racking. On our last trip we went all the way to the top with our granddaughters. My wife at first said she wouldn't go but our granddaughters kept pleading so she went and enjoyed it. She was afraid that at the top she would feel the entire structure swaying with the wind, but that wasn't so. It feels solid and the "cage" around you also feels substantial, so she didn't have a problem.
On this last trip, I had to walk up from the 1st to the 2nd level (2nd level to 3rd level in American terms) to re-join my family. The elevator rules allowed me go down, but not back up. It really stirred up my fear of heights but I had no choice. I felt way too exposed on the stairs. I would not do it again without a pressing need. I focused on very real, near and immediate things (lifting my foot to the next step, holding on the railing, etc. Believe me, my hand never left the railing.) And I did not look away from the stairs or through them. Other people passed me in both directions, laughing and enjoying themselves, so clearly the issue was mine.
So I'd say do it. Go up in the Eiffel Tower. I don't know how your fear of heights compares to ours, or what kinds of coping mechanisms you have developed, but we've done it and would do it again.
By the way I don't walk out on see-through floors. Not at the CNN tower in Montreal, not at the Eiffel Tower, not anywhere.

My husband hates heights. I am climbing towers all over Europe while he has coffee. But I did get us both tickets to the top of the Eiffel Tower this October. We went straight to the second floor on the elevator which was so crowded (even on a rainy day when the tower itself was not crowded) that there was no need to notice the glass walls. The second floor has a perfectly solid floor and you can retreat inside if being on the outside deck is not your thing. He managed to survive the very top by mostly staying towards the inner wall. So you don't need to go to the first floor and I would avoid the stairs with your issues.

Bob--thank you for addressing so perfectly the concerns I have re the stairs--focusing on each step, holding on, not looking down or through the stairs. I think the elevator to the 2nd floor will be the answer for me.

"Hard for me to understand how one can go up in an airplane and arrive in Paris but not be able to climb the tower. But to each their own!" Exactly, it's because flying in an enclosed airplane does not activate what can be called fear of the edge.

Great, Christa. Glad I could help. I think you'll really enjoy yourself.
There's no reason to use the stairs and you can choose not to look out the glass part of the elevator. The 1st and 2nd floors shouldn't be hard.
Bob

Christa, go to the top, you have to go to the top. You are there and probabably the only time you will be there, so Go To The Top. The Tower is a Tank of an elevated structure. It is designed so that it can't fall down, even in an earth quake. All the systems have Triple, and Quadruple fail safes. No Tourist has ever been severerly harmed by the moving mechanics of this tower, none, out of many Millions of visitors. So this is a time to face some of that fear, and let this fear flow through you like a light wind of anxiety. It can't hurt you and one of its venues, as part of the Paris Exposition, was to make people comfortable about tall structures.

There is no rule that you have to go up the Eiffel Tower, especially if you are uncomfortable with heights. Go to a spot where you can get a good view of it from the ground - Champs du Mars, Troccadero, or a river cruise. Then for a higher view of Paris, including the Eiffel Tower, go up the Montparnasse Tower where there are no crowds and short wait for the elevator, as well as good views from within the observation floor of the building. From there, you can go up to the roof, which is open air, but fully enclosed with plexiglass. Have a great trip.