Bonjour,

I’ll get right to it… Do we love Paris? Yes we do! The city that I probably had the lowest expectations for, but easily surprised me the most. So why is this you might ask yourself? What does Paris hold that is so special? Hundreds of thousands of Frenchies gathered together? Macarons? Wine and Eiffel Tower? Hmm, I suppose you can find all these other places around the world as well… So what is it then…

Four days we have spent touring around the city blending in with locals. Now how did we manage that you might also ask? It just so happens that Sarah speaks French, or Canadian French so close enough! And that happens to be very convenient when in France. We have done as we did in all the other cities we also visited. Seen the landmarks, and talked to the people. And it all starts with the landmarks. The way the city of Paris is constructed is just fabulous. This is the first place we have felt that we can see what we, and what everyone else, want to see without feeling like we are suffocating in one big line of people. Paris is open! Big, long streets, and big beautiful parks. Take the first day for example. Our first stop was the Arc De Triomphe.

You can’t miss it. Which we saw while taking the street down towards The Louvre.

Always looking back at this magnificent monument.

Even all the way from Arc De Triomphe Du Carrousel almost at The Louvre you can still see it!

Point is, the city of Paris is open. You can see what you are looking for looong before suddenly bumping into it in a small crowded Street. Everything also looked very clean as we walked around. The gardens were kept nicely and even the water in the river looked clear. That’s the first city river in Europe we have seen clear water this summer.

I didn’t do too much research on Paris before coming, and I didn’t think there was too much to see. Wrong! There’s lots to see, and it doesn’t have to cost you a fortune either! Walking from one Arc to the other you will pass heaps of goodies such as Place de la Concorde, Grand Palais, Petit Palais, Pont Alexandre III to mention some. The louvre just after and a few minutes further down the river you will come across mighty Notre- Dame. Such a great walk.

On the way from The Louvre to Notre- Dame you will pass Pont des Artsthe, the original love lock bridge. The bridge doesn’t have many locks on it anymore. Thay cut down over a million locks weighing over 45 tonnes a couple of years ago because sections of the bridge started to collapse. But there’s still hope to see some locks. Or probably still hundreds of thousands of them.. Just walk over the bridge down to Pont Neuf and you’ll see it!

And of course we added one of our own!

Sarah ❤️ Robin, justwaypoint, Aug 31 2017

Yes, you have to when in Paris! You also have to spend some time in the park in front of the Eiffel Tower! For me the tower was a bit like the Sydney Opera house. You have seen it so many times on TV, pictures etc., so the expectations isn’t that big. Was wrong again just as I was with the Opera house. The Eiffel Tower is magnificent and you can’t get around it even if you wanted to. You can see it from all over Paris reaching over 300 meters into the sky! It’s massive…

Sarah did a few handstands,

And we did the required kiss❤️

We had a beautiful time in Paris and we will be back many times for sure!

I also have to mention that we had a studio apartment with a balcony, 5 minutes walk from the Eiffel Tower, and 8 minutes from Arc The Triomph. It costed us $300NZ for four nights. That’s the way to do it!

Au revoir

Robin!