Sightseeing in Paris

Last week, I shared photos of our lovely AirBnB in the 16th arrondissement of Paris {see that post here} and today I’m back with some photos I took during our time in the city.

We took the train from Stuttgart to Paris on Friday and returned on Monday, so I would classify our visit as a long weekend. If you’re traveling from the States, you might have a longer stay, but I think we managed to get A LOT done during our time in Paris!

After we checked in to our apartment, we had a couple of hours before our dinner reservations, so we walked around downtown. It was HOT so we tried to find shade wherever we could and drank lots of water.

I had booked a three course dinner with wine pairings and we were more than a little relieved to find that they had air conditioning at the restaurant. Later that night we walked to the Place du Trocadéro to see the evening light show on the Eiffel Tower.

Saturday was ridiculously hot; over 100 degrees. The half day walking tour we had booked was canceled because of the heat, so we decided to spend time in the museums instead, where we could expect air conditioning.

We started at the Musée d’Orsay. We bought the Paris Museum Pass ahead of time for all of us (except our daughter who had free admission) and were able to go in a fast entry line without an appointment. If you want to see Monet, Renoir, and other Impressionists, this is the museum that houses them.

Our next visit was to Saint-Chappelle to see the beautiful stained glass (I had prebooked an entry time with our museum passes).

Notre Dame is still closed for repairs, but it’s close by so we did get some photos of the exterior.

Our next stop was the Louvre where I had also prebooked our entrance time; yes, I saw the Mona Lisa, along with several thousand other people!

To be honest, I enjoyed the Michelangelo statues more.

We were pretty tired after we finished at the Louvre, so we took the metro back to our flat to relax for a few hours (I found that a cold water foot soak was necessary!).

We split up that night; we went to dinner with our son, and our daughter and her bestie went to see the Paris Opéra Ballet on their opening night of A Midsummer Night’s Dream. Since they’ve danced forever, I was so glad that they got to see one of the world’s best companies! (They also managed to see a Stuttgart Ballet performance earlier in the month)

Sometime during the night, a cold front blew through and on Sunday morning it was cool (high 50s!) and drizzly–quite a change from our smoking hot Saturday! It was a great morning for our walking tour of Montmartre.

We finished our tour at the Arc de Triomphe and took a break for lunch and a stroll along the Champs-Élysées.

We weren’t done…I had booked entrance to Versailles for the late afternoon so we took the train out there and had a great time admiring all the gilt and chandeliers.

We’ve visited a lot of beautiful castles and palaces in Europe; this was one of the most impressive–and excessive!

After a sugar fix of macarons from Ladurée, we headed back into the city to rest and change before dinner.

Our son peeled off on his own to attend a chamber concert at Saint-Chappelle while we went to dinner at a local brasserie with the girls. We all slept VERY well that night!

Monday morning we had left open for a little shopping–I bought a pair of silk pants and two linen shirts and am thrilled with all three. Then we headed to the train station for our trip home. I appreciated that you could find a glass of champagne even at the train station!

Thanks for letting me share our travels with you–au revoir!