Eiffel Tour and other Paris, France Things to Do Tips

In 1889, when the Tour Eiffel was completed, it was the tallest building in the world at 300m. The Tour Eiffel was originally built as a tempory structure to commemorate the centenary of the Revolution. And since, the Eiffel Tower has become an enduring symbol of the city of Paris.
The Tour was originally built for the 1889 Exposition. This steel construction defied all traditional rules in architecture. It is now the television transmitter for the greater Paris region. The Tour selected by a competition which was won by Gustave Eiffel, an engineer who had experience of constructing high level railway viaducts. In the public eye, the tower had many mixed opinions, celebrated and loathed in equal measure. Throughout its construction, the residents became convinced that it would collapse, and Eiffel had to reassure them personally. The author Guy de Maupassant left Paris permanently to avoid looking at its 'metallic carcass' but others who espoused more self-consciously modern views championed the tower: Seurat and Douanier Rousseau were among the first to paint it, in 1889 and 1890 respectively. On a clear day, it is possible to see Chartres Cathedral from the high level viewing platform.There are three floors. The first is at 57 m., the second at 115m., and the third at 276 m. The top of the aerial is 320 m. above the ground. And on a nice day, you an see from the top of the platform, the whole of Paris and even the distant suburbs.
The 12,000 steel girders are held together by 2,500,000 rivets to produce a smooth, curving profile. Its functional elegance heralded the dawn of Industrial Art, and has met with much sarcastic comment from more conservative observers ever since it was finished in 1889.

Stairs - all visitors: 3,50€
Adults
Lift to 1st platform 4€
Lift to 2nd platform 7,30€
Lift to 3rd platform 10,40€
Children
Lift to 1st platform 2,20€
Lift to 2nd platform 4€
Lift to 3rd platform 5,70€

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Address: http://www.tour-eiffel.fr/
Directions: You can't miss it!!!

The glamour of the Champs-Élysées, particularly its upper end, may not be quite what it was, dominated as it is by airline offices, car showrooms, and bright, light shopping arcades. But there's still the Lido cabaret, Fouquet's high-class bar and restaurant, and plenty of cinemas and outrageously priced cafes to bring the punters in. At Christmas this is where the fairy lights go, and on December 31 everyone happily jams in, in their cars, to hoot in the New Year.
The new landscaping project has removed the avenue's side lanes where cars used to prowl in search of parking spaces, and now pedestrians have an equal share of the avenue's width, with shade from more trees. cultural centers, deluxe hotels and other activities that participate in the tradition and prestige of the Champs-Elysees are encouraged to return by the municipality.

The stretch between the Rond-Point roundabout - whose Lalique glass fountains disappeared during the German occupation -and Concorde is bordered by chestnut trees and municipal flower beds, pleasant enough to stroll among, but not sufficiently dense to muffle the squeal of accelerating tyres. The two massive buildings rising above the greenery to the south are the Grand and Petit Palais, with their overloaded Neoclassical exteriors, rail station roofs and exuberant flying statuary. They house a number of museums and the Grand Palais is the address for major cultural exhibitions, curtailed at the moment due to major restoration works.

On the north side, combat police guard the high walls round the presidential Elysee palace and the line of ministries and embassies ending with the US in prime position on the corner of place de la Concorde. On Thursdays and at weekends you can see a stranger manifestation of the self-images of states in the postage stamp market at the corner of avenues Gabriel and Marigny.

How to get there
Metro line 1, 2, 6, 8, 9, 12 or 13: Charles-de-Gaulle-Étoile, GeorgeV, Champs-Elysées Clemenceau, Concorde
RER A : Charles-de-Gaulle-Étoile

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Address: http://www.champselysees.org/

Between the Champs Elysées and the Tuileries Gardens, there lies the Place de la Concorde. With traffic roaring and careening about seemingly in all directions, it is easy to feel lost on its 84,000 square meters.

History
It was designed by Gabriel begun in 1748 and completed in 1763. It was first called Place Louis XV, and planned as a worthy setting for the royal statue. Place de la Concorde is often associated with the bloody events that took place on its pavement. In 1770, for example, 133 spectators were trampled to death at a huge fireworks display on the occasion of Marie-Antoinette's wedding to the Dauphin. A few
decades later, the revolutionaries, who were intent on eliminating all royalist monuments trom the face of the earth, removed Louis XlV's statue, dubbed the plaza Place de la Révolution, and set up their guillotine on it. Louis XVI, Marie-Antoinette and 1119 other people lost their lives here, among them Charlotte Corday (the murderess of Marat), Danton, Philippe Égalité and Robespierre. In order to help these bloody events on their way to oblivion, the Directory renamed the square Place de la Concorde in 1795. And, officially, the 1830 Revolution renamed it Place de la Concorde.

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Address: Metro 1, 13 : Concorde

Notre-Dame is now viewed as one of the key defining examples of the style which was to become known as Ile-de-France Gothic, by the early nineteenth century few Parisians valued their medieval past very highly. Interest in the medieval building was largely rekindled by Victor Hugo's novel Notre-Dame de Paris. For twenty years, Viollet-le-Duc worked at Notre-Dame, adding the spire, consolidating the fabric and replacing missing or defaced sculptures.

Inside
Interior, the immediately striking feature, if you can ignore the noise and movement, is the dramatic contrast between the darkness of the nave and the light falling on the first clustered pillars of the choir, placing an emphasis on the special nature of the sanctuary. Nearly two-thirds glass, it is the end walls of the transepts that admit all this light as well as the two magnificent rose windows coloured in imperial purple. These, the vaulting, the soaring shafts reaching to the springs of the vaults, are all definite Gothic elements, yet, inside as well as outside, there remains a strong sense of Romanesque in the stout round pillars of the nave and the general sense of four-squareness.

Not to be missed !
Before leaving, do not forget to walk round to the public garden at the east end for a view of the flying buttresses supporting the choir, and then along the riverside under the south transept, where you can sit in springtime under the cherry blossom.
And in front of the cathedral, in the square separating Notre Dame from Haussmann's police Headquarters, is what appears to be and smells like the entrance to an underground toilet. In fact, it is a very well-displayed and interesting museum, the crypte archeologique, in which are revealed the remains of the church which predated the cathedral, as well as streets and houses of the Cite dating as far back as the Roman era.
On the pavement by the west door of Notre-Dame is a spot known as kilometre zero. This is where all of the main road distances in France are calculated.

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Address: Ile de la Cit?