Paris

We went to Paris for a week and caught up with an old friend from the USA that we haven’t seen in nearly 20 years. We stayed in an amazing 5 bedroom house in the 12th Arrondissement.

Kids under 18 are free to most museums in Paris, so I bought a 4 day Paris museum pass and traipsed all over Paris visiting stuff. We arrived in Paris the day after the Olympics finished (although the Paralympics was still going on) and so there were a lot of parks and roads blocked off and Olympic signs everywhere.

Even though we visited a lot of places 5 years ago, K was young and didn’t remember a lot so we did it all again.

Pere-Lachaise cemetery

This is an old cemetery in Paris where many famous people are buried including: Jim Morrison, Chopin, Edith Piaf, Oscar Wilde and several others.

Conciergerie and Sainte Chapelle

We went to both the Conciergerie and Sainte Chapelle. Unfortunately, I didn’t take many pictures in the Conciergerie because I was having too much fun with the interactive ipads! 😂

The conciergerie was the original royal palace which later turned into a prison. It was initially where the royal family kept prisoners and then where the revolutionaries kept their prisoners (including Marie-Antoinette). Sainte Chapelle is the church that was part of the original royal palace and it is one of my favourite churches in the world – the windows are amazing.

We then walked down the street to the Notre Dame, but it is still under construction after the fire in 2019. It is supposed to open again in December 2024, so hopefully we’ll be able to swing back around later.

Napoleon’s Tomb – Dome of Les Invalides

We took a walk around my old neighbourhood from when I used to live in Paris, and visited Napoleon’s tomb and the Army museum in Les Invalides.

Orangerie and Monet’s Water Lilies

From my old neighbourhood, we walked by the Assemble Nationale and over the Pont Alexandre III, across the Place de la Concorde (all closed off due to the Olympics) and over to the Orangerie in the Tuileries where we looked at all the various paintings and of course Monet’s Water Lilies.

Louvre

Of course, no trip to Paris is complete without spending a few hours in the Louvre.

Versailles

The day we went to Versailles it was absolutely pouring rain. So, we decided not to go into the gardens and instead just spent some extra time in the palace. The lines were still really long and we had to wait in the rain for 1.5 hours to get in!

While in Paris, we also visited the Centre Pompidou modern art gallery, the Galleries Lafayette and Printemps shopping malls, the Madeleine church and walked all over Paris (approx. 25,000 – 30,000 steps per day). Here are some other sites around Paris:

All up we had a fabulous time in Paris and felt like it was way too short. Can’t wait to go back!