One Day in Paris

Look! There it is...

Hugh, Roger and Sophie.

Sophie at the Eiffel tower.

The Eiffel tower from the Seine.

We had to take the children to see the Eiffel tower, as before arriving in France it was the one tourist destination that they knew about in France. We were in Paris on the Saturday of the 15 August long weekend. Roger had been assured that Paris is at its quietest in August (all the Parisiens leave town for their August summer vacation) and that parking in the city is free. So we set our trusty TomTom to "The Eiffel Tower" and headed into the city. With a lot of luck we were able to find a park within 500 metres of the tower. We didn't need to resort to the tactics of some others, who had family members (with mobile phones) on foot finding a parking space and guarding it while they contacted their driver on the mobile phone to direct him to the sacred parking spot.
The most remarkable thing about the Eiffel tower was the crowd, with the queues having signposts with expected waiting times at intervals. We didn't want to wait two hours under the Eiffel tower for the privilege of paying a huge sum of money to ascend in a lift and admire the crowds from a higher point (well those in our group aged over 10 didn't want to.) So we went down to the Seine and took a boat ride, whereby we could see many of the sites without tiring out the little ones too much. The loud speakers on the boat were not quite loud enough so we didn't really hear all the details in three different languages.
Now please excuse me for posting so many pictures of our day in Paris...

Paris Landmarks