Eiffel Tower and the Louvre

[Brokenfurnitureandroses]

Hi.
we are hoping to visit Paris as a family of 5 over the Easter break. I’ve heard that if you want to go up the Eiffel Tower, you have to book it well in advance. What site should I book it on (preferably to get the best price)? Also, with the Louvre do you have any tips for visiting? I see that the 1st week in April is crossed out - does this mean that the tickets have not been released yet?
Thanks in advance!

make time to see the Musee D'Orsay, its really wonderful. I think you will really enjoy it.

Lol they want to go to the Louvre.

Eiffel tower tickets are released 2 months in advance, right now there is reasonable availability for 15th March on the official website. I just checked my emails and I got my tickets for the summit 'by elevator' a week out, as was showing as unavailable prior to that. AI seems to think they still release more tickets at 1pm Paris time exactly one week prior, so this could be a plan B if you miss the initial booking slot. With the summit shut for renovations until early Feb you can't test it out unfortunately. I booked the Louvre a month prior to our visit, that may be a coincidence as it was a couple of days after I booked our flights and maybe I was just crossing things off. We had 9am timeslot and when we arrived there people queuing one side of the pyramid for 9am and the other side for 9:30, so be careful to join the correct queue.

I should have said the kids really enjoyed the catacombs, another thing you need to pre-book but worth doing if it appeals.

The Louvre has 15km of galleries - plan what you want to see beforehand. Allow the best part of 60 mins or so to get in. My general advice would be just avoid it, though you need to go at least onceto know that you need to avoid it :).

Personally I prefer the Musée D’Orsay - much more accessible and easy to navigate (and it will be a lot more interesting for kids). Even better for kids, and also free for you, is the fantastic and much underrated Musee Carnavalet in the Marais. That covers the History of Paris in a fab way

Sorry I'm late to reply. If your kids
Really want to see these things book in advance. With the Louvre plan in advance what you will see. 99 % ot it is utterly boring. Actually 100 % of it of it is boring.

The Louvre is enormous, tiring and overwhelming, in my opinion.

The D’Orsay is much nicer.

See now I’m one of those who listened to everyone telling me the Louvre was too overwhelming, not worth it, don’t go. So I didn’t for YEARS. I’d been to Paris many times before I finally went. Yes it’s enormous, but it’s beautiful. My tick sheet was the Mona Lisa (how could I go and NOT see it?!?), the Three Graces and the Winged Nike. They didn’t disappoint (even the Mona Lisa!), and I saw lots of other wonderful antiquities as well.

I wasn’t fussed by the Eiffel Tower though, and only went because DD wanted to do it on her first trip to Paris.

The Musee d’Orsay is lovely as well though. And I loved the Rodin museum. There’s a lot to do.

AI is correct. More tickets are released a week before. We managed to find a slot easily (though I was on the site the minute they were released) and we went in Easter.