Paris in July without children

[glinda]

My lovely hubby has booked a few days in Paris for us to celebrate 20 years of wedded bliss! So I would be very grateful for recommendations of places to go and lovely, but not too pricey, places to eat. Also, which tourist traps would you avoid?

Lucky you, have a fantastic time. Bumping for you.

glinda- we are also going to Paris in July without children... to celebrate both our 40ths. Have you booked your hotel yet??

Any recommendations/tips from mumsnetters much appreciated.

Tea at La Duree

Cocktails at night or lunch during the day at Kong

Chique Parisiennes will probably say they're touristy, but we loved them when DH took me to Paris for my 30th.

Get yourself a carte Musee for a couple of days. Not only will it save you money if you want to visit a few musuems - but it also means you go straight to head og the queue sodon't have to waste precious time standing in line.

A two day pass will cost you ?32.

In addtion to the obvious ones like the Musee d'Orsay and the Louvre, I owuld really recommend visitng the Sainte Chapelle. You'll be bowled over the the beauty of the stained glass windows - I then realise that yuo are still in the downstairs bit and the really beauitful bit is upstairs!

You will probably find that the queues for the Eiffel Tower and Notre Dame Cathedral are completely horrendous. We were in Paris for a few days last July and didn't bother doing either once we saw the queues!

The Batobus is a good way to get around - more pleasant than the Metro.

The Orangerie is a lovely small art gallery, with only a few rooms but mostly full of enormous monet water-lily paintings.

If you like Monet, you might also like a day trip out to Giverney, where he lived for the last 20 years of his life, and which is full of flowers and waterlily ponds.

I agree about the Eiffel Tower - unless you plan on getting there really early. I think there is a way of avoiding the queues - but I think it involves booking lunch on the restaurant up on one of upper levels. Can't remember the details.

Never had a problem with queues at Nortre Daem - but then we have only ever wandered around the inside as it is after all a working cathedral (and unlike St Pauls, not one you pay to go into). We've never done any of the tours or gone up the towers though.

We like having a coffee or lunch at Cafe Panis which is right beside Nortre Dame. it's a great cafe for just sitting and watching the world go by (some comfortable leather charis inside too) and they do a good French Onion soup. It's not the cheapest though - although nto bad considering its location.

Musee Rodin and general environs lovely.

There is so much to do & see in Paris I think you should decide first what sort (or combination of sorts) of a Paris-experiencer you want to be ... high art? shopping-n-fashion? sport? nightlife? theatre? top-five-landmarks? history? memorable food?

Then you can get some more targetted suggestions.

So - for instance - when we went to Paris (with children) 18 months ago we wanted (i) a couple of memorable things for the children (Eiffel Tower and river trip did that); some homey Paris where people would be friendly to the children (Marais worked well); modern & contemporary art (also Marais - Beaubourg; and Musée Picasso); off-the-beaten-track history and technical interest (Musée des Arts et Métiers, marvellous eccentric place). We absolutely had no interest at all in glamour or shopping or fashion or nightlife or sport, so recommendations for anything related to those would have gone over our heads.

If you want to do a lot of museuming, check the opening days and times. IIRC many museums are shut on Mondays and the Louvre is shut on Tuesdays, but you'd have to check that.

I love the Musee Picasso, if you're into Picasso, obviously.

For Notre Dame the best way of seeing it is either to go to a service or a concert - we went to a lovely, fairly inexpensive concert there one evening and it was really magical.

There are loads of lovely places to eat near the new Opera (Bastille). You can also eat very well in the restaurant at the Musee d'Orsay. The Louvre has three places to eat inside it, and I can thoroughly recommend Cafe Richlieu (in the Richlieu section)

Most of Paris is really very lovely, but the Champs Elysees is fairly depressingly touristy and full of McDonalds etc. Many people also complain about the fakery of Montmartre. Yes, it probably is fake, but it's so nicely done I don't really care. However, you won't get the best value eating there as it's mostly fairly ripoffy "Menu Touristique" places doing nothing much more sophisticated than chicken and chips. It is a long flog up the hill to Sacre Coeur (you can get a bus though) and I personally find I have to be in the right mood to appreciate its slightly kitsch splendour. But go for a drink and a wander around and it's really lovely.

The other tourist trap letdown is the Sex Museum - lots of fertility symbol statues, all taken out of their own culture and context, plus some trashy artwork. In my defence, we only went because the guidebook raved about it, but it was awful.

Some of the very best views to be had over Paris are IMO from the Centre Pompidou's balconies and large gallery windows. For walking around, the Islands in the Seine are lovely - apparently there is an amazing ice cream parlour on the Ile de Vincennes, but we didn't quite make it there.

A boat trip is a good way of seeing where everything is. I liked the Rodin Museum, and enjoyed walking around that area and just drinking in the atmosphere. For quirky shops there is a street in St Germain called Rue de St Andre (I think).
Bofinger, near Bastille is a traditional Paris Bistro, which is good for lunch.

Thanks for all the ideas! Will I be terrified by the prices generally?

We weren't last year, but the pound-euro rate was rather better then, so I think you will find it fairly expensive unless things change again by then.

We enjoyed Rodin Museum, Pompidou centre (modern art), Arc de Triomphe, Notre Dame and the walk up to the Sacre Couer (a la Amelie) - you can also eat in the cafe where Amelie was filmed.

There is also a fab Turkish type cafe located at the further end of the botanical gardens (not in the gardens, outside the gate and up the road a little) - beautiful outside tiled garden, hot mint tea and little sticky cakes. Students all hang out there and it's a great place just to sit and watch the world go by.

The Per la Chaise cemetery is quite an interesting place, but the surrounding areas are a bit dodgy and the nearest Metro is a bit of a hike.

A friend went last week and said it was very expensive.

Rodin museum is a great place to visit. Beautiful gardens and a sweet cafe in the grounds in a tree-lined avenue . We walked from the Louvre up to the Champs Elysee via the Tuilleries (I think??) - fab gardens with plenty of cafe's to stop at.

We went to look at the Eiffel Tower but didn't bother going up. Notre Dame was very busy but worth going to.

We ate at Restaurant du Palais Royal (10 Galerie de Valois in the 1st Arrondissement) on our anniversary. We had a table on the terrace which overlooks the Jardins du Palais Royal and I arranged to have champagne waiting at our table! It was so perfect - fab food and very romantic.

For something a bit romantic, there's nothing like doing the boat tour at night. Seeing everything so beautifully lit up and the light show from the eiffel tower is really magical!