Ah…Paris, the city of love. Where writers and artists come to fulfil their dreams, where the fashion and perfume houses are at the top of their leagues and of course, the home of former Royalty getting their heads chopped off. Yes, Paris has it all, shopping, culture, history, sport, cuisine, to name a few and based on personal experience, the city can’t be done in a day. In my blog posts about Paris, I have separated the city like the locals have done, in arrondissements to make life so much easier as there is so much to do here.
But what is an arrondissement? OK, I better explain first, the city of Paris is divided into twenty arrondissements municipaux which are administrative districts also referred to as arrondissements. In most Parisian postal codes, the number of the arrondissement is included in the last two digits, 75001, 75002, 75003 all the way to 75020. Also each arrondissement has a name, for example, the 1st arrondissement is Louvre, the 5th arrondissement is Panthéon and so on. An extra thing to add about arrondissements, is that the first four have a shared administration and are called Paris Centre.
If people reading this saw a map with all twenty arrondissements, they will see they are arranged in a shape of an snail shell, a clockwise spiral, which starts from the centre of the city with the first arrondissements starting on the north bank of the River Seine and spirals clockwise from there.
OK, I hope I have explained that well, so like I said earlier, I will start with the 1st arrondissement (1er arrondissement) and is known to the locals as le premier (the first) and Louvre. This arrondissement includes the western side of Île de la Cité which is one of the oldest areas of Paris (this area was known as Lutetia and was conquered by the Romans in 52 BC). This arrondissement is one of the smallest in Paris, is the least populated as most of the buildings here are for shopping, administration and business offices.
How to get around the 1er arrondissement & explaining the Metro and RER systems
If visiting the area, I highly recommend just walking or cycling around it as all the sights are so close together. There is no need to use the Metro or RER. However visitors may need to use these two to get to the 1st arrondissement. The Metro is the subway of Paris and are slower lines to travel on as there are so many stops on the line. The RER are much longer trains (some are double-deckers) and have less stops (only stopping at major areas of the city or interchanges) and go out further away from the centre of Paris into the countryside.
The Metro has five lines going into this area.
Line 1 La Défense (Grande Arche) to Château de Vincennes has the following stops in the 1st arrondissement: Concorde (for Place de la Concorde), Tuileries (for Jardin de Tuileries), Palais Royal–Musée du Louvre (for Palais-Royal, Comédie-Française and Louvre), Louvre-Rivoli, and Châtelet.
Line 4 Porte de Clignancourt to Bagneux–Lucie Aubrac, stops off at Etienne Marcel, Les Halles, and Châtelet. It also stops off at Cité which is not in the 1st arrondissement but it is the nearest station to the western side of Île de la Cité which is in the 1st.
Line 7 La Courneuve–8 mai 1945 to Mairie d'Ivry / Villejuif–Louis Aragon. This line stops at Pyramides, Palais Royal–Musée du Louvre, Pont Neuf and Châtelet.
Line 8 Balard to Pointe du Lac stops of at Madeleine
Line 11 starts at Châtelet and goes to north-east Paris and terminates at Rosny–Bois-Perrier
Line 12 Mairie d'Aubervilliers to Mairie d'Issy stops at Madeleine and Concorde.
Line 14 Saint-Denis–Pleyel to Aéroport d'Orly stops at: Madeleine, Pyramids and Châtelet.
Châtelet, combined with Les Halles and the RER station of Châtelet-Les Halles, is one of the largest metro stations in the world as they all connect. With Metro lines 1, 4, 7, 11, 14 going through, it also serves the RER.
RER A - quickest trains to take visitors to La Défense, Charles de Gaulle–Étoile, Auber and Gare de Lyon.
RER B - quickest trains to take visitors to Charles de Galle airport, Gare du Nord and Saint-Michel (Notre Dame).
RER D - quickest trains to take visitors to Stade de France (National Stadium), Gare du Nord and Gare du Lyon.
For route maps and ticket information on Paris transport network, visit here.
Now we know how to get around by transport, everything is very easy on foot to see all the sights. But what is there to see? The 1st arrondissement has some of the most famous sights to see in Paris.
Arc de Triomphe du Carrousel is a triumphal arch located at the Place du Carrousel which is located at the eastern end of Paris Axe Historique ("historic axis"), a nine-kilometre-long linear route which dominates much of the northwestern quadrant of the city. It is a great example of Neoclassical architecture and built in 1808 to commemorate Napoleon’s military victories between 1805 and 1807. The Arc de Triomphe de l'Étoile which is also located on the Paris Axe Historique on the Champs-Élysées is about twice the size, was designed in the same year however was not completed until 1836.
The Louvre is probably the most famous museum in the world alongside The British Museum in London and the Vatican Museum in the Vatican City. As an art museum, it houses famous works such as the Mona Lisa, Venus de Milo, and Winged Victory. For first time visitors who really want to see the Mona Lisa, it's not a huge painting, its like the size of an A4 sheet of paper. Expect to be pushed and thrown to the ground by other visitors as it gets so crowded in this room. Well, it's not as bad as that, but don’t expect to stand there and admire the works for ten minutes in complete silence. That will not happen. The museum is located in the Louvre Palace which was built in the 13th century under King Philip II. There are remnants of the medieval Louvre fortress in the basement of the building. Over the years, the Louvre turned from a defensive fortress to a residence of French Kings by King Francis I in 1546.
The palace had a museum open up in 1793 which mainly consisted of confiscated works by the church. The collection at the museum was increased under Napoleon as his army was doing a lot of looting of art works when he did his tour of beating armies in Europe, Egypt and Syria. The museum even changed its name to Musée Napoléon, but after Napoleon’s abdication, many of the works were returned to their original owners. However the collection was further increased later on during the Second French Empire. Today the museum houses over 500,000 pieces of art and other objects. Please note, the use of cameras and video recorders is permitted inside but flash photography is forbidden.
At ground level and in the palace grounds is a huge glass pyramid and its three accompanying pyramidions ("pyramidlets") which has stood here since the late 1980s and are a simple delight to look at.
Palais-Royal, located slightly north of the Louvre on Rue Saint-Honoré and is a former French royal palace which was originally called Palais-Cardinal and has stood here since the 1630s. The Palais-Royal is now the seat of the Ministry of Culture, the Conseil d'État and the Constitutional Council. There is a nice public park in the centre of the palace known as Palais-Royal Garden (Jardin du Palais-Royal).
Sainte-Chapelle is a Gothic styled royal chapel within the medieval Palais de la Cité, the residence of the Kings of France until the 14th century, on the Île de la Cité (the island in the River Seine as mentioned earlier on in this post). Construction started around 1238 and took ten years to build as it was consecrated on the 26th April 1248. The chapel is one of the earliest surviving buildings on the island, even though it got damaged during the French Revolution and restored in the 19th century and it has one of the most extensive 13th century stained glass windows anywhere in the world. It is such a beautiful building that I recommend everyone to see it.
Next to Sainte-Chapelle to the north is a really fancy beautiful building called the Conciergerie, which is a prison built around the 12th century and used to house Marie Antoinette, yes, that Marie Antoinette, the Queen of France, who famously said ‘Let them eat cake!’ during the French Revolution. This would be the last place that Marie would live before being taken to the Place de la Révolution (these days known as Place de la Concorde) by cart before she would lose her head. The building is a riverside fortress in a Gothic style and has turrets capped with slate-blue roofs which are beautiful to see, but all the walls inside are white. Very French indeed.
The Conciergerie has gone through several periods of changes. The building started out as a royal residence for Clovis, the first French King and years later, King Louis IX (1214-1270) instructed a royal chapel to be built, which is of course, Sainte-Chapelle. King Philip IV (1268-1314) turned the palace into the seat of Parlement de Paris and fortified the palace. King Charles V moved out of the palace in 1358 but the building stayed as an administrative centre. Because of this, Charles V appointed a ‘concierge’ to run the palace and prison and this is how the building got its name, Conciergerie. These days visitors can go around the Conciergerie and visit the cell Marie was kept in, there is a museum as well with all the history of the building. It is such a great museum, I highly recommend a visit as it is a very important part of Paris and France’s history.
Tuileries Gardens (Jardin des Tuileries) is a huge public garden between the Louvre and the Place de la Concorde which was created in the 1560s and opened to the public in 1667 (and then became a public park after the French Revolution). It is such a beautiful park to take a stroll and get away from the stress of the crowds at the tourist sites in the area. The park even hosted the Olympic and Paralympic cauldron for the 2024 Summer Olympics and Paralympics.
Pont Neuf is the oldest standing bridge which spans the River Seine and stands at the western point of Île de la Cité. The name Pont Neuf was given to distinguish it from older bridges that were lined on both sides with houses, and has remained after all of those were replaced.
Les Halles is a huge shopping complex which is connected to the massive RER and Metro hub of Paris busiest station, Châtelet–Les Halles and it is a complete eyesore. Sorry, I am not a fan of the architecture here which houses over 160 shops and outlets. It does however cater for everyone's shopping needs but when walking around this, I was not impressed. I have heard it has improved under the ownership of Westfield so maybe I need another try of the place (I am not a big fan of ‘Le Shopping’ either!).
There are other places to check out (but I am going to list them as I haven’t explored them yet and hopefully I will do as I am a regular visitor to Paris) are the Comédie-Française (French comedy headquarters), Galerie Véro-Dodat (gallery), Musée des Arts Décoratifs (museum), Musée du Barreau de Paris (museum), La Samaritaine (an department store) and Place Vendôme (large square to the north of Jardin des Tuileries).
Personal view on the 1er arrondissement
The 1st arrondissement is a fantastic area to explore in Paris and is a great place to start for the first time visitor. There is plenty to do and see, lots of places to eat and drink and there is a lot of history to explore. Visitors can see everything from Claude Monet’s Waterlilies to the hotel where Coco Chanel spent World War II (that would be The Ritz), It can be very touristy as Paris is the most visited city in the world so I have one bit of advice here, don’t expect to embrace into the French culture too much as locals in the city, if they don’t work in this area, they will avoid it as they also find it too touristy. Only locals who work in this area come here. All the sites here can be done in a day but it would be rushed, so I would recommend two-three days. My favourite thing to do in the Spring, Summer and Autumn (on fine days of course) is to stroll around the Tuileries Gardens and Palais-Royal gardens as they are lovely green spaces for this part of Paris. Don’t forget the gardens outside the Louvre Museum are also a great place to chill out on a sunny day. I have created many memories in this area in my younger days and also when I took Olga for her first visits to the city of love over a decade ago. I also have run the Paris Marathon through this area in 2015 and 2019 and remember the crowds cheering me and the other runners along the Rue de Rivoli. I also love checking out places which were scenes from television shows and movies like Pont Neuf for The Bourne Identity, Amelie, Sex And The City An American Girl in Paris (Part Deux) is filmed in Kong, a rooftop restaurant in the 1st arrondissement, Emily in Paris, Pour dix cent (Call my agent!), Lupin and so fourth. I felt like every street I walked down in Paris I was in a Hollywood movie set. I love this part of Paris however over the last decade for me as I am a regular visitor to the city, I usually land up in the other arrondissements, but that's just me personally.
Essential information on Paris
How to get to Paris
Paris is a very easy city to get to. The three main airports in the region are Charles de Galle (CDG) to the north of the city, Orly (ORY) to the south and Beauvais (BVA) to the north-west of the city. CDG is where most international visitors will arrive and from here, take the RER line B to Gare du Nord, Châtelet-Les Halles and Saint Michel-Notre Dame to connect with other RER and Metro services around the city. There are also taxis from CDG but this is an expensive option in my personal opinion.
ORY is also used for international flights but it is not as big as CDG. From ORY take the metro line 14 and this will go into the heart of the city, including stops at Châtelet-Les Halles, Gare de Lyon and Saint-Lazare. BVA is a airport located outside the city of Beauvais and is used for no-frills flights like Ryanair. There are coaches that will go into Paris from here and take about ninety minutes to two hours. There are also trains from the centre of Beauvais to Paris but it's a bit of a mission to get to the city centre from the airport to connect with the train.
The first place I would go to find airline tickets to the city is using (I would recommend) Skyscanner to find flights as that is my first point of call. Then if necessary use the airlines directly to find a good deal. I sometimes use Momondo as well to compare prices before booking.
By train, Paris is very well connected to the rest of Europe. Gare du Nord, a station I know very well, has connections to Brussels, Amsterdam, Cologne, and London (via the Channel Tunnel) and of course, the North of France such as Arras, Calais and Lille.
Gare de l'Est handles trains heading east to Reims, Nancy, Metz, Strasbourg, Stuttgart, Frankfurt & Munich. It also handles the weekly Venice Simplon Orient Express between March & November. Gare de Lyon is the station for trains heading southeast out of the city, including trains to Dijon, Lyon, Avignon, Marseille, Nice, the French Alps, Switzerland, Italy & Barcelona.
Gare d'Austerlitz merely handles the intercité trains on the classic route from Paris to Limoges, Cahors, Brive & Toulouse and regional trains to Orleans, Blois & the Loire Valley. Gare Montparnasse handles trains using the TGV Atlantique high-speed line to Brittany, Bordeaux, Biarritz, Lourdes, Tarbes and the Spanish border at Hendaye for onward trains to San Sebastian & Spain.
Gare Paris de Bercy handles the mainline intercité trains to Vichy & Clermont Ferrand, the (non-high-speed) TER regional trains to Lyon and Dijon. Paris St Lazare is the station serving Normandy, including Intercités trains to Caen, Rouen, Dieppe, Le Havre, Cherbourg.
Car Rentals - as I do a lot of road trips around the world, I use Rentalcars.com which is very reliable for booking car hire in advance. I also use Turo (the airbnb of car rentals) and never had a problem with them. The cars are insured, owners vetted and never had an issue.
Accommodation: There are a lot of accommodation options and a lot of websites which can do some great deals. My first point of call is always Booking.com and can offer a range of hostels, hotels, campsites, apartments, guesthouses and bed and breakfasts.. After that I always have a look through AirBnb and Vrbo for great deals on apartments and other lodgings especially when traveling as a family. When traveling to Paris, visitors will find cheaper hotels on the outskirts of the city centre. When doing this, try and find a hotel near a metro line or RER station (which isn’t that hard to do). In the centre, hotels are more expensive, but I find the older hotels which use to be brothel houses in the Second World War have paper thin walls and I could hear those green cleaning machines out in the street at 4am whirling away or listening to every word of a conversation from the couple on the other side of the hotel room walls. That's my personal opinion and I am sure the Ritz isn’t like this as it is located in the 1st.
Currency: France uses the Euro currency. Currency can be exchanged at the airports and train stations (for a huge fee) so I would recommend either going to a currency exchange place downtown, to a bank (if they have good rates) or if you got a good bank account with fantastic exchange rates, then use an ATM machine (may incur a small fee but I always do this option as I got good bank accounts). A great website I use to compare currency exchange rates is XE, which gives people up to date information.
Language: The official language in Paris and the rest of France is French. Contrary to other countries, English isn't widely spoken. Although Parisians do not generally speak or like to speak English, tourists won't have any problems communicating in this language in most hotels, restaurants and shops. I find that a lot of Parisians do speak English, especially the younger generations but it is very polite for the visitors to the city to speak any French possible at first. If not, just say, Je suis désolé, parlez-vous anglais? (I am sorry, do you speak English?).
Watch out for: As far as I am aware, there are no major scams to look out for. As always in Europe, watch out for the usual pickpockets or any pretty crimes. Stay clear of those pesky people near major tourist sites who want to sell you fake jewellery or braid your hair. Paris is always on a high sense of security as if a major incident will be declared like a terrorist attack. The Paris police force is one of the best in the world and will keep the locals and visitors safe if an incident is declared. Hopefully this will not happen when visitors visit the city but this is what it has been like since the 2000s, not just in Paris, but in Brussels, Nice, London, Sweden and Germany amongst other places in Europe.
Travel insurance: This is essential to anywhere you go in the world. I always carry travel insurance. Having travel insurance will cover you from theft, illness and those annoying cancellations which can happen on the road. Safety Wing offers coverage for a lot of adventure activities as well as emergency medical, lost luggage, trip cancellation and so forth.
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