The Beginning

Before leaving Paris, we planned our visit to Eiffel Tower, the most remarkable landmark in this romantic city. Yeah, we went to there at night but to my surprise it was glowing in blue, no longer the usual yellow-golden shinny look. After that, I realized this was because of the celebration of France’s rotating presidency of the European Union (EU). Twelve stars are mounted on the northwest face of the tower to symbolize the EU Flag. (Reuter News) But now it should resume back to it’s original appearance.

Shooting the photo from far…

According to Wikipedia, more than 200,000,000 people have visited the tower since its construction in year 1889. The building was divided into few floors and different floor will cost you different admission fees. I actually bought the ticket straight to the top floor and it cost me around 13  €. Check out this site for the actual entrance fees – Tour Eiffel 

Lining up to buy tickets~~

View from the Top Floor, awesome!!

Small Little Eiffel Tower souvenirs…

Yeah, time for supper after a tiring walk

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The next day, we decided to visit Palace of Versailles (Official Website), the vast royal palace and gardens built by King Louis XIV. It is a suburb of Paris, and about 20km southwest of the French capital. So, we had to take the subway to get in.

Check out WikiTravel – Versailles 

Starting from the station Porte-Maillot… (btw, Sortie = exit in French)

had a quick lunch before the walk

On the way walking to our destinations~~

Introduction to Palace of Versailles

The Palace of Versailles, or simply Versailles, is a royal château in Versailles, the Île-de-France region of France. In French, it is known as the Château de Versailles.

When the château was built, Versailles was a country village; today, however, it is a suburb of Paris, some twenty kilometers southwest of the French capital. The court of Versailles was the center of political power in France from 1682, when Louis XIV moved from Paris, until the royal family was forced to return to the capital in October 1789 after the beginning of the French Revolution. Versailles is therefore famous not only as a building, but as a symbol of the system of absolute monarchy of the Ancien Régime.

By the time we reached, it was almost 3o’clock and the place actually closed around 5.00pm. We don’t have much time to visit this place due my schedule and also the long queue. At the end, we walked around the garden at the back and took some photos of the landscape. It was fun though and the place is too big and you really need TIME to explore every corner. (plan one day for this if you are keen)

Entrance of the Palace

Gave up buying the ticket after I saw this long long queue

Side view…

The garden is very BIG!!!

Looks cute

I found this site Paris-Photos from Google – a nice photo gallery for Palace of Versailles.

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A quick summary for the remaining route…

Continued from Part Two, we walked across River Seine from Louvre Museum and came to Institude de France. Then, we headed to Notre Dame to take some photo, and walked to the other side of River Seine. Ok, then from there we walked all the way back to the hotel using the same route. Check out the map below (for the part from Louvre Museum to Notre Dame)

River Seine

The Seine (French: La Seine, pronounced: [la sɛn]) is a slow-flowing major river and commercial waterway within the regions of Île-de-France and Haute-Normandie in France and famous as a romantic backdrop in photographs of Paris, France. It is also a tourist attraction, with excursion boats offering sightseeing tours of the Rive Droite and Rive Gauche within the city of Paris. It terminates in the Bay of the Seine region of the English Channel and is navigable by ocean-going vessels for about ten percent of its length, as far as Rouen, 120 km (75 miles) from the sea, while over sixty percent of its length, as far as Burgundy near the Swiss Alps, is negotiable by commercial riverboats and nearly its whole length is available for recreational boating. (from Wikipedia)

To me, this is the soul of the city Paris, and I really love this river. I had a good walk along the river bank…Hope that I can back to here one day and enjoy my meal here!!!

Institut de France

I only know this is a French leanred society through Wikipedia….Nothing much, just posed and take a photo here.

(Adapted from http://www.naturepixel.com/institut_france_pont_arts.jpg)

Notre Dame

This is one of the famous landmark in Paris. It is also the cathedral of the Catholic  archdiocese of Paris.

Timeline of construction

    * 1160 Maurice de Sully (named Bishop of Paris), orders the original cathedral to be demolished.
    * 1163 Cornerstone laid for Notre Dame de Paris—construction begins.
    * 1182 Apse and choir completed.
    * 1196 Bishop Maurice de Sully dies.
    * c.1200 Work begins on western façade.
    * 1208 Bishop Eudes de Sully dies. Nave vaults nearing completion.
    * 1225 Western façade completed.
    * 1250 Western towers and north rose window completed.
    * c.1245–1260s Transepts remodelled in the Rayonnant style by Jean de Chelles then Pierre de Montreuil
    * 1250–1345 Remaining elements completed

Then, we took a break and enjoyed our afternoon tea in Haagen Dazs.

Randomly took some candid shots on our way back…

Louvre Museum at night (actually just around 6.00pm)

Visited a stall at the square and bought a choc-waffle

Yummy Yummy!!!

Avenue des Champs-Élysées (fascinating!!!)

Frozen pond with lights decoration…

I remembered it was freezing cold that day and the temperature was around 2 °C, but feels like –10 °C. This also explained why we couldn’t take much photo because it was too cold…

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