Paris Private First-Timers Tour: Iconic Landmarks & Crêpes

Highlights

Inclusions

Itinerary

1. The Place de la Bastille is a square in Paris where the Bastille prison once stood, until the storming of the Bastille and its subsequent physical destruction between 14 July 1789 and 14 July 1790 during the French Revolution. No vestige of the prison remains. The square straddles 3 arrondissements of Paris, namely the 4th, 11th and 12th. The square and its surrounding areas are normally called simply Bastille. The July Column (Colonne de Juillet) which commemorates the events of the July Revolution (1830) stands at the center of the square. Other notable features include the Bastille Opera, the Bastille subway station and a section of the Canal Saint Martin. Prior to 1984, the former Bastille railway station stood where the opera house now stands.

   10 min

2. Place des Vosges, originally Place Royale, is the oldest planned square in Paris, France. It is located in the Marais district, and it straddles the dividing-line between the 3rd and 4th arrondissements of Paris. It was a fashionable and expensive square to live in during the 17th and 18th centuries, and one of the main reasons for the chic nature of Le Marais among the Parisian nobility.

   15 min

3. The Hôtel de Sully is a Louis XIII style hôtel particulier, or private mansion, located at 62 rue Saint-Antoine in the Marais, IV arrondissement, Paris, France. Built at the beginning of the 17th century, it is nowadays the seat of the Centre des Monuments Nationaux, the French national organization responsible for national heritage sites. It has been listed since 1862 as a monument historique by the French Ministry of Culture.

   10 min

4. The Hôtel de Sens or Hôtel des archevêques de Sens is a 16th-century hôtel particulier, or private mansion, in the Marais, in the 4th arrondissement of Paris, France. It nowadays houses the Forney art library.

   15 min

5. Notre-Dame de Paris ; meaning "Our Lady of Paris", referred to simply as Notre-Dame, is a medieval Catholic cathedral on the Île de la Cité (an island in the Seine River), in the 4th arrondissement of Paris. The cathedral, dedicated to the Virgin Mary, is considered one of the finest examples of French Gothic architecture. Several attributes set it apart from the earlier Romanesque style, particularly its pioneering use of the rib vault and flying buttress, its enormous and colorful rose windows, and the naturalism and abundance of its sculptural decoration.[5] Notre-Dame also stands out for its three pipe organs (one historic) and its immense church bells.

   15 min

6. The Fontaine Saint-Michel is a monumental fountain located in Place Saint-Michel in the 6th arrondissement in Paris. It was constructed in 1858–1860 during the French Second Empire by the architect Gabriel Davioud. It has been listed since 1926 as a monument historique by the French Ministry of Culture.

   10 min

7. Crêpe stop at a traditional french Crêperie.

   30 minAdmission included

8. Saint-Germain-des-Prés is one of the four administrative quarters of the 6th arrondissement of Paris, France, located around the church of the former Abbey of Saint-Germain-des-Prés. Its official borders are the River Seine on the north, the rue des Saints-Pères on the west, between the rue de Seine and rue Mazarine on the east, and the rue du Four on the south. Residents of the quarter are known as Germanopratins. The quarter's cafés include Les Deux Magots, Café de Flore, le Procope, and the Brasserie Lipp, as well as many bookstores and publishing houses. In the 1940s and 1950s, it was the centre of the existentialist movement (associated with Jean-Paul Sartre and Simone de Beauvoir). It is also home to the École des Beaux-Arts, Sciences Po, the Saints-Pères biomedical university center of the University of Paris, the School for Advanced Studies in the Social Sciences, and the Musée national Eugène Delacroix, in the former apartment and studio of painter Eugène Delacroix.

   15 min

9. The Church of Saint-Germain-des-Prés is a Roman Catholic parish church located in the Saint-Germain-des-Prés quarter of Paris. It was originally the church of a Benedictine abbey founded in the 6th century, by Childebert I, the son of Clovis, King of the Franks. It was destroyed by the Vikings, rebuilt, and renamed in the 8th century for Saint Germain, an early Bishop of the city. It is considered the oldest existing church in Paris.

   15 min

10. The Pont des Arts or Passerelle des Arts is a pedestrian bridge in Paris which crosses the River Seine. It links the Institut de France and the central square (cour carrée) of the Palais du Louvre, (which had been termed the "Palais des Arts" under the First French Empire).

    15 min

11. The Louvre is a national art museum in Paris, France. A central landmark of the city, it is located on the Right Bank of the Seine in the city's 1st arrondissement (district or ward) and home to some of the most canonical works of Western art, including the Mona Lisa and the Venus de Milo. The museum is housed in the Louvre Palace, originally built in the late 12th to 13th century under Philip II. Remnants of the Medieval Louvre fortress are visible in the basement of the museum. Due to urban expansion, the fortress eventually lost its defensive function, and in 1546 Francis I converted it into the primary residence of the French Kings.

    15 min

12. The Arc de Triomphe du Carrousel (English: Triumphal Arch of the Carousel) is a triumphal arch in Paris, located in the Place du Carrousel. It is an example of Neoclassical architecture in the Corinthian order.[1] It was built between 1806 and 1808 to commemorate Napoleon's military victories in the Wars of the Third and Fourth Coalitions. The Arc de Triomphe de l'Étoile, at the far end of the Champs Élysées, was designed in the same year; it is about twice the size and was not completed until 1836.

    15 min

Cancellation

Free cancellation up to 24 hours before the experience starts, for a full refund.

Reviews

Ratings come from 8 reviews collected by our booking partner. They are travellers' own words, in the order they were written — never reordered to flatter the experience.

Know before you go

How it compares in Paris

• Its from-price is 14% below the median of the 4664 experiences we list in Paris.
• It is longer than most of them.
• By number of reviews it ranks 1524 of 4664.
• The operator lists free cancellation on it.

About Paris

Paris pairs grand boulevards and riverside monuments with café terraces, art collections of global stature and neighbourhoods that feel like villages.

The Seine runs through the heart of the city, past the Île de la Cité with Notre-Dame and the Sainte-Chapelle, the long façade of the Louvre and the Musée d'Orsay in its former railway station. Downriver, the Eiffel Tower rises over the Champ de Mars, and the Arc de Triomphe crowns the Champs-Élysées.

Top-ranked sights in Paris: Louvre Museum, Eiffel Tower, 4th Arrondissement.

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