Paris is the capital and largest city of France, with an estimated city population of 2.04 million in an area of 105.4 km2 (40.7 sq mi), and a metropolitan population of 13.2 million as of January 2026. Nicknamed the “City of Light”, partly because of its role in the Age of Enlightenment, Paris has been one of the world’s major centres of finance, diplomacy, commerce, culture, fashion, and gastronomy since the 17th century.
To get to Paris we too the Eurostar from Kings Cross in London, if I remember correctly, it was almost a three-hour journey. The Eurostar passed through an underwater tunnel to get to Europe and then France.
We arrive at Gare du Nord train station where we entered the city of Paris. Not hesitating we start exploring one time as our Airbnb was closer to the Eiffel Tower.
Our first stop would be the Basilique du Sacre-Coeur de Montmartre which is an Iconic, domed white church, completed in 1914, with interior mosaics, stained-glass windows & crypt.
The views from the courtyard were amazing you can view Paris as far as the eyes can see including the Eiffel Tower.
We went in and explored the church, the inside was massive and so beautiful, I even paid one euro to like a candle for my late parents.
Didn’t stay to long at the Sacoeur as we had plenty to see, and there were a lot of people going in and out, so we made our way down to the Carrousel de Saint-Pierre.
There I got my fridge magnet, and we took a little break then it was back to exploring.
We then made our way down to the Boulevard de Clichy, heading west on the Promenade, were we came up on to the famous La Machine du Moulin Rouge.
Then we headed south to La Terrasse des Galeries Lafayette, when we talk about fashion this is the mall to check out, all the big designers and brands in one place.
The building itself was an amazing design, so we explored and then we to the food court on one of the upper levels for lunch.
One thing I fail to mention is that French is not mandatory everyone we interacted with spoke English, so it was easy to communicate.
After lunch we went to the roof top where there was an amazing view of the city from here, we can pinpoint where to go next.
Our next stop would be the Musee du Louvre where we walked through the courtyard and checked out the Pyramide du Louvre which stood above the Musee.
At this point we tried to take a coach to the Airbnb only to realise we couldn’t, because they changed their payment system since the last world cup they hosted so we continued walking and exploring crossing the river La Seine to reach the Airbnb.
After a little rest we went back out and the evening to the Champ de Mars, which is a nice park with full few of the Eiffel Tower. At night the tower lights up and every hour on the dot it displays a light show.
After enjoying the park, we had dinner by a litter pizza shop Le P’tit Troquet, and then retired for the night.
The next day the journey continued, we walked through the Jardin de la Tour Eiffle and passed right under the tower, here we met several merchants selling tower souvenirs.
Then we crossed the Pont d’lena bridge and went to check out the Fountaine de Varsovie. The fountain was dry at this point but there was a perfect line of site to the Tower for great photos. This was the fountain featured in the movie Rush Hour 3.
The walking continued through the Place du Trocadero back on to the road to the next destination the Arc de Triomphe. The arc which was featured in John Wick Chapter 4 is one of the most famous monuments in Paris.
Our last location would have been Notre-Dame Cathedral of Paris but we could not get onto the metro so, we decided to head back to the Eurostar before we missed our train.
Paris was nice, but in my opinion it is overrated, it is much busier than the other cities we visited, and we were also warned about pick pocketers, but all in all it was fun.
You can see more photos of Paris here.