Paris – Arc de Triomphe & Champs Elysee
April 25, 2017
Arc de Triomphe
Our next stop on the agenda for today was the Arc de Triomphe. Just a short walk across the river and up the street from the Eiffel Tower. The “roundabout” that the Arc sits centre of is very impressive (clip on video page). There are no markings, there is about 3-4 ‘lanes’ and the drivers seem to be able to manage getting on and off without too much hassle. It looks to be that, cars on the roundabout give way to those coming on and off.
To get to the Arc you need to go under the road and come up onto the centre piece.
The Winding Staircase to the Top
The view from the top – nothing short of spectacular. It is really pretty too, seeing the roads/streets/avenues that run off from the roundabout, they’re all lined with trees. If it was planned, it was well done – if not, it fell into place perfectly.
You can see all the way down Champs Elysees down to the other end where the wheel is and start of the park Jardin des Tuileries that leads to the Lourve.
Champs Elysees
We wondered down the Champs Elysee, after the Arc and taking photos in the middle of the road.
All your shops are there, well mostly all the expensive ones that you see on the ‘High’ street – including Renault & Citreon, Mercedes – they had cars, but not really a forecourt type thing. There was Tiffany’s, Tag Heuer and Swatch (we came back here the next day).
By now we were starting to get a tad knackered and hungry. Plus there was a Pandora Eiffel Tower to find. A quick google took us on the metro down to the Lourve (we only wanted to see it really, the glass pyramid – weren’t overly fussed about going in).
We walked into the park/grounds where the Lourve is, took our photos of the pyramid and looked around – we couldn’t see any shops. A closer look at google maps appeared to have the shop underground. It was!! There was a staircase hidden beside some hedges that leads down to an underground shopping centre. Marvelous.
There was a McDonalds, so that was tea – Simon had raved about French McDonalds being better than anywhere else – it was pretty good.
Then it was back to the hotel for bed – our legs were begging for rest. See kilometres and step count below.
S&S
xoxoxo
FitBit Data. 25/04: 17.97KM’s – SRT 27,485; SJT 23,401