Travel

Oh La La Paris…

The Eiffel Tower:

The Eiffel Tower was finished being built in 1889 named after it’s creator and engineer Gustave Eiffel; who’s company designed and built this famous tower. It was built for 1889 worlds fair in celebration of the centennial of the French revolution. Between 1889 and 1930 it stood the worlds tallest building.  It’s the tallest building in Paris standing at 320 metres/1,050 ft tall (Not including it’s spire.)  It is the most visited paid monument in the world as it see’s sometimes up to or over 20,000 people a day and sadly as I learnt it sees at least 7 suicide attempts a year. (Sad seeing as it is the city of love!) It features in one of the most famous propaganda photo’s of WW11, where Hitler had his photo taken in front of it. They even considered taring it down to use as scrap metal… Thank god they didn’t it’s beautiful and only 12.5 € for a young person (12-24) to go right to the top…

 

The Arc de Triomphe:

The Arc de Triomphe translates in to English as the Triumphal Arch. It stands at 50 metres or 164ft in height. The monument was designed by Jean Chalgrin in 1806 as it gave a triumphant patriotic message. Between 1882 and 1886 there was actually a sculpture by Alexandre Falguière, of a chariot drawn by horses called “Le triomphe de la Révolution” –  in English – “The Triumph of the revelution” It remained for a short time before crumbling in to ruins (Sad I know… would’ve been pretty to see!) I once heard a rumor that whilst driving round the round-about that it is placed on your insurance is invalid as the roundabout is so large unless and obvious accident, it would be too hard to tell who was at fault. There is a lift that takes you to the top where there’s a small museum on the history of the arch.

 

Musée du Louvre:

The Louvre is one of the most visited museums in the world and is the largest museum in the world. It opened as a museum on the 10th August 1793 and held only and exhibition of 537 paintings where as today it holds nearly 35,000 objects dating from pre-history to the late 19th Century. This includes the world famous Mona Lisa painted famously by Leonardo da Vinci and of course featured in the 2003 book written by Dan Brown and the 2006 film, that’s right, The Da Vinci Code… But also not forgetting the gorgeous Venus de Milo… It averages at about 15,000 visitors a day and just a tip if you have your British or European passport with you when you visit you get in for free… So it’s a must when visiting.

 

Pages: 1 2 3

Click to comment
To Top