Ultimate Paris Travel Guide

Those who follow me on Instagram may have noticed that I’ve been posting more pictures from my trip to Paris; I’ve been reminiscing on my past travels and just appreciating my good memories again.

Paris was a dream, I’ve been thinking about my trip quite a bit recently and noticed that I hadn’t done an ultimate travel guide for it like I had done for Rome – Ultimate Rome Travel Guide.

My boyfriend and I went to Paris last July and he’d had planned and booked this trip as a sweet birthday surprise. We went the day after my graduation and stayed for 2 nights – I remember that the preparation for this trip was so hectic! Click here to see what we got up to in Paris – Paris Travel Diary.

Where to Go

The first places that we were thinking to go were the Eiffel Tower and the Louvre Museum so we’d got the entrance tickets for these locations in advance and then planned other places to go.

Wall of Love + Moulin Rouge – I’ve put these two together because they are about a 10 minute walking distance from each other so you could see both in the same day! We were lucky when visiting the Wall of Love, it wasn’t very busy and someone was friendly to offer to take a romantic photo of us. Fun fact: The wall has over 250 different languages – so many different ways to say I Love You. We walked to the Moulin Rouge to see the iconic red windmill, next time I go to Paris I’d love to go to watch a cabaret show.
Louvre Museum (Musée du Louvre) – We had booked tickets, I’d recommend doing the same so you don’t have to queue at the ticket office. Also be prepared for a long queue to see the Mona Lisa, we were in the queue for ages, in the summer heat!
Eiffel Tower + Champs de Mars gardens – We also booked tickets for the experience to go to the top of the tower in advance. Also right near the tower you can find spots to get cute pictures of the tower – we found the Champs de Mars gardens. It’s a park space right next to the tower, which was quite busy when we went but we had a relaxing time – next time I go I’d love to bring food for a picnic and relax for longer.
Galeries Lafayette + Champs-Élysées – If you’re looking to shop in Paris (window shop!) then go to this department store and down this avenue for all the glam designer stores.
Arc de Triomphe – One of the most iconic places in Paris, someone was really nice to offer to take a picture of my boyfriend and I there. Next time I’d love to go to the top of the monument and see the view from up there.
Sacré-Cœur Basilica – if you have the time (+ energy) climb to the top to see this beautiful church and see the view of Paris from there as well.

Where to Eat

On our walks we found some French restaurants to go to for breakfast and lunch, my favourite place for lunch was at Le Sancerre, which is near the Wall of Love. For breakfast, I’ve mentioned before that we found it hard to find a restaurant that was open in the morning – on our way to the Eiffel Tower we found Le Recrutement. I’m always craving ice cream on my trips, we stopped to go to Amorino and obviously didn’t regret it!

In this trip this sparked our love for Lebanese food, for my birthday dinner we booked a table at Maison Noura and it was amazing. The restaurant is really pretty – totally instagrammable! We didn’t quite understand the menu but our waiter was kind enough to translate and explain for us.

Where to Stay

We stayed at Hotel Sacha which was near the Moulin Rouge, Sacré-Cœur Basilica and the Galeries Lafayette. We had a lovely pretty room with such beautiful decorations and a nice view from our window and little balcony.

We walked everywhere and from this location it was a 30 minute walk to the Louvre Museum and about an hour walk to the Eiffel Tower which we actually did – stopping along the way at the pretty sights of the Paris streets.