Why Paris Is My Favorite International City to Visit
Sarah has traveled to Europe multiple times in the past 4 years and has been to Rome, Paris, London, Lisbon, and Madrid.
Arc de Triomphe at night
A Lot To See
Paris has a lot of things to see besides the Eiffel Tower and Arc de Triomphe. There's an amazing museum called the Louvre where you can see the Mona Lisa along with many floors of artwork from various decades. There's also the Versailles Palace, even though Versailles is far from Central Paris, it's still worth the trip to see the beautiful gardens. If you like mystery and horror-themed sights, you can see the Paris Catacombs and learn about their history and if you are interested in shopping, there's a beautiful shopping district close to the Arc de Triomphe called The Champs-Elysees. If this isn't enough shopping, there are also many indoor shopping malls throughout the Paris area that you can visit. Another beautiful place to visit towards the end of the day during sunset is the Montmartre area where you can get a great view of the city of Paris from the top.
For those of you that are looking for theme parks, Paris also has Disneyland Paris which has two theme parks and also Parc Asterix. Both aren't in central Paris but you can get there without a car. Getting to Disneyland Paris, it's very simple. You just need to take the RER A all the way to the last stop which is Disneyland Park. To get to Parc Asterix you can take the RER B to the Charles De Gaulle Aiport and there will be shuttles there that can take you to Parc Asterix.
Good Public Transportation
There are many underground metro trains, buses, and trams that take you around Central Paris and the surrounding areas including the Charles de Gaulle Airport and the Orly Airport. Therefore, you really don't need a car or taxi to take you where you want to go. The transportation also isn't that expensive considering you can take public transportation everywhere. If you're only going to stay for one day, plan to only go a very limited amount of places and just walk mostly everywhere, you can get a single ticket that takes you from one point to another point. However, the price of this ticket will depend on where you need to go and how far it is from point A to point B.
However, if you are planning on being in Paris for multiple days or you plan to use the transportation a lot, you should purchase the weekly Navigo pass for zones1-5. Even if you don't use the farther away zones since you'll be staying in Central Paris most of the time, the farther away zones are the zones that include the airports so you will need them when you leave Paris. The Navigo pass is five euros plus however many days you plan to put on the card, for example, the weekly pass is about 22.80 euros plus five euros so it will cost you around 28 euros in total. Also, make sure you bring a small photo of yourself to put in your Navigo card so that when the metro police check your Navigo, they won't fine you thinking you stole a random person's Navigo. If you've been to Paris before and have an old Navigo, you can just refill it and not pay the five euros for a new one.
Diverse Foods
The food in Paris is amazing! Even if you don't like French food, there are all types of food that you can find in Paris. There are American, Italian, Vietnamese, Japanese, Chinese, and French. I personally don't like most French food but I love eating Italian and Asian food whenever I go to Paris. Most people wouldn't think to buy Asian food in France but it's actually pretty authentic. The Asian food in Paris is much better than Asian food in Florida so whenever I travel outside of Florida, I'm always looking for good Asian food.
In Paris, there's a street full of Asian groceries stores and Asian restaurants and the ingredients are imported from Asia so the restaurants are only using quality ingredients. Some French foods I do like however are their baguette sandwiches and their pastries. The baguette sandwiches come in a wide variety and usually, I like to order the ham and butter one. The sandwiches are pretty cheap since they usually only cost about five or six euros and they're big so it's worth the money. Also, French pastries are always the best pastries to eat. The French make amazing pastries and they're very pretty too. Therefore, even if you don't like French food, you'll always find something to eat in Paris that you'll like.
© 2022 Sarah Wong
