19.9.08

Eiffel Tower (1)

I have now been blogging about Paris since March last year ... and I haven’t yet made a real post about the Eiffel Tower. Of course you see it from everywhere in the city, so it has appeared on my photos now and then, but it has not got its real post. To compensate for this lack, I will now make three posts about it, the two coming with some more specific “details”.

This first one will basically cover only what you can see from the Tower. Normally that’s the major purpose of a visit. The top picture shows you the view towards the Champs de Mars, L’Ecole Militaire and the Tour Montparnasse – one of the few skyscrapers within the city limits.

The first difficulty, when posting about the Tower is that there are thousands of photos taken of it every day, and it’s not easy to make a “different” one. I had only the choice between these four. Maybe the original one is the one with the Swedish flag in front of it? I will revert to the reason for the flag in my next post. You have to queue if you want to reach the top. You can to some extent reduce the waiting by using the steps (some 700) to the second floor – which I did. You will then only have to line up for the (compulsory) lift to the third and last floor.

I tried to put a number of photos together in order to give you the complete 360° view from the top. Below, you can find zoomed photos (I have made links to previous posts about some of these spots):

The first collage shows from top left to bottom right: La Défense (office buildings, just outside Paris – behind the Bois de Boulogne; Hotel Concorde-Lafayette at Porte Maillot (another of Paris’ few skyscrapers); Grand Palais and Petit Palais – two exhibitions halls from the World Fair 1900, the Alexander III Bridge and Place de la Concorde; the Louvre. The second collage shows in the same order: Les Invalides; the Arch of Triumph at Place Charles-de-Gaulle / L’Etoile; Notre Dame; Sacré Coeur; one of the most extravagant Art Nouveau buildings in Paris, by Lavirotte (Avenue Rapp); the copy of the Statue of Liberty, facing New York. While using the stairs on the way up I took several other pictures. Here are two additional ones: One over the Trocadéro (La Défense in the background), the second one with a few prominent buildings – Notre Dame, Les Invalides, Saint Eustache and the Pantheon.
If it helps some of you to localize these places in the Paris geography, here is a plan. It's Friday again! I wish you a nice weekend!

43 comments:

lyliane six said...

C'est superbe de là haut, il y a bien longtemps que je n'y suis montée, il faudra que je le fasse, à pieds pour m'entrainer, je l'avais fait il y a 40 ans!!
Ils avaient fait flotter le drapeau Suédois, pour saluer le plus Parisien des Suédois que tu es.

Anonymous said...

C'est magnifique, Peter!! The zoom photos are amazing, and all the work you did putting the panoramas together, all the views. Oh dear, it's getting to be autumn, and I always want to be in Paris in October. Can you send smells, sounds and some low autumn sunlight through here too please?

Shionge said...

Together with my family, we can never never ever get enough of Eiffel Tower.....we went there day and night and everywhere we travel, there is always a glimpse of this charming lady :D

Oh Peter....I wanna run home now and look through my Paris travel tonight...hugs and love from Singapore :D

Virginia said...

Great views. Your got many more good photos that I did the last time. IT was pouring rain however. Please add the Trocadero to our list of must sees! We completely missed the beautiful areas around la tour due to the bad weather. How DID you get your Swedish flag in the photo?

Anonymous said...

I echo Shionge's views. Can never get enough of it.
BTW, your photos are very different from the normal ones.

Waiting to hear about Swedish flag.

Olivier said...

c'est pas beau de regarder sous la jupe de la dame

"Rétines et pupilles,
Les garçons ont les yeux qui brillent
Pour un jeu de dupes :
Voir sous les jupes des filles,
Et la vie toute entière,
Absorbés par cette affaire,
Par ce jeu de dupes :
Voir sous les jupes des filles"
Souchon.

Tes vues panoramiques me font palir de jalousie, elles sont superbes.

Bon Weekend

Cutie said...

I have been there and I'm so proud of it. I went there near evening and the whole of Paris is so beautiful with all the lightings. Being up there really take away all the sadness that was in me and I felt so comfortable up there.

I wish that I had took the stairs instead but then when you go with friends, there isn't much of a choice you can make.

I really hope one day I will be able to go to Paris with my other half. Would love to travel to Europe with him. But then right now, it's time to save more money before we can be going anywhere. Hehe...

Olivier said...

En réponse a ta question, non l'exposition est très éphémère, elle ne dure que dimanche après-midi.

Anonymous said...

700 marches pour le plaisir d'une bonne photo! Chapeau!

hpy said...

ohé! J'ai vu mon quartier et mon immeuble (en très petit, cela va de soi). Ca fait plaisir de faire un retour en arrière quand arrière rime avec quelque chose qui a été plaisant. Bon week-end culturel.

SusuPetal said...

Fun with that Swedish flag!

Beautiful scenery, really.

When I visited the tower, I came dowa along the stairs; it was quite horrible, there were a lot of pupils running down, the stairs seemed to shake an awful lot, and I grasped to the rail.
I was lucky when I felt the solid ground under my feet!

Have a nice weekend, Peter!

Anonymous said...

eh Peter je me suis mal exprimé! c'était l'abnégation du photographe tout dévoué à son art que je voulais souligner et non une photo en particulier.Il y a plusieurs bonnes photos dans la série. Le petit hommage à ton pays d'origine et l'effet diamant est très sympathique. Pour les vues en 360° qui sont très difficiles à réaliser tu aurais pu travailler en post traitement pour obtenir une luminosite uniforme. Et puis tu as tenté des cadrages originaux , c'est bien!

Gaëlle said...

Il ne manquait plus qu'elle sur ton blog ! Je ne suis montée en haut qu'une seule fois il y a des années de cela. Merci de nous faire partager la vue !

marie6 said...

That is one monument I would love to visit!

Great photos and enjoy your weekend!

HZDP said...

Peter,
this is SPLENDID, gorgeous!
Thank you for the insight and the details..

and wish you a nice weekend,too

Jo's-D-Eyes said...

Great view Peter!
I look forewards to see the other 2 post's, well yes eveyone has been in the Eifeltower (or one should!)

Thanks for answering my question,no more questions today haha:) happy weekend-wishes

Greetings, JoAnn's-D-Eyes/Holland
My Dutch skywatch is here:
www.joannwalraven.blogspot.com

Evelyn said...

Very lovely photos...I never get tired of looking at her! My favorite time to see her when I'm in Paris is at night on the hour when she twinkles!

claude said...

Voilà, je viens de passer une journée à Paris sans bouger de chez moi et c'est super !
Que Paris est beau de la Tour Eiffel ! Sur les deux photos prises de par en-dessous on dirait des pierres précieuses.
Moi qui suis crevée de la Foire et qui ai la crève, ton post me met en forme !

Thérèse said...

Dame Eiffel revisitée avec tant de plaisir et sans souffler! Merci Peter.

alice said...

Tu ne pouvais pas me faire plus plaisir: je n'ai jamais eu le courage de monter si haut, je me suis arrêtée au 1er...

Neva said...

What struck me about the Eiffel Tower when I was there was the chicken wire that was around the top of the walkway...Very flimsy stuff but does what it is supposed to do,I guess. I love your post today.....your shots around the Eiffel tower to what you can see are awesome! have a great weekend, Peter.

Neva said...

What struck me about the Eiffel Tower when I was there was the chicken wire that was around the top of the walkway...Very flimsy stuff but does what it is supposed to do,I guess. I love your post today.....your shots around the Eiffel tower to what you can see are awesome! have a great weekend, Peter.

Alain said...

La longue vue, c'est un vrai bijou. La meilleure photo de ton post, je trouve.

Shammickite said...

I remember the day I went up to the top of the tower with my sons, the view was wonderful! It was a bright sunny day in September, blue sky, in fact it was TOO HOT!And on the way up we heard so many different languages spoken. What a lovely day we had walking roud paris. I shall always remember it... especially because my shoes rubbed a big blister on my foot and I was in great pain!! But it was worth it!

Vagabondage said...

Bonjour Peter,

Je suis littéralement émerveillée, jamais, jamais je ne pourrai regarder pareil spectacle, incapable que je suis de monter au delà de deux étages...

Merci de m'avoir permis d'admirer sans monter là-haut.. Si haut...

Bonne journée à toi.

abcd said...

Hi Peter, this post brings memory of my recent trip to Paris. Eiffel Tower is fascinating, and of course, the Blue Eiffel Tower is extremely gorgeous, am glad that I was there to acknowledge the moments.

Will send you pictures of Blue Eiffel just in case you want to add on to your blog.

Have a nice weekend.

Chuckeroon said...

Ooh, I liked this! (But how to choose, Peter? It's a large feast).

Confess I've never been up the Tower.....so, thanks!!!!!!!

Maxime said...

La tour Eiffel est depuis longtemps dépassée en hauteur par bien d'autres constructions à travers le monde. Mais ce qui la rend unique par rapport à tous ces immeubles, c'est que elle, elle ne sert à rien, et constitue un geste purement "gratuit". (de plus, elle dispose d'un escalier, et n'a pas l'air conditionné !).

Anonymous said...

Excellent post Peter. Despite it's status as a tourist icon, it is definitely worth the study. I visited for the first time on my last visit to Paris. What I like is you can go to the base of the tower and actually touch the base of the structure. This gives it a strange feeling of accessibility which is absent from many giant landmarks.

NB there was an interesting podcast on the BBC some time ago. It's still available here

In our time

GMG said...

Hi Peter! I’m finally with some time to enjoy your excellent blog! And I'll start with your last post on Tuscany, which I've already commented. The fact that the famous «Vivoli Gelato» was closed in August shows the whole spirit of the land... On the contrary, Giolitti in Rome is open 365 days a year from 7:00 a.m. through 01:30 a.m.... They must close on February 29th... ;)
I also think you did a great job drawing the attention to Lucca. Usually people doesn't pay great attention to it, but it's worth the trip, to use Michelin's words!
Then we have the College des Bernardins: of course you had to be there on the opening day... ;) Though it was raining ( I caught all that rain to get to the Tate Modern on that day...), the pictures are great and the story quite interesting!
The Hotel de Cluny is an old acquaintance, but I never took pictures inside. For the Unicorn the best way is probably to buy postcards and scanner them... ;))
The Notre Dame pictures are superb! The only reference missing is to the «Officier des Arts et Lettres» George Whitman and his Shakespeare and Company bookstore... Not medieval, but historic!!
You seem to be lucky; further to the Batignoles Park, now you have the Clichy-Batignolles...
Caviar and foie-gras around the Madeleine, that's the place to be! Now, that the prices of the Iranian caviar have skyrocketed the chance is to get to the Prunier...
What I regret is that Xian is still on my wishlist. But one day I'll make it...
Finally, you are dealing with the 1889 icone of Paris. I'm sure that, after your three posts on the Eiffel Tower, the subject is finished! Nothing left... And that would be great for us!!
Many thanks for your comments on Blogtrotter, while I was off. It’s now on its way to Crete 2007! Hope you enjoy and wish you a great week ahead!

PeterParis said...

lyliane:
Le drapeau suédois a partagé l'honneur avec 26 autres! (+ le drapeau européen.)

ruth:
I will try to do my best, but I'm afraid it will be limited to some posts, hopefully reflecting a nice September / october weather!

shionge:
Trust that you found your Paris photos!

PeterParis said...

virginia:
Trocadero is added! For the Swedish flag, you will undertsnad with my Monday post!

cuckoo:
See my comments to Virginia! :-)

olivier:
Ce n'est peut-être pas très poli, mais souvent c'est beau!

PeterParis said...

cutie:
I really hope you can save quickly! Maybe we can then try the French cuisine together - also with your "other half")!

olivier:
Merci pour la réponse! Tant pis!

lasiate:
700 marches + 20 minutes d'attente pour l'ascenseur pour le troisième étage!

PeterParis said...

hpy:
Tu as encore des bons yeux!! :-)

susupetal:
The stairs to the third floor were tougher (not allowed to public any more)!

lasiate:
Merci!!! Pour la luminosité, j'ai essayé un peu, mais...

PeterParis said...

bleeding orange:
Il ne manquait pas que la Tour... je n'ai pas encore fait Notre Dame, le Louvre, Sacré Coeur...! :-)

marie6:
The Tour and I are waiting for you!

hzdp:
Thanks a lot, and the same to you!

PeterParis said...

joann:
Some 6 or 7 million visitors per year... A lot, but not yet "everyone"! :-)

evelyn:
Yes, I believe that the twinkling lights was a good idea!

claude:
Pourtant, beaucoup de critiques pendant la construction... !

PeterParis said...

therese:
C'était un plaisir! On peut se reposer pour souffler au premer étage... bar, restaurant...!

alice:
Peut-être le deuxième (et le troisième?) la prochaine fois? :-)

neva:
I believe that if you want to jump from the top, you really have to make an effort!

PeterParis said...

alain:
Oui, je suis assez content! :-)

shammickite:
Obviously a ver nice dau despite the blister!

mathilde:
J'ai fait les photos du troisième exprès pour toi (et quelques autres qui n'aime pas trop les hauteurs)!

PeterParis said...

pink ginger:
Your Paris visit was a great pleasure also for me, as I had the chance to meet you and your partner!

I have received your photos, sincere thanks! You will find them on my Monday post! Hope you don't mind?

chuckeroon:
Hope to see you back for a visit then!!

maxime:
Elle sert quand' même à quelque chose: Elle est plein d'antennes! :-)

PeterParis said...

richard:
Thanks for this kind comment... and the link! :-)

gmg:
Dear globe- and blog-trotter. Thanks for this very long and kind comment!

I will visit Crete (on your blog - tomorrow)!

sonia a. mascaro said...

What a great post, Peter, as always! I would LOVE to know Paris!
You did a good job here!

Starman said...

You pointed out Saint Eustache, but I think you meant St. Sulpice.

PeterParis said...

starman:
Of course! Thanks for pointing out. I corrected the map.