This eight-day tour takes you to see Paris’s very best while leaving you enough free time to explore yourself or do some shopping in its famous boutiques. Visit the Eiffel Tower, Louvre Museum, and Versailles Palace with skip-the-line tickets. You won’t be lacking for memorable culinary experiences with a wine, cheese, and charcuterie tasting lunch, a macaroon-baking course, and fine-dining meals aboard a cruise ship and the restaurant bus. A day trip to impressionist painter Claude Monet’s Giverny Garden is a highlight. Lodging is in a charming 4-star hotel in central Paris.
DAY 1
A chauffeur will meet you for a private transfer from the airport to your hotel.
We will give you a Skip-the-Line ticket for the Louvre Museum with Audio Guide. Enjoy a self-guided visit to the world’s most famous. Explore the museum’s huge collection and its greatest works of art, such as the Mona Lisa, the Venus de Milo, and the Coronation of Napoleon.
Before it became a museum in 1793, the Louvre had long been one of the principal palaces of the French Kings. Located right in the heart of Paris, the Louvre’s galleries stretch for 786,000 square feet. It is home to the world’s largest collection of artworks, spanning more than 7,000 years from ancient civilizations to the 19th century. The museum’s collections are split into eight different departments: Egyptian antiquities, Greek, Etruscan & Roman antiquities, Near Eastern antiquities, Islamic art, Paintings, Sculptures, Decorative Arts, and Prints & Drawings.
Spend time discovering these collections with your audio guide, who will show you some of the museum’s most famous works and tell you about the stories that lie behind them. Marvel at the Mona Lisa, painted by Leonardo da Vinci in 1506, the Venus de Milo, a celebrated Greek sculpture dating from 100 BC depicting the goddess Aphrodite, or the giant 33-foot-long painting of the Coronation of Napoleon, painted in 1807 by Jacques-Louis David to commemorate the crowning of Napoleon Bonaparte in the Cathedral of Notre-Dame.
The entrance tickets are valid until museum close.
The audio guide rental is valid for three hours upon deposit of 32 euros.
Your visit includes:
Skip-the-line tickets Audio guide
Duration: This is a self-guided tour at your own pace. Stay as long as you like. Museum hours are from 9 am to 6 pm on Mondays, Thursdays, Saturdays, and Sundays and from 9 am to 9:45 pm on Wednesdays and Fridays.
Note that the museum is closed on Tuesdays.
DAY 2
Shared Guided Tour of Paris with Skip-the-Line Entrance to the Eiffel Tower and a 1-hour River Cruise.
Discover Paris’s most famous sites with an expert guide. Travel in style and comfort aboard a chauffeured luxury minibus.
Stop for a photo in front of the majestic Hôtel des Invalides before heading down the Champs-Élysées from the Arc de Triumph to the Place de la Concorde. Marvel at the Palais Garnier Opera house. Try to spot Quasimodo at the Cathedral of Notre Dame. Admire the impressive architecture of the Place Vendôme.
Enjoy a visit at the 1st and 2nd floor of the Eiffel Tower with skip-the-line ticket. Your tour ends with an hour-long river cruise. Sit back, relax, and enjoy iconic views of Paris while learning about its monuments’ history and architecture.
Note the tour does not include hotel pick-up and drop-off (tour ends at the Eiffel Tower).
Duration: approximately 5 hours
DAY 3
Guided Wine, Cheese, and Charcuterie Tasting Lunch
This is an incredible opportunity to taste French cheeses in a historic 17th- century cheese maturing cellar in Paris’s chic le Marais neighborhood. Learn the subtlety of tasting exceptional cheeses and pairing them with wonderful wines.
The lunch begins with a food tour. The best is saved for last with a visit to the cheese cave. Your cheese specialist points you towards the best places to find the gourmet French food and ingredients in Paris including bread, pastries, fruit, wine, and charcuterie, etc. You will never taste cheese and wine the same way ever again!
The tasting includes a generous selection of cheeses and charcuterie, 3 glasses of wine, homemade desserts, coffee or tea.
Duration: 2 hours
DAY 4
Half-Day Guided Tour – Claude Monet’s Garden
Escape Paris for a half-day excursion to the home and gardens of impressionist painter Claude Monet with a guide. Immerse yourself in the world of the painter, famous for his landscapes of water lilies, the Japanese bridge, and irises. See the beautiful water lily pond and Monet’s legendary Japanese-inspired bridge for yourself.
Admire the lush green landscapes of the Normand countryside as you travel by luxury air-conditioned coach to the village of Giverny. The trip will take approximately one and a half hours. The painter Claude Monet lived there for 43 years, with his family of eight children from 1883 until his death in 1926.
Passionate about gardening and color variations, he designed his flower garden, fruit tree orchard, and water garden as if they were works of art. As you visit the gardens at Giverny, you will see the central pathway leading up to the house, bordered by different varieties of nasturtiums and roses, as well as the multicolored flower beds full of tulips, narcissi, daffodils, irises, and peonies. Stroll through the Clos Normand Flower Garden, which is home to many plants of Eastern origin, until you reach the lavish water garden, famous for its water lilies, weeping willows and green Japanese bridge (bridges like this are traditionally red in Japan). This makes for a captivating atmosphere with the play of light and the reflection of clouds on the water.
Take the opportunity to explore Monet’s pink-plastered house, where he lived and worked for many years (guided tours are not permitted due to tight space). Visit the impressionist master’s studio. These rooms, as well as those of his private apartments, have been reconstructed with the original furniture to appear as they did in Monet’s day. Visit the sunny yellow dining room, which was very modern for its time, with earthenware dishes and a kitchen tiled with local blue and white Rouen tiles. In the dining room, admire one of the premier collections of Japanese prints in the world.
At the end of your visit, see the village. The gift and book shop is housed in what was once the studio where Monet painted the huge Water Lilies canvases.
The tour includes
- Transport to and from Paris
- Entrance ticket to Giverny House and Gardens Services of a tour guide
The tour does not include
- Hotel pick-up and drop-off Duration: 5 hours
- Afternoon Small Group Macaroon class
Macaroons require a few steps and tricks to make perfectly. This class shows you the techniques and gives you the practice need to feel confident making these in your own kitchen. Learn about Italian meringue, adding colour the right way, the macaronade, and making tasty fillings between two shells.
After making your macaroons, enjoy them with tea. The tour does not include hotel pick-up and drop-off. Duration: 4 hours
DAY 5
Guided tour to the Palace of Versailles with Skip-the-Line entrance tickets.
A stone’s throw from Paris, Versailles is perhaps the greatest symbols of France’s monarchy. It is a lavish, extravagant place. Leave your Paris accommodation at 8 a.m. for a minibus journey to Versailles; arrival scheduled for around 9 a.m. The number of participants is limited to a maximum of eight to allow you to enjoy a tailor-made excursion with your driver-guide.
The Palace of Versailles was the official residence of the Kings of France Louis XIV, Louis XV and Louis XVI and their courts from 1682 to 1789.
The Palace of Versailles has more than 700 rooms and stretches for over 721,000 square feet. Marvel at the palace’s most beautiful rooms: the King’s Grand Apartments, the Queen’s Grand Apartments, mirroring those of the king, which include the Coronation Room and the Queen’s Bedroom, once occupied by Marie Antoinette, among others. Also, admire the exceptional Hall of Mirrors, by the famous architect Jules Hardouin-Mansart. It is lit by 17 windows and some 350 mirrors. It overlooks the palace’s gardens, the second part of your visit.
In 1661, Louis XIV commissioned the landscape architect André Le Nôtre to lay out the grounds and gardens. Enjoy some free time to strolling through the gardens and admire the 386 works of art (including more than 200 statues), fountains, flower beds, ponds, and trees.
Your return to Paris is at approximately 12 noon.
Duration: 4 hours
DAY 6
Lunch Tour of Paris on a Luxury Restaurant Bus
The Bustronome offers a unique fusion of sightseeing and fine dining. Admire the City of Light’s best views while indulging in a refined four-course meal at this luxury restaurant on a double-decker bus.
The glass-ceilinged roof makes for fabulous panoramic views (the kitchen is below). Ready for a truly out of the ordinary and memorable dining experience? You’ve found it.
An optional audio guide lets you learn the history and secrets behind Paris’s favorite monuments during your meal.
Meeting point is next to the Arc de Triomphe
The tour does not include Hotel pick-up and drop-off. Duration: 1 hour and 45 minutes
The first 100% English One-Man Show in Paris!
Enjoyed by more than 500,000 spectators, this hit show is much more than stand-up comedy! Do you love Paris, but think that Parisians are a little different? You are completely right! Comedian Olivier Giraud will help you understand Paris’s inhabitants and teach you everything you need to know in order to your visit!
Broken up into lessons, this hilarious performance teaches you how to behave like a real Parisian in a taxi, shop, metro, restaurant and, perhaps, in a future relationship…
The show is performed completely in English and offered year-round in one of Paris’s most beautiful Italian Renaissance-style theatres.
Duration: 1 hour and 10 minutes
DAY 7
Lunch Cruise on the Ducasse Sur Seine
Enjoy a unique experience at lunch, cruising on the first 100% electric boat on the Seine river. Delight in spectacular views over the most beautiful landmarks of the capital along the journey.
Chef Francis Fauvel presents a modern and refined French cuisine, entirely prepared on board. A 100-reference wine list of exceptional, environmentally sustainable terroirs, ranging from the great classics to the new wave winemakers, complements the menu.
DAY 8
Private Departure Transfer
A chauffeur will meet you at your hotel for a private transfer to the airport.