Description
Day 1
Athens-Paris Arrival in Paris early in the morning. Transfer and check-in at our hotel. We will then embark on a full and very extensive tour of the most important sights of the City of Light. Of course we will start with the #1 emblem of Paris, namely the Eiffel Tower. You definitely know it, as probably do all the people who inhabit this planet. It was built in 1889 by the engineer Gustavo Eiffel on the occasion of the great Paris International Exhibition of Technology and Progress, which took place in 1900 and also to celebrate the 100th anniversary of the French Revolution. The tower is 324 metres high and served as the grand entrance to the exhibition, which was held on the Field of Mars. For its time, the building was considered too innovative and inelegant. Newspaper reviews were particularly negative. For example, the great French novelist Guy de Maupassant is said to have eaten lunch at the restaurant at the top of the tower every day and when asked why, he replied ‘because it is the only place in Paris from which you cannot see the tower’. And the famous French poet Paul Verlaine used to change his route to avoid seeing it. Today, however, the Eiffel Tower is considered a very impressive work of so-called structural art. And although its construction was temporary, and the French state, under the building contract, had the right to demolish it 20 years after its construction, this never happened… For the record, we mention that Greece, as a newly established state, participated in the 1900 Paris International Exhibition with the liqueurs and cognacs of the Patras-based Potopoiia Nikolaos Kalliikonis, which had been founded in 1850. The Greek pavilion was located in the Grand Palais (Grand Palace), which we will see on our tour immediately afterwards. Nikolaos Kallikonis at the exhibition won the gold award for the quality of its products. Both the Grand Palais and the Petit Palais (Little Palace), which we will see together (they are next to each other), were built as exhibition spaces on the occasion of the Grand International Exhibition. Today they both function as fine arts museums. Next stop on our tour is the Champs Elysées, the most famous avenue in Paris and, according to the travel guides, the most beautiful in the world. It was built by Louis XIV in 1667 as a continuation of the Ceramic Gardens. Louis resided in the Palace of Ceramics. The name Ilisia Fields comes from Greek mythology. The avenue ends at the, also famous, Arc de Triomphe, built by Napoleon about 2 centuries later. He chose this particular spot because the area was his residence before he was crowned emperor. Next is the Palazzo Apomache, a magnificent complex of museums and monuments built under Louis XIV. The original use of the facilities was as hospitals and rehabilitation centres for the disabled war invalids. Today there is also a mausoleum for great French politicians and generals, such as Napoleon. And the Appomachian district, in terms of real estate, is the most expensive in the whole of Paris, perhaps in the world. Of course, our tour of the City of Light could not miss the famous Notre Dame, one of the most admired Gothic architectural monuments. It is located on the Ile de la Cité islet of the Seine River. Its construction was completed in the middle of the 13th century. On 2 December 1804, Napoleon Bonaparte was crowned Emperor in the church. But Notre Dame became world famous thanks to Victor Hugo’s epic Gothic novel of the same name, published in 1831 and now considered one of the most important masterpieces of world literature. Next we will head to the Pantheon, one of the most iconic examples of neoclassical architecture in Paris. Its name is Greek and its architecture bears elements of the Corinthian style. It was built in the 18th century by Louis XV, originally as a church dedicated to St. Geneviève, the patron saint of Paris, to house her relic. Eventually, however, after many modifications, it serves today as a non-religious mausoleum of distinguished French citizens (Volteros, Rousseau, Marais, Zola, Malraux, Dumas, etc.) We will then pass by the famous Quai d’Orsay, located on the West Bank of the Seine. There we will see the French Ministry of Foreign Affairs where the negotiations and formulations for the drafting of the Treaty of Versailles that ended the First World War in 1919 took place. In addition, the quayside street is also notorious for the painters who historically set up their easels and paint there – this scene is a landmark seen in all the films that have been shot in Paris from time to time. Another of our stops for today is the Trocadero. Proctect
