Sunday in Paris

After breakfast, we walked to the Eiffel Tower -- the nice thing about our location in Rue Cler is that we can walk to most of the significant sights or to the stops where an "on-off" bus can be picked up for further distances.  Our first stop was the Eiffel Tower itself -- it is far more impressive than I expected!

 

According to what we read, the Eiffel Tower was built in 1889 for the Paris Universal Exposition.  A bridge builder named Gustave Eiffel won a contest to build the tower

He designed the tower, financed it, his factory produced the iron beams, he invented special cranes and apparatus to build it, he paid the workers, and he brought the project in on time and under budget!  He definitely deserved to have his name on it. 

 

There were long lines to walk up the steep stairs of the Eiffel Tower (720 stairs to go up both levels - I can barely keep up with our four story walk up to the studio apartment!), so we decided to keep walking and found ourselves at the Seine River.

These boat rides looked like fun, so we took a guided tour down the Seine -- the overhead recording was in French, English and Spanish -- and we learned a lot.  Here are some of the sights we saw:

Notre Dame Cathedral - its Rose Window is the largest in the world!

Not the Washington Monument!  The design for the WM was based on the "obelisque" at the Place de la Concorde.

Not the White House!  The design of the White House was based on this Palais de l'Eysee.

This lovely looking building was a jail once known as the torture chamber, now called the  "Conciergerie."

And now we're heading out to find a nice café for an outdoor late lunch . . . .