Backpacking Tours

Posts Tagged ‘Notre Dame’

Paris

Eiffel Tower / Tour Eiffel

The most famous building of the world is nowadays inseparable from Paris, but this was not always so. The builder, Gustave Eiffel, first offered the chance to Barcelona, but the mayor of the Catalan city did not like the idea. Finally it was built with resistance in Paris, but the huge success confirmed the idea of Eiffel – today the Eiffel Tower is the most popular sight – with entrance fee – in the world: in 2006, nearly 7 million people went up to the Tower, while since its building this number is more than 200 million. But even after the initial oppositions, the lady’s life was not easy: lightning stoke her, cheater traders have sold her more times, Hitler wanted to demolish her and wanted to make weapons from the material (Hitler was not the friend of Paris anyway as at the end of the World War II he commanded to burn Paris up, but the governor of the city denied it). The 324-meters high Eiffel Tower was the highest building in the world since the building in 1887 until 1930. The structure is 7300 tons, and thanks to the brilliance of the designer, it only swings 6-7 centimeters even in strong wind. The magnificent lightshow is 292 thousand watts of power.

You can get to the 1st and 2nd floor of the brilliantly built tower by using the stairs or the elevator, while the 3rd floor is only available by using the elevator going from the 2nd floor. From the highest floor, when the weather is nice, you can see even 70 kms away. You can count on a minimum 1-hour long queuing or even more, and on the 2rd floor you need to wait a lot again to get to the 3rd floor. It is worth to visit the Tower at night, when for 10 minutes at the beginning of every hour the yellow lighted tower flashes in white light. Young people lying, eating, drinking and meeting each other applause and are exultant. When the weather is nice, there are a lot of people in the park in front of the tower even at night – no one should miss this feeling. Read the rest of this entry »