To Be or Not to Be... a Tourist.

In the world of travel, there's a movement away from tourism, encouraging us to be "travelers" instead of "tourists," to seek the hidden parts of a city instead of facades erected for the masses.  For the most part, I buy into this philosophy.  For example, it's better not to rely heavily on guidebooks lest you see a place through the authors' eyes instead of your own  (of course, with a city as prominent in film and literature as Paris, it's impossible to visit without preconceptions).  I also avoid tacky souvenir shops 100% of the time.  Some people, though, take anti-tourism to the extreme: they skip the major sites altogether.  I don't think it's necessary to avoid going to monuments just because they're popular-- they're popular for a reason, and in Paris I found, for very good reason.  The monuments and museums are steeped in history, their architecture is magnificent, and they are a pleasure to visit, even if you are secretly checking off the "must-see" places in the back of your mind.

The most-visited site in Paris is not, as one might think, the Eiffel Tower or the Louvre, but La Notre Dame.  I climbed the 400-something spiral stone steps up the towers to view the gargoyles and the city (and the huge bell):

I didn't even get close to the Eiffel Tower on my first day, there was so much to see in other parts of the city.  But the second night, I did.  The fog made it look like the top was lost in a golden glow:

I crossed the Seine and walked to Les Champs Elysees-- where the Arc de Triomphe stands in the middle of the busiest intersection and the street is lined with fancy stores, restaurants, and a Christmas market. Later in the week, I climbed to the top of the Arc.

I spent half a day in the gargantuan treasure-trove that is the Louvre (got lost inside even with my printed-out self-guided tour), saw the Mona Lisa (and the perpetual crowd surrounding her) and other masterpieces that impressed me even more. 

So I saw most of the "must-see" things in Paris-- that type of sight-seeing was tiring, even pacing myself as I did.  I gave in on day four and swapped my fashionable black boots for sneakers, to save my brutalized feet. So what if I look like a tourist?  At least I speak lovely French (to the surprise of all the Frenchmen that approached me ;)