Paris (EYEWITNESS TRAVEL GUIDE) | DK Publishing | Essential for the first time traveler to Paris

Paris (EYEWITNESS TRAVEL GUIDE) | DK Publishing | The best travel guide!

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Paris (EYEWITNESS ...

	Paris (EYEWITNESS TRAVEL GUIDE) DK Publishing DK Travel, 2006 - 448 pages average customer review:based on 52 reviews view larger image
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highly recommended

Essential for the first time traveler to Paris

The DK Eyewitness Travel Guide for Paris is a perfect product for the first time traveler to Paris. I have used it the last 3 times I was in Paris, but I found it most useful on the first trip. It also makes great reading before going to Paris. Read it on the plane!

The historic chapters are brief but essential to understanding the history of France and the city of Paris. This is especially helpful in uderstanding the revolution and the Bourbon restoration after Napoleon I under Louis XVIII and his younger brother Charles X, followed by their cousin Louis-Philippe I and the take-over of government by Napoleon III.

Medieval Paris is still present in Paris at the Louvre, Notre-Dame, and Sainte-Chapelle. Sainte-Chapelle is not easily accessed and the guide helps you find your way to the entrance of this Gothic jewel. The guide has a special section on Sainte-Chapelle, the first Gothic structure, with its thin columns holding up beautiful glass walls of red and blue.

Renaissance Paris can be found in the wonderful Place Royale (Place des Vosges). This space is amazing, and continues to be used for housing and shops after 400 years. Within Place des Vosges is the Victor Hugo Museum, showing his apartment furnished with his original furniture. Just relax in the central courtyard.

The guide color codes the various Quaters of the city, offering the highlights of each section of the city, along with suggested walking routes. This helps the travel orient to the book while walking and also helps avoid the naggig problem of missing a point of interest while nearby.

A full 22 pages is devoted at the beginning of the guide with an extended time-line showing the history of Paris and offering tips on sites to visit to capture various eras in the city's history. I found this especially useful in understanding the grand transformation of the city under Napoleon III and Baron Haussmann in which avenues and boulevards were widened, and the city became more accessible with broad grids and multiple spoke-like intersections. Because of this design, traffic jams are rare. When traveling, a slow-down on one street can be rectified by simply moving over one street. Travel patterns in the city are infinite.

The guide is well illustrated, with photographs, maps, drawings, charts and tables, all of which help the traveler orient and enjoy.

Because many travelers are in Paris only for a couple of days, the guide highlights the cities main tourist attractions and gives these sites ample explanation: Sainte-Chapelle, Versailles Palace, Pompidou Center, Musee d'Orsay, Eiffel Tower, Jardin du Luxembourg, Musee du Louvre, Notre Dame, an the Arc de Triomphe.

The guide includes a map of the metro system, which is inexpensive, convenient, and quick. However, be careful of pick-pockets at the metro stops at the major tourist sites. The gude advises you to buy a book of 10 metro rides at once for a cost saving. If you plan on being in the city long, this is a good idea.

There is a general subject index that is very thorough. For example, there are 17 entrys under Victor Hugo; 6 for Jean-Paul Sartre; and 24 for Pablo Picasso.

The maps at the end of the book were excellent and worth the price of the book. The street finder allowed you to orient yourself quickly if lost. The street finder was great for finding obscure addresses. We found the studios of Paul Braque and Nicholas De Stahl in hidden neighborhoods.

We had to use a taxi because we were late for a concert. The city is not taxi dependent like New York and Barcelona and thus taxis are harder to catch and more expensive. The bus routes are well marked and whereas they take longer than the undergound metro, you certainly see more of the city from a bus.

The guide helps explain the train system. I have come into Paris from Madrid, Brussels, and left Paris for Amsterdam and Frankfurt. It is important to know which train station to use. For example when arriving from or going to Amsterdam and Brussels you must use the Gare du Nord. When going to or arriving from Spain, you must use Gare Montparnasse. When going to or arriving from Frankfurt, you must use Gare de L'Est. you are in big trouble if you assume all these stations service the same destinations. The guide helps you sort this out so that you can use the train system in Paris conveniently.

The guide even tells you about the public toilets in Paris, which are conveniently located but the city needs far more of them. They are inexpensive and the entire little bathroom is washed down with sprinklers between users.

The street markets in Paris are wonderful and the guide tells you how to find the various markets. There are great cheese buys which you can take back to your hotel room to enjoy during your stay. The Passages are worth visiting for covered shopping. Walk down Rue du Faubourg St. Honore at least once to see the Chanel and Hermes flagship stores.

The guide also offers five guided walks. There are other books on this topic that offer many walking suggestions. This is one of the few weaknesses of the book, more suggested walks would be great.

As you can see, I found this guide to be fantastic, full of detail and pictures and maps. If I could give it six stars, I would.

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The best travel guide!

I must say that I love this book. My sister and I went to Paris last April for about a week, and this book was our bible.
It was actually loaned to me by a teacher at the school were I work, who is from Paris. She said in her opinion this was the best guide for someone who is going to Paris for the first time.

I am so glad I had it with me, it was very informative, easy to understand and overflowing with useful information. One of the best pieces of information I found was that some historical monuments are free the first Sunday of the month. This was extremely useful to us, especially since our third day in Paris was the first Sunday of the month.

We ended up getting into the Norte Dome for free and a couple of other places. It was great because by that time we were beginning to feel the effects of paying the sometimes-high fees to get into most of the other historical monuments.

If we did not have this book we would have wasted lots of time trying to figure out what to see and how to get around. In response to the reviewer who said that this book does not go into depth or explain enough about the historical monuments, I say a person traveling to Paris should already have a good deal of knowledge about the history of Paris and its sites.

In conclusion, I think this book is great and recommend it to anyone going to Paris.

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reliable and easy to navigate

On a recent trip to Paris, I took along a DK Eyewitness guide for Paris as well as a Frommer's guide. In all honesty, I could have relied solely on the DK guide and been fine. The photographs are helpful when you need to locate different landmarks and structures and the maps are VERY reliable (unlike Frommer's), which is absolutely essential in a city like Paris.

If you choose DK guides that focus on a particular city or region, they are slimmer and more portable than the all-country guides. Information has been whittled down to the essentials, which I must admit has its downsides. At times I wish the writers provided more information on cultural aspects, but there are other guides for that. DK guides focus on destinations such as museums, gardens, parks, historic homes, etc. I would have to agree that the sections on hotels and restaurants are almost useless. Single sentence descriptions, although concise, aren't necessarily helpful when trying to choose an interesting location.

The best feature of DK guides is the ease with which you can navigate each guide. I've browsed through (and read) many, and they all have the same format. The history sections are useful and concise, and the divisions within each guide actually make sense. After a little while, you can quickly determine which page to flip to when you need to look up transporation tips or maps, or whatever else you might need.

As for the Paris guide, I found it informative and accurate. I do wish the guide provided more information about holidays and national celebrations. I traveled during Christmas and didn't know what to expect. I have to admit, though, that many guides don't cover holidays well. So for all of you that may wonder, the Champs-Elysees is surprisingly busy (albiet with tourists) Christmas day, the metro operates all day, patisseries, charcuteries, and other specialty food shops are open in the morning (for all those tardy shoppers I suspect), there are many eateries open in the more touristy areas, parks are less crowded and have some French families strolling about, and it IS bitterly cold. Oh, and it's sleepier the day after Christmas.

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Great Book to Plan ahead

That's a good book to consult before travelling especially if it's a first time visiting Paris. I used it to plan my vacation to not waste time when I arrive there. It is very useful to plan ahead and to consult on site. I also recommend along with it Let's go map guide Paris by Inc Let's go.

Like a Beautiful Brick

The Eyewitness Books are beautiful. They are printed on high quality glossy paper, have magnificent photos, and are a joy to read and hold. But, I think they make better coffee table fodder than they do actual practical guide books for tourists.

If you just want to hit the most famous places, this guide would do. They do not go into depth about Paris, they stick to the tourist highlights. There are snippets of historical information about the City of Light, but they are not profound enough to justify its biggest drawback: its WEIGHT. This is an exceptionally heavy volume, and you will not like feeling as if you are carrying around 12 bricks in your "sac" at the end of the day. Trust me, if you can't live without DK Eyewitness, take their Top 10 Paris book on your sightseeing tours. It's much lighter and just as pretty as the full version.

I recommend you plan your trip with the uglier but more informative Frommers, and walk with DK Eyewitness Top 10.

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