Tips for Paris for Rwc games

Great stuff. Two hungover heads no doubt.

I was looking again yesterday, and you can actually book the bistro restaurant on the 1st floor of the Eiffel Tower on the Saturday afternoon (which includes a lift ticket to the 1st floor), but at €105 a pop, it's a bit steep!!, and not a lot on the menu for an 8yo...

I think I'm just going to chance arriving and queuing up as early as possible on the Saturday morning, say 10-11am and just slugging it out, as my son is '''''mad'''' into tall buildings/structures, so a trip to the top of the tower is an absolute priority for us!!

When I was there in 2004, it was also October, and there were about 40,000 Irish in town for the game, and on the evening we went to the tower, we were in a lift within about 5 minutes of arriving onsite!, granted there's a World Cup on and there'll be a load of Scotts in town too and we'll be doing it much earlier in the day, but feck it, needs must...

2nd priority would maybe be the Louvre if we get up and down the tower in good time..

My hotel is on the 13 metro line and it says it takes about 43 minutes to get to Stade de France from my local station, so I'm planning on being on a metro no later than about 6:30pm giving me a good ~1hr 45mins to get safely inside the stadium... I'll happily be in our seats an hour before kick off if it avoids any crowd buildups outside..

Was at the Aus v Georgia game which was close to if not a sellout at SdF 2 weeks ago and there were no issues I saw beyond what you would normally see when 80k people are entering a small area. There was a very large police presence around the stadium when I got there and until about an hour after, once they pulled out it did feel a bit dodgy but just get out of the area quickly and your fine.

The Arc de Triomphe is really good, I've been up day and night and really enjoyed it. And you can see the Eiffel Tower nicely

If you're staying south of the city then Montparnasse has a great view of the city, and the Eiffel Tower, from the top (the building itself is ugly as sin, but you can't see it when you're up it!)

Edit: just googled Montparnasse (to check my spelling 😋) and it's €21, bit much really

It depends on where your entering stadium, if its North or West yeah its better but South and East then La Plaine - Stade de France makes more sense, they both are about the same walking distance.

Excellent, thanks for this. I'm going in through Gate X, and my hotel is on the 13 metro line. so looks straight forward enough.

@Mr chips 55 How did you find getting back onto the 13 after the game?

Sounds like we are in the same boat.

I'm travelling through Frankfurt, staying at on airport hotel on the Thursday night and arriving into CDG around 1100 on Friday.

Plan is to get to hotel, drop bags and grab lunch somewhere. Louvre booked for mid afternoon as the young lad wants to see.the Mona Lisa. Not sure how long we'll spend there. Eiffel Tower is booked for 2130. I'm hoping the lit up tower at night will be cool.

He's mad keen to see l'arc de triomphe too. I haven't told him you can go to the top of it and don't intend to either. 😂

Saturday is going to be a long day so trying to plan it. It would be great to do something in the morning and then head back to hotel for the afternoon to give him a rest before heading out to Saint Denis.

Someone mentioned Versailles....was there before and it.really is an amazing place but I reckon it would just be too much. If I had another full day in Paris, would do it in a heart beat.

I'm looking at hotels at the moment, I see the district's listed, 5th arr, 10th are etc....is there any logic to picking one over the other? Are smaller numbers closer to centre or what's the craic?

Does anyone know what taxi availability is like at the Porte de Maillot bus station where the Beauvais shuttle bus stops in Paris? Flight will be arriving at 8:30pm so I’m anticipating not getting off the bus any earlier than 10pm, and don’t fancy attempting the metro that late after just arriving with an 8yo in tow… Plus it’s a 15 minute drive vs 30-40 minutes on the Metro…

For taxis in Paris I found the G7 app excellent. Regarding Saturdays game, the Metro out from Boulevard de Clichy was very packed at about 6.15pm. We had a few beers in a local bar in St. Denis. It was fine. No delay getting in to the stadium about an hour before kick off. No problem getting the Metro back in after the match. Not as packed as coming out.

We flew Shannon - Heathrow. Then got the Eurostar to Gare du Nord. It worked out fine.

Has anyone used the bag drop at stade de France. Noticed them on each gate on Saturday.

Have a tight turnaround to get to the stadium, due in BVA at 16:55 for Scotland game so want to avoid going to hotel before game.

There didn't seem to be many queuing at it on Saturday.

Was in Paris for the weekend, and here are my learnings.

We stayed near Moulin Rouge, so some of the recommendations are based on where I stayed.

Time from getting off the plane in Charles De Gaul (without luggage), to arriving in our hotel, was about 90minutes. This was a relaxed pace.

It was difficult to get into a decent restaurant in the area on the Friday evening without a reservation. Most places take reservations online. Worth booking something if you can

The pubs up by Moulin Rouge were jammed. Good fun, but very busy. I wouldn't be opposed to bringing a few cans, and drinking outside with the crowds. Didnt seem to be any problem with a little bit of public drinking

We got to the Place De La Clichy metro stop around 7:10 on the Saturday evening. Massive crowds, but well marshalled, and no problems.

Despite sitting in the opposite corner from the metro station, we were in the stadium by around 7:55. Very well ran.

We were in section Y on the bottom tier, and couldn't get drink in the stadium. The bar was open, but the might as well have had cows standing behind the taps. At one stage, we queued from 30 minutes, an moved less than 5m in the queue.

Be prepared, not to drink at the game.

We also took the metro back after the game. Took about 25 minutes of shuffling extremely slowly, but we got there. Again, no trouble, or pushing. Carriages were crazy busy though.

We just bought a couple of cans when we got back to the Moulin Rouge area after the game, and stood outside having some drinks