visiting the Eiffel Tower at night (on a budget)

Last night we drove to the Eiffel Tower from our eurocamp. 104km with traffic it took us just under 2 hours. We could have taken the train from neighbouring villages but it would have cost around £50 for the 4 of us plus carparking charges and metro fees.

Before arriving on this trip we decided we would drive it so I applied online for a CritAir sticker (Paris - like most major cities has a clean air initiative). The process is simple and I will post a link to the CritAir blog as soon as I have written it 🤣. (Just to note you don't need one after 8pm at night so you could go without one if you adjust your times)

Doing this on a budget saw me spend an hour packing us up with baguettes, snacks, crisps, fruit and freshly made tupperware boxes of penne bolognaise.

We set off and had easy sailing using the toll road that cost €4.80 only getting busy as we entered Paris (look out for the Stad de France on the left)

We entered Paris a different way to last time so it took me a while to realise we were heading upto the Arc de Triomphe (not via the Champs Elysees) we were the 5th exit and it really is a hair raising experience with no lanes and everyone cutting across....but take it slow and you will be fine! Watch fhe video here...(note I muted our original sounds with a whimsical Disney tune to hide the expletives) https://vm.tiktok.com/ZGemYvRxc/

Our first full view of the Eiffel Tower came as we waited fo Cross a bridge over the Seine where one of our children said "oh so it's like blackpool" and I wondered whether we had just wasted a quarter tank of petrol and our sanity! But we pushed on headed to an underground carpark (St Dominics). We knew we were supposed to pre book but we didn't and it was full...

A quick Google translate of some writing that was on the floor let us know we could street park and pay either via machine or the Paybyphone app so we parked up and I used the app. We arrived at 8.01pm and noticed that when we put in 3 hours it was giving us till 9am the next morning so I played around and ended up paying for 30 mins that again expired at 9am the next day which cost €3! (Outside of 9am-8pm its about €6per hour which is still cheap compared to London)

The code for the area we parked in on the PaybyPhone app is 75007 and we parked opposite a cafe/restaurant called L'alma (you can google maps this cafe to get the street we parked on) and we were just 2 streets away from the foot of the Eiffel tower.

This is where our plan for a budget trip became unstuck...we all were desperate for the toilet and made the mistake of walking in to a cafe called CAFE GUSTAVES....I would HIGHLY recommend adding this to your avoid list. We knew we would need to get a drink to use the facilities...but the toilets and queue were the grossiest I've ever come across but the level of desperation was peak!

This pit stop cost over £35!!!! We had:

Coke €7

Fanta €7

Worlds smallest beer €7 (why pay 7 for a coke when a beer is the same price)

Water (small) €6.5

Chips (littlest one was hungry as he had chosen NOT to eat in the car) €10 - for about 20 over cooked French fries

The most upsetting thing was I asked for the bill at 8.40pm and at 9.10pm we still hadn't got it (asked 4 times) meaning we missed the "sparkle" at 9pm

The only decent thing was my son who is a huge ratatouille fan thought he was in Gusteaus and the fact they had Remy there seemed to confirm this for him!

We finally made our way to the foot of the tower and it was all worth it...the stunning amber/gold tones against a dark sky was spectacular. We took lots of photos and rang our families to share the experience.

There were lots of people approaching us selling Eiffel towers, bottles of wine/beer and my most hated item the green lasers but polite no thank yous were all that was needed to be left alone. One man did approach with red roses and held one out to me... my husband (not for the first time) responded with a "no thanks we have been together too long for those" the man laughed and walked off (feel like I need to point out I laughed too and if he hadn't of said it I would have - it helps when your wife doesn't like red roses lol).

In the distance across the main road our youngest saw lots of event tents so we decided to check it out...wow! It was a small craft and world food market and it was stunning! I would definitely recommend having a stroll over for a nosey... the boys had been so good that we couldn't refuse their requests to get something from the largest pick and mix stall I've ever seen! They even had Eiffel tower shaped gummies! The eldest chose some bits from the pick and mix €3 per 100g, the youngest a large swirly lolly €3.50 and I myself grabbed a bag of roasted candied almonds - total spend €18.

We exited the market onto what my eldest and husband called "the tiktok street" where in the middle of the road people where literally changing into ball gowns etc to have their photo taken in the middle of the road because the traffic lights hold traffic for over a minute at a time! Our eldest was very excited to get his shot

Once we crossed Tik Tok street we realised we were in a nice open space to watch the 10pm "sparkle" we managed to get some photos including a photo rarer than a shot of the lochness monster...(a photo of myself and the husband WITHOUT children and NOT a selfie....)

The sparkle moment hit my boys differently and gone were the "blackpool" comparisons and they were replaced with "wow this is amazing....mummy look" and it all seemed worth it again!

We took a slow stroll back to the car and once again we were all desperate for the loo (husband was working out in his head if he needed to sell a kidney)

Near our car was a fabulous pizzeria called the Trattoria D'ell Angelo who took pity on 4 crossed legged and panicking Brits and let us use the very beautiful and clean facilities without buying anything!

We then headed to the car and took a break to eat the left overs of our pack up before setting off back to camp. Route diversions (A1 being closed) meant we came back via non toll roads which saved us money 💰

Would we do it again? Absolutely it was a real highlight of our trip!

Did we feel we missed out by not paying to go up the tower? Absolutely not! Just being around it was enough for us!