Paris_ City Guide (Lonely Planet, 7th Edition) - Lonely Planet [295]
Banks usually open from 8am or 9am to between 11.30am and 1pm, and then 1.30pm or 2pm to 4.30pm or 5pm, Monday to Friday or Tuesday to Saturday. Exchange services may end 30 minutes before closing time.
Most post offices open 8am to 7pm weekdays and 8am or 9am till noon on Saturday.
Supermarkets open Monday to Saturday from 8.30/9am to 8pm, though a few now open on Sunday morning as well. Small food shops are mostly closed on Sunday and often Monday too, so Saturday afternoon may be your last chance to stock up on certain types of food (eg cheese) until Tuesday.
Restaurants keep the most convoluted hours of any business in Paris; for details Click here.
Most museums are closed one day a week: usually Monday or Tuesday. Some museums have a weekly nocturne in which they remain open until as late as 10pm one night a week, including the Louvre (Wednesday and Friday) and the Musée d’Orsay (Thursday).
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CHILDREN
Paris is extraordinarily kid-friendly. Be it playing tag around Daniel Buren’s black and white columns at Palais Royal, laughing with puppets in Jardin de Luxembourg, sailing down the Seine or resting little legs with a city sightseeing tour via one of its two above-ground metro lines (2 and 6), there really does seem to be a cheap childish pleasure around every corner here.
Some restaurants serve a menu enfant (set children’s menu), usually for children under 12, though often starters or the savoury crêpes served in neighbourhood brasseries are more imaginative (steak haché and fries gets tiresome after two days). Cafétérias Click here are a good place to bring kids if you just want to feed and water them fast and cheaply, as are French chain restaurants Click here.
Kids aged between six and 12 and keen to cook and consume their own creations can do so at Alef-Bet.
Information
Pariscope and L’Officiel des Spectacles Click here both have decent ‘Enfants’ sections covering the week’s shows, theatre performances and circuses for kids. Online see the exhaustive site, www.cityjunior.com (in French).
The newspaper Libération Click here produces an English translation of its bimonthly supplement Paris Mômes (www.parismomes.fr, in French) called Paris with Kids. It has listings and other useful information aimed at kids up to age 12; focusing on the ‘unusual’ is its philosophy.
Lonely Planet’s Travel with Children by Cathy Lanigan includes useful advice for travelling parents.
Sights & Activities
Many museums organise educational, fun-packed ateliers enfants (kids’ workshops) for children from aged four or six and upwards. Sessions cost €3 to €10, last a couple of hours, and must be booked in advance; some are in English. Favourites include hands-on art workshops at Les Arts Décoratifs Click here, Musée de la Halle St-Pierre, Musée d’Orsay, Palais de Tokyo and Centre Pompidou; money- and medal-making at the Musée de la Monnaie de Paris; meeting marine life at the Centre de la Mer; learning about animals with activities and film at the Musée National d’Histoire Naturelle; and calligraphy, Arab music and mosaics at the Institut du Arabe Monde.
Building an Eiffel Tower, Parisian church or entire village from thousands of miniature wooden planks is what kids do at the innovative Centre Kapla (Map; 01 43 56 13 38; www.kapla.com/centre_kapla.html; 27 rue de Montreuil, 11e; sessions €10; 10.30am-6pm Wed, Sat & school holidays; Faidherbe-Chaligny). It runs three 1½ hour building sessions daily; book in advance.
Around Paris, the mesmerising equestrian displays and stable visits at Versailles and Chantilly make magical half-day trips; the Disney and Astérix theme parks Click here need at least a full day.
See the Neighbourhoods chapter for details on the following suggestions:
Children’s Playgrounds Port de Plaisance de Paris-Arsenal (Map; 4e; Bastille); Jardin du Luxembourg (Map; 6e; Luxembourg); Square Willette (Map; Montmartre, 18e; Anvers)
CineAqua (Map;