Sunday, June 5, 2011

Le Meriden Paris Hotel


Le Meriden is one of the Paris hotels you may want to consider for your trip to France. During your stay at Le Meriden, you’ll be walking the halls and enjoying the accommodations that many famous people before you have enjoyed. The likes of B.B. King, Cab Calloway, Fats Domino, Lionel Hampton and many more are but some of the famous people that have stayed in the Paris hotel.

About the Hotel

Le Meriden consists of 953 guest rooms and is one of the sour-star hotels you can find in Paris. The hotel sits just minutes from the Eiffel Tower and the Luxembourg Gardens. Inside and outside of the hotel, you’ll find plenty of activities to keep you happy and busy. Some of the hotel amenities include a bowling alley, a fitness center and dry cleaning services. You can choose from non-smoking and smoking guest rooms. An on-site gourmet restaurant meets the desires of almost any palette. In addition, the hotel offers babysitting services for families traveling with small children.

Getting around Town

Plenty of ground transportation options are available to get you to and from the hotel during your stay in Paris. Le Meriden is within walking distance of the train station. If you prefer the subway over the train, the subway station is very close to the hotel as well.

Activities near the Hotel

Le Meriden is also located near the Exhibit Center, so you can take in various types of exhibitions. Museums are also abundant in and around Paris. You have the choice of visiting Centre Pompidou, Musée du Louvre, Musée de Rodin, Musée d’ Orsay, Musée National Picasso, Arc de Triomphe, Panthéon, Crypte Archéologique de Notre-Dame, Châteaux de Versailles, Villa Savoye, Roué Libre, Sainte Chapella and more.

One of the interesting and eccentric museums in Paris is the Musée des Egouts. This museum is called the sewer because it is located inside of a sewer. If you can stand the slight odor, as you walk through the museum, you’re actually walking through a journey in the history of Paris. During the journey, you will learn about waste treatment and water supplies now and then in Paris history.

Shopping and dining are other pastimes you can enjoy during your stay in Paris. The Hard Rock Café, various art galleries and department stores meet the needs of almost any visitor of any age.

How to Choose the Best Hotel in Paris

Paris is full of a lot of things to do and see, but it is all full with plenty of hotels in Paris from which to choose for your stay. One of the primary concerns when choosing hotels in Paris is the amount of money you want to spend. The cost of the hotels, however, should not be the only factor you consider. You should also consider your likes and dislikes.

Ratings and Reviews

As you start to uncover the options you have for hotels in Paris, you’ll want to dig deeper than the information that the hotel website provides to you. Visit travel websites where former patrons of the hotels can leave ratings and reviews on the hotel property. Read through these reviews carefully. You’re likely to find a mix of reviews, where some patrons loved the hotel and others hated it. Look for reoccurring themes fir the reviews. If all or the majority of the reviews complain that the hotel is noisy because of remodeling then this is likely the case for the time frame the reviews took place.

Rating Factors

Beyond guest reviews, you can also rely on the hotel ratings awarded to hotels by various hotel and hospitality organizations. Organizations that rate hotels base ratings on customer service, food, rooms, amenities, location, etc. Generally, hotels are rated on a one to five scale, with one being the worst and five being the best. Hotels in Paris range from options that are rate one-star hotels to those that are rated five-star hotels. Budget will come in to play here too because the higher the rating of the hotel the more expensive it is to stay.

Best Hotels in Paris

While this is not a comprehensive list of some of the best-rated hotels in Paris, it is a starting point for researching hotel options for your stay.

• Hotel Bristol: This hotel is rated three stars and is located near Champ-Elysees.
• Hotel Luxemboubou Parc: This hotel is located near St Germain and is also a three-star rated hotel.

With three-star hotels in Paris sitting in the middle of the rating scale, you’ll find average accommodations at an average rate. For the most part, you’ll find clean, comfortable and affordable accommodations and amenities at a fair price. Hotel managers and the staff work hard to accommodate the needs of their guests, tend to cater to various types of travelers, including couples, groups and families.

Saturday, June 4, 2011

Touring the Roots of Paris


Paris is a city that is rich with history, music, art, cultures, science and more. Whether you are in the midst of planning your trip to Paris or a new resident in the city, you’ll want to get your bearings on what you need to see and do while you are there. Guided tours, at least at first, may be your best bet in learning what you need to know about Paris. From there, you can even branch out on your own.

Guided Tours

Guided tours have tour guides that walk you through the streets of Paris, pointing out sights to see and providing you with the back story on the building, place, person or thing. Tour guides are even available to take you on a tour of the Louvre, take you on a visit to monuments, museums and other things along the way. Some of the sights you will see may include:

• Popular water fountains
• La Pyramid in Paris
• Louvre
• Regal Palace
• Grand Museum Gallery of Paris
• Buran at the Regal Paris

More Sites to See

Paris has a never ending set of people, places and things to see. Do some research before you head over to France, so that you can at least make a tentative plan of the sights that you must see during your visit. You may want to have some alternates as well, so that you can fit in additional locations or swap out visits as necessary.

Some other options include:
• Palais Regal
• Palais des Exposition (Exhibit Hall)
• Palais des sports (Sports Stadium)
• Le Palais Garnier (Paris’s old opera house)
• Le Grand Palais (Gallery)
• Le Petit Palais (Gallery)
• Royal Palace, which contains the Le Jardin des Tuileries water fountain
• Place de la Concorde
Les Champs-Elysées, where you can walk through archways, tree lined streets and visit the train depot

Louvre Neighborhood

The neighborhood that surrounds the Louvre is the Tuileries Palace. Back in the 1870s, this area was ravaged by a fire. After the fire, some of Paris’s finest designers worked to redesign and rebuild. Today, the area is still home to the palace where Catherine de Médicis bespoke the structure. The neighborhood is also home to some of the most beautiful grounds filled with garden plants, flowers and more.

With so much to see and do while you are in Paris, some upfront planning can go a long way. While you do not have to rigidly stick to your plan, having a plan ensures you get the best tour package deals before you arrive in Paris, and that you have a tentative itinerary on what to see and do while you are there.