Paris Diaries: If only to say you did it

A surprisingly earnest take on Europe's best landmark

There are, famously, plenty of things to see and do in Paris. But there is, equally as famously, one big thing to do in Paris, literally and figuratively. And the first time you go to Paris, you must go and see it. I don’t make the rules, but if I did, rule number one of visiting Paris would be to go and see the Eiffel Tower as soon as you arrive.

Partly because, once that’s done, you can get on with the rest of the city. Getting the Eiffel Tower over and done with is the equivalent of arriving at the family party and heading straight for the weird and boring uncle or cousin or grandparent and putting in your ten minutes. They’ll tell you all about the gearbox in their new Range Rover or where you might find a Black-crested Warbler¹ and once they’re finished you’re free to peruse the vol-au-vents and drink triple gin and tonics to recover.

Once you have gone to see the Eiffel Tower and perhaps even taken the long climb up to the top then and only then can you begin to think about steak and frites and bookshops and a shop full of taxidermy.

But also partly because it’s fantastic. According to the TripAdvisor review where the title of this post comes from you visit this French icon if only to say you’ve done it, but that’s not true at all. You visit because the Eiffel Tower is marvellous and beautiful and actually really worth it.

The idea of doing it as soon as you arrive, of biting the wrought-iron bullet straight away, is that then you can transition into the happy Parisian local or visitor and just see it in passing as you move through the city. You’ve had your hour or so of passionate love and now you occasionally bump into it when walking down the Seine or up in Montmartre. It isn’t awkward, you both knew the score when you first laid eyes on each other.

This is the best kind of relationship to have with the Tower. You don’t need to keep in touch regularly, you can just carry on with your life, and then when you’re nearby or at a good spot you can look up and be reassured that yes, it’s still there. It always will be.

But L. steadfastly refuses to be a one-and-done when it comes to the Tower. We have been to Paris together four times and have both visited before we met, and yet there will come a time in each trip when L. will turn and look at me and say, “you know what we haven’t yet seen…” and off we will go. We might be in Montmartre or Montparnasse or out in Vincennes, it doesn’t matter, we’re off to the Tour Eiffel.

On this trip L.’s Eiffel urge hits after an evening of steak at Le Relais and then cheap wine at one of Hemingway’s old haunts, when we work out that if we leave and walk quickly down to the river we will time it right to see the tower light up and glitter against the cold winter sky. For five minutes, on the hour, every hour after dark the Tower lights up and shines a golden sparkle. Its beacon on the top also literally does the rounds and on a clear night can be seen far across the city.

But that’s in ten minutes and we’re at least fifteen away from the Seine. We’re walking quickly and occasionally breaking out into a jog, making a beeline for the river like a killer getting ready to ditch the gun. We don’t slow and soon we’re making headway. We might still be behind schedule according to Google Maps but it doesn’t know we’re moving as if being chased, and in a way we are, we have minutes to reach the river where the Tower will come into view.

We make it just in time, and over the tops of tall buildings there is the golden glittering monument. If seeing the Eiffel Tower from afar in the daytime is good, seeing it from the river as it has its five minutes of showing-off time is brilliant.

Of course this view of the Eiffel Tower is from afar and this is where it is at its best. Up close you can see the years have started to take their toll. Rust is starting to show, but the main problem is the surrounding area.

If the Eiffel Tower were to ever blow away or be stolen by a gigantic cat burglar, the city of Paris could just gather all the cheap plastic versions that are sold by its feet, stick them together and voila, a newer more future landfill-y kind of Tower. Street hawking is an Olympic sport around these parts.

And that’s not to mention that the whole base of the Tower now has security reminiscent of a military-industrial complex. On my first visit I could walk right under and around the base and just stare up at the thing, agog. Try to do that now and you’ll soon be well acquainted with the butts of more than a few French rifles.

Going up it is a bit of a chore, too. It’s great if you like waiting in queues. When I was waiting in one of many queues for a lift on the middle section of the tower (you can’t just go all the way up in one go) I saw out of the corner of my eye a proposal taking place. There were the appropriate coos of admiration and applause from my fellow tourists but all I could think was that if you were going to literally drown in cliché (is there a more romcom place to propose than at the Eiffel Tower?), the least you can do is propose at the top. Only bothering to go to the middle section is, in my opinion, a good indicator of the effort (or lack of) that man will put into the marriage.

This didn’t occur to the now-future bride as she said yes, obviously.

But all of my grump and disappointment about the monument up close aside: the Eiffel Tower is great. Sure I’m glad I don’t live right next to it, or have to pass it on my daily commute (I trip over fresh air, never mind 37,000 tiny pointy reproductions), but as a landmark and a symbol of an already great city, it is, I think, unsurpassable.

All cities have their landmarks and focal points. London has Big Ben, Rome the Colosseum, Venice the Grand Canal. But few cities’ focal points loom up from afar like the Eiffel Tower. You’ll be going about your business or your day’s tourism and then, all of a sudden, it’s there in the background, or sometimes the foreground, waiting to say hello.

It helps that Paris is so flat of course but then what can you see from the one hill of note, from Sacre Coeur atop Montmartre? You have to strain a little and get the right angle but yep, there is is, Gustave’s great masterpiece, lit up against the night sky.

As much as I pretend when L. brings it up that I’m not bothered, nonplussed, take-it-or-leave-it when it comes to seeing the Eiffel Tower again, I know that deep down when we get up close my phone will be out of my pocket before I know it and I’ll be adding another dozen or so pictures to my collection of photos of it that I’ll never look at again.

It makes me gasp every time, even if it’s the second time that trip and at least the tenth in my lifetime. Each time I’m so grateful that Paris said when the world’s fair comes to town let’s build a bloody great tower and even more grateful that they didn’t decide to tear it down afterwards.

But I won’t say any of this the next time L. turns and starts a sentence with, “you know what we haven’t yet seen…”. I’ll roll my eyes, sigh, and say, “really? Again?”

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