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We were in Paris for four days at the end of our holiday this year in August.  we had a day in Disney (fantastic as ever) and a day in Paris.  We took the train from Touran (we stayed at 4vents) and about 35 mins later arrived in Paris.  We couldnt believe the queue's to the major attractions, i'd never seen so many people.  The queue of people waiting to get into places like Notre Dame and L'arc de triomphe was mad, seriously I would think about an hours wait at least.  We didnt queue as the kids would have driven us mad.  We did go up the Eiffel Tower which we didn't find too bad.  We also managed to do a boat trip on the Seine courtesy of Mr. Tesco (thank you, very good!).  All of the restaurants along the champs elysesee were open, and appeared busy.

Despite this, we managed a full day there, and the kids loved it, albeit they were totally shattered at the end of the day !!

Hope this helps

Ali

Towards the end of August may not be a problem because most Parisiens will be back by then. However, during the vacances at least half of restaurants will shut especially those where locals eat their lunch - so you may be confined to tourist restaurants and Italian ristorante: for some reason most of these stay open!  Likewise restaurants around Gares de Nord and Est and Montparnasse will be open if over-priced.

Your bigger problem may be getting into museums and other sights - enormous queues of tourists build up. If you're staying for several days the way round this is to buy an appropriate pass (used to be three-day, four-day, week .... just check with a tourist office or on-line: you used to be able to buy them at Waterloo - perhaps there's somewhere at St Pancras or Dover?).  These will save you a bit of money but also allow you to jump the queue!

Don't think of taking the car into the centre - public transport is cheap enough and one of the great pleasures of Paris is simply walking around: something interesting around every corner!

We stayed at 4 vents for a two week holiday two years ago and spent a full day in Paris travelling by train from Tournan (masses of free parking at train station) we were there first week in August and didnt find the queues too bad at all. I prebooked a fab restaurant through toptable.com in the centre of Paris by the name of Chez Flottes, fab food and fab prices!  First time we had known our youngest finish her meal before her beloved tomato sauce had got the the table!   We travelled with another family and agreed to babysit each others children for an evening whilst the other couple visited the Moulin Rouge, a very rare treat for us to have an evening without our daughters. 

This year we stopped at 4 vents for four nights on our way home from Brittany and this time as well as Disney did Parc Asterix (with tesco vouchers) and it wasnt the best of ideas queued far long than we did at Disney...some queues were over 2 hours! 

4 vents is a fab site ideal for Paris, Disney, Provins and Fontainbleau.  It is mainly Brits on site, huge pitches and a pool which is very very cold but this year with the blistering heat a huge relief!