Strolling through the Tuileries the other day to meet a friend for lunch, the jaded, sophisticated me was horrified by the tacky carnival and amusement park rides setup in the middle of one of the most beautiful parks in Paris. My friend called to say she was running late, so instead of dismissing the carnival, I decided to check it out.

As a kid, I spent my summers on the boardwalk at various New Jersey beach resorts. Walking through the noisy kid-filled aisles and hearing carnival barkers in French, I had a sudden flood of happy child memories come back to me.

I used to spend all of my hard earned allowance on games of chance like the floating plastic ducks, the shooting range with cartoon character targets, and the darts trying to break the balloons, all in the quest of winning another silly colored stuffed animal.

When I passed the food stands of cotton candy, jelly apples- they call them Pomme de amour/love apples here, custard & Italian ices, sausage & peppers, and churros (I used to have the Italian version called zeppoles), I remember my eyes always being bigger than my stomach (certainly not the case anymore) and sometimes getting a tummy ache afterwards.

And let’s not forget the rides: the fun house, bumper cars, the house of horrors, the giant Ferris wheel and the gravity defying ones that I couldn’t get enough of (now I would need an immediate visit to the chiropractor after going on one) that made me laugh and cry at the same time.


So if you want to skip some of those “important” museums & monuments and secretly indulge your inner child urges to go to the carnival, checkout the Tuileries. You may even run into me: I’ll be the one with the pink cotton candy all over my face.

Tuileries Carnival till August 26th.
Metro: Tuileries, # 1 line

I am pleased as punch to announce the launch of Eye Prefer Paris Tours, which are 3-hour walking tours I will personally be leading. The Eye Prefer Paris Tour
includes many of the places I have written about such as small museums & galleries, restaurants, cafes & food markets, secret addresses, fashion & home boutiques, parks, and much more.

I look forward to meeting you on my tours and it will be my pleasure and delight to show you my insiders Paris.

Check it out at www.eyepreferparistours.com