Paris · FR
Paris Historic Heart Highlights
From the Louvre across the Seine to Notre-Dame and the Latin Quarter — the city's old core on foot.
What's the walk about?
Lace up your shoes and step into the historic heart of Paris, the ancient core where the city was born and still beats loudest. This gentle walk carries you from the grand courtyards of the Louvre, across the Seine by way of its most beautiful bridges, and onto the Île de la Cité, the island where Paris began. Along the way you will discover Gothic masterpieces, royal history, hidden squares, and a fragrant flower market, before finishing among the cafes and bookshops of the Latin Quarter. Perfect for first-time visitors, it gathers ten of the city's most iconic sights into one easy, memorable stroll through more than two thousand years of history.
What you'll see
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1
Musee du Louvre
Museum
A former royal fortress and palace that is now the largest and most visited art museum on earth. Its luminous glass pyramid glitters in the courtyard, while inside the Mona Lisa smiles at millions.
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2
Pont des Arts
Bridge
A graceful pedestrian bridge linking the Louvre to the domed Institut de France, and the first iron bridge ever built in Paris. Once smothered in love locks, it remains the city's most romantic crossing.
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3
Pont Neuf
Bridge
Despite a name that means New Bridge, this is the oldest bridge in Paris, finished in 1607 under Henri the Fourth. A bronze king still rides his horse at its center, watched over by hundreds of carved stone faces.
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4
Place Dauphine
Square
A tranquil, tree shaded triangular square at the western tip of the Ile de la Cite, laid out by King Henri IV in 1607 and named for his son, the future Louis XIII.
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5
Sainte-Chapelle
Chapel
A dazzling Gothic royal chapel built by King Louis IX to house the Crown of Thorns, famous for its soaring walls of thirteenth century stained glass.
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6
Conciergerie
Monument
A medieval royal palace turned revolutionary prison on the banks of the Seine, best known as the place where Marie Antoinette was held before her execution in 1793.
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7
Marché aux Fleurs Reine-Elizabeth-II
Market
The oldest flower market in Paris, a cluster of glass roofed wrought iron pavilions on the Île de la Cité, renamed in 2014 in honour of Queen Elizabeth the Second.
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8
Cathédrale Notre-Dame de Paris
Cathedral
The great Gothic cathedral at the heart of Paris, more than eight centuries old, ravaged by fire in 2019 and triumphantly reopened in December 2024.
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9
Shakespeare and Company
Bookshop
A legendary English language bookshop on the Left Bank, directly opposite Notre-Dame, where thousands of wandering writers have slept among the shelves since 1951.
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10
Place Saint-Michel
Square
A grand Latin Quarter square laid out under Baron Haussmann, dominated by an immense 1860 fountain of the Archangel Michael defeating the devil, and a beloved gathering place for Paris students.
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