I was really looking forward to this day, mainly because Justin was now with me to share the experience, but also because we were doing the Bike Ride tour. I’d booked this weeks before at Lin’s recommendation and it was totally brilliant and one of, if not the highlight of the entire trip. Big call – but it lived up to all my expectations.

Our meeting point was at the South Pillar of the Eiffel tower. Excitement number 1. We hadn’t yet been up close to the tower, only passed it on the bus tour on our first day. It was huge and the elevators were zipping up and down. It really was something spectacular to see. It was only ever meant to be a temporary structure, as the gateway to the World Show of 1889, but it became an icon and hence, never pulled down.

So we met up with our tour guides from Fat Tire Bike Tours, went to gather our bikes and we were soon on our way. Paris is very flat so the ride was easy. We stopped every so often for an informative talk about a building or a landmark. Our guide, Ned, was funny and charming and excellent at his job. He really made it great. There are some photos of this ride on Flickr here, but Justin also took video which is very funny.

Riding around the cobblestone roads was jiggly and getting over the main roads was daunting but thrilling once we were safe. Paris is fast and bumper to bumper, but the roads are fairly wide and they are safe drivers, so we were never really in that much danger! If you are ever in Paris, you have to do the Bike tour. Great fun.

That took 4 hours all up so in the afternoon we strolled though the back streets and made our way to the river where we caught a Cruise of the Seine. Loved this too. The views from the water were terrific and because we’d had a week to work our way around, we were familiar with the sites and to see them from a new vantage point was great. It also meant we could sit down for an hour or so! Justin took so many photos we ran out of space on the memory stick!

After this we walked upriver and passed the Tunnel where Diana’s car crashed in 1997. There was no official memorial but all over the façade were messages to her and Dodi, poems and phrases and pictures, and lots of site seers, like us, who just wanted a sticky beak. I had my photo taken there – is that ghoulish?? I told you I was having a Diana Fest!

It was late afternoon by this stage so we headed back to the hotel, got something totally takeawayish for dinner and I went straight to sleep. A brilliant, but exhausting day, to say the least.