The Eiffel Tower is all that it is promoted to be. 

Karen had made reservations many months ago so that we could eat a meal on the first floor of the tower. We had precise instructions of what time to be there, where to go and not to be late.

We follow instructions well. We got into our line to take the elevator to the first floor to Madame Brasserie restaurant. The website said we could enjoy a unique, refined and generous dinner served with a unique view of all of Paris.

Ok, it was a little more sophisticated than we expected. For folks who like whole hog, pulled pork barbecue, Madame’s was a little out of our league.

However, Karen had booked a window seat overlooking the Seine River and I believe it was one of the best seats in the restaurant. 

We were greeted with a glass of champagne. Not an imbiber of spirts, I did sip it so see how it tasted. I refer you back to the previous paragraph were I said we were out of our league. Next came a glass of red wine. Same scenario. Tasted it but that’s all. The water was excellent!

We got a choice of appetizers. I selected the infused fruit soup, which appeared to be puréed cantaloupe poured over pieces of sliced cantaloupe, with a large crouton covered with a piece of ham. It was very good. Karen ordered the tomatoes tartlet, which looked to me like several different kinds of tomatoes in a tart pie crust with kalamata olives and cream cheese. She said it was excellent.

Next came the main course. We both opted out of the lightly seared octopus with seaweed butter. We both selected the beef tartar. We folks around Broad Creek call it uncooked beef. Yep it looked light raw hamburger with a few greens on it. It also came with a bowl of sautéed new potatoes with garlic and thyme. But by this time we were getting pretty hungry and consumed it all. 

Ahh, dessert. It was my favorite part of the food. It was a bowl of raspberries and black berries mixed in with almonds and whipped cream. It was delicious. Karen got the chocolate custard—wait for it—mixed with buckwheat popcorn. Now, whoever thought that popcorn would go well with chocolate. We shared tasting each other’s dessert and Karen’s was OK. Did I mention the water was very good, as well.

We were given one hour and 15 minutes to finish our food before the wait staff disappeared. Right before our sever left she offered to get us some coffee. But we were pretty full of water.

We walked around on the first floor after eating, taking in the marvelous views and getting lots of photos. Karen also had booked us a return visit at 6:00 to take the elevator to the tower’s second floor and summit on a guided tour. We again followed instructions, met our tour guide outside the tower. She walked us in although we had to stand in a line for those who were going to the summit without an Eiffel Tower guide.

Her name was Liz and she was really good. A young woman working on her doctorate and giving tours at numerous tourist sites around the city to support herself. 

She told us about Gustave Eiffel, who came up with idea to build the tower.  He was determined to build it out of metal, which was not well met by many. Some called it a high and skinny pyramid of ladders.

Eiffel, an entrepreneur, got the French government to put up 20 percent of the funds for the tower. He raised the rest. His agreement was that he would get 20 years to recover his investment to build the 984 foot tall structure. It was the tallest structure in the world until the Chrysler Building was completed in New York in 1929.

The structure was to celebrate the 1889 worlds fair in Paris and the 100th anniversary of the French Revolution. It took Eiffel two years, two months and five days to complete the structure that ended up costing $1.5 million which would be $44 million in today’s money.

By the way, Eiffel recovered his investment in the first six months of the tower’s opening with 21 and half years to rake in the profits. During the worlds fair some two million people visited the tower.

The tower has 18,038 metal parts with 2.5 million rivets holding it together. It has 73,000 tons of steel and 60 tons of paint. And, the tower is painted every two years by 25 painters with brushes—no spray paint here.

We departed Paris on Saturday morning and spent all day on the trains heading for Lauterbrunnen, Switzerland. We were in the upper deck of first class on the train as we whizzed along at about 200 mile per hour to Basel, Switzerland. Very scenic all the way. We then changed trains in Basel to Interlaken and from Interlaken on another regional train to Lauterbrunnen.

Tomorrow we’ll tell you about visiting the highest train station, gift shop and fudge factory in all of Europe.

Top photo shows us standing on the first floor of the Eiffel Tower. We didn’t realize that the shadow of the tower was behind us until we looked at the photos later. And, yes, there’s some of the appetizers in Madame Brasserie’s restaurant. Karen’s is the tomato tartlet and my infused fruit suit with a piece of ham on a crouton. The water was excellent, by the way.