One can see the Eiffel Tower from points all over Paris, and this is a good thing, as it adds to the background and helps your wonderful photos. And yet, ask anyone who travels a bit about actually going up the tower, including me, and you’ll probably receive a shudder, as one of the first steps for how to become a travel snob is to distain such pedestrian, plebian, newbie-traveler activity.
Look for online articles about being a travel snob, as I just did, and the characteristics they cite are almost trope-like stereotypes, starting with the distinction between “tourist” versus “traveler” that few real people care about. Snobs, they inform us, of course distain domestic travel, advance plans, anything that doesn’t last six weeks, tour groups, or anything that isn’t hard. They don’t take selfies, and they have a prepared speech about how their own style of travel has made them a better person.
I don’t worry about things like that. If your idea of a vacation is parking it for six days in a Caribbean resort, I’m just happy that you’ll never be in front of me in line for the Louvre. Enjoy. Unless you’re hurting something, there’s no wrong way to travel.
There are reasons to scorn the very famous must-do sights, such as ascending the Eiffel Tower, but only two valid ones:
- It is ultimately not a great travel experience, as it eats up too much time, costs too much, is a pain, and thus is not much fun.
- It and the area around it is a tourist-only zone, not giving you a true Parisian experience.
The difference between practical travelers and the travel snob is the practical travelers will cite some aspect from #1 for avoiding the tower, while the snob will cite #2.
What’s fun or not when traveling is up to you, but I truly believe every other reason listed in #1. The Eiffel Tower will indeed yes eat up your time, with transport to the site, the security check to even get into the area, and the lines for the elevators (for both up and down). It costs €17 to get to the top. Paris is not a vertical city like New York, the tower is not in the center of the city, and thus the view from the top isn’t all that great. If you’re the type that can have fun doing this anyway, go for it. Perhaps you’re recently in love and can have fun doing anything. Perhaps it’s always been your dream to go up the tower, so hit it.
Still, those deterrents are not the reason a snob will distain it. It simply isn’t something that Parisians do, any more than residents of Washington, DC (where I live) go up the Washington Monument. It’s something the tourists do, and thus the area around the Eiffel Tower is not like the rest of Paris. It’s the special Eiffel Tourist Zone, just for visitors, thus bereft of the indigenous culture. Parisian couples in love do not spontaneously go to the tower for a romantic evening. Parisian friends don’t meet there for a drink. They hardly go anywhere near it, any more than I walk around the Washington Monument.
Travel snobs don’t distain every popular sight. This is much more complicated than some vaulted principle to never follow the herd or to get off the beaten path. The Notre Dame cathedral and the Louvre are also crowded with tourists, but they are magnificent places with great world creations. The travel snob knows that you shouldn’t do anything, such as eat or drink, too close to those places, but it’s a rare snob whose dogma says to shun all attractions.
However much they might cite reason #2 initially, for a travel snob it must be combined with #1, not ultimately being a good experience. The Louvre and Notre Dame areas are also short of native culture (though it’s not nearly as bad), but seeing both of them is a worthwhile experience, one somewhat organic. It may be the idea of the contrived attraction that has little redeeming value that sets the snobs so firmly against the Eiffel Tower, in the same way that the London Eye or Tokyo Tower makes us squirm.
Even contrived attractions can be scalar. I’ve kissed the Blarney Stone and I’m not sorry, as the castle and grounds are gorgeous. I’m not very attracted to the Disney Worlds, but I would go if someone pulled me along and I’m sure it would be decent fun. Cruise ships, however, do not attract me at all, and neither do resorts or places like Vegas. If it’s built just for tourists, if the purpose of the place is to contain you into the Tourist Zone, we snobs are wary.
I’m writing this post because I spent time in Paris a few months ago, and one evening I went to the Eiffel Tower purely to take photos of it (not going up it. I’m cheap.) I started my visit there on the north side of the River Seine, a quite nice view. As soon as I reached the Palais de Chaillot, a structure right across the river from the tower, the Tourist Zone started. People, tourists, were perched on every low wall or jutting surface, jabbering away in languages not French, while taking photos of each other and a backgrounded Eiffel tower.
One is not surprised, as this is the Eiffel Tower, but still I was stunned at how far the Tourist Zone extended, and how exclusionary it was towards the city around it.
Stepping around them, the vendors started. Guys, mostly Africans, roamed through the crowds selling things that tourists need, such as water and other drinks, including half-bottles of wine and champagne. Some were carrying massive bundles of selfie sticks, others had spread out small blankets and set out souvenirs, including of course little statues of guess what?
Across the river, closer to the tower, the carousals started. I would count three. Here is where people are carefully checking their advance-purchase ticket to the tower, as they have a window of time to ascend and they need to get in line. Closer to the tower now and I realized I couldn’t get right under it to shoot upward. The area beneath the tower is fenced off with an airport-like security features. You need to go through metal detectors and have any bags searched to get in, and I didn’t feel like subjecting myself to that.
Instead, I walked around one side, along the fence they’ve erected to keep people out. I set up my tripod next to the fence, and watched as the lights of the tower suddenly started flashing, grabbing some shots. One thing I’ve learned from doing some photography: if you wander around a tourist zone with a camera, even a good one, people treat you like a tourist. If you have a tripod, you’re treated like a photographer. The people next to me ask my advice about camera settings, hand me theirs to take photos of them, and ask to see the shots I’ve taken. I can fool myself that I’m working, not being a tourist.
Travel snobs often suffer from second-hand embarrassment. We look at the tour bus passing by and feel sorry for the people inside. We see the people standing in line for the tower and grimace, feeling bad for them, though they are probably perfectly happy.
Travel snobs don’t like it when a local person makes them as a tourist. We like to fit in. We hate when the waiter figures us out and switches from French to English. In the tourist zone, no one is local, and thus we are doubly uncomfortable, because we’re made as a tourist automatically. We know that we really should be hanging out anonymously in some utterly undiscovered French-only café in some non-visited part of Paris that only the residents know, instead of hanging around the Eiffel Tower outing ourselves.
Perhaps it’s because I’ve already been up the Eiffel Tower that I can distain it. I went twice, during the day and at nighttime, during my first trip to Paris when I was 18. It’s easy to feel superior to your younger self. But I still enjoyed this recent visit to the tower. I got some decent photos and realized the thing is a fairly impressive structure. The park extending in front of it, Champs de Mars, is quite lovely and works well to show it off. Although I’m clearly a tourist, so is everyone else there.
After the sun set and I folded up my tripod, I walked out of the tourist zone and back into Paris, where I found everything else that I liked.
A candid admittance, that!
Very interesting observation that having a tripod makes one look like less of a tourist! By the way, Eiffel pictures do turn out more scintillating from a distance, like all of yours.
Thanks!
Even though most people would also consider me a “snob”, going to a place is trying to experience it all, from the coffee in the middle of nowhere when they don’t even understand you to visit the second floor of the Eiffel Tour… it’s all. I’m from a very touristy place and hell, why shouldn’t I visit also the Park Guell or la Sagrada Familia? Is not that places are only for tourists but just that they win in numbers… So, ok, now I don’t know if I’m a snob hahaha
Everyone has their own way of experiencing the places they visit, you don’t have to feel bad for them. Who are we to stand in the way of their happiness, right? By the way, your photos are stunning!
Elena | http://www.inspiredtoexplore.com
I really enjoyed the quirkiness and lightheartedness of this post! I wish I’d had more time to explore Paris. Will have to go back!
This needs to be said! I never understood the traveler vs tourist argument — to me it’s just that, travel snobbery. Everyone has their own way of experiencing everything. 🙂
Personally, I don’t like crowds and queuing – but I WILL endure them for something that I’m interested in. I didn’t go up the Eiffel Tower either (personal preference: I like having it in my photos) but I did endure the crowds and the queue at the Louvre. It’s all a matter of preference and no one’s really “better” at traveling. 🙂
I guess it’s all relative — many more extreme/offbeat travel snobs see Paris itself as a joke to visit, since there’s no real challenge in getting around or communicating — compared to say, a remote island off of East Timor. As a side note, I once went to Paris and stayed with a couchsurfer from a small village in Indonesia – he was studying at one of the universities in Paris. We went to the Eiffel Tower and he started crying, because for him it symbolized making it somewhere nobody in his family ever thought they could. It kinda keeps me in check about the deeper meaning that what some of these utra-touristy emblems can stand for.
Excellent story there about the Indonesian, and a good new perspective. As to your first point about Paris itself not being enough of a challenge, I have similar feelings about places like Australia, in that I don’t want to endure a 21-hour plane ride only to step off into a place that’s similar to Canada.
If I eill visit the Eiffel Tower, I would choose to be photograph in a candid shot , but definitely I wouldn’t go up. Just imagining the crowd scares me most.
I don’t like heights, but I wanted to go to the top of the tower at least once…and I agree that it wasn’t the best experience. Honestly, I like the view from the top of the Arc de Triomphe better…and this was pretty candid, but entertaining.
Tourists approach such iconic sights with their own aspirations, whims and fancies. They enjoy it in their own way.
I guess it is fine. Excellent captures!
I guess I am right in the middle 😀 I try to immerse myself in a local culture as much as I can, try the local food, the local drinks, find out where the locals hang out. But I am also all for the major attractions, some of which might seem like tourist traps. And while I try to speak the local language if I have some basic knowledge of it, I don’t mind being spotted as a tourist. I find that sharing experiences with both locals and other travelers is an important part of traveling. I believe if you travel long enough, some snob tendencies are hard to avoid. But I am not sure if its us being snobs or us wanting a different thing from travel. I don’t think someone enjoying a couple of weeks of down time each year is looking for the same as someone doing a few trips each year, or traveling all year round.
I think everyone enjoys traveling his own way. I really love your pictures of the illuminated Eiffel Tower by the way!
I think the whole perception is just relative. For me it is about experiencing everything – be touristy and then be an offbeat traveler. As long as people enjoy responsibly I guess t is fine. Loved the photos btw! 😀
Interesting concept and thoughts you have on what it means to be a travel snob and what it means to be a tourist. Each to their own but what an interesting way to distinguish them! The photographs you have taken are very beautiful, love the depth of your shots.
I probably still go just for the sake of going. I mean if I pay a zillion dollars for an international flight to Paris, I feel like I’d like to visit haha. I’m a sucker for a tourist trap for my first visit. I like to travel deeper once I’ve hit up all the tour spots 🙂
I would say to each their own. Every person has their own style and interest and manner of enjoying a place. It does not matter as long as you are happy doing what you are! Loved your pics.
As much as we would love to explore the unexplored away from the touristy crowds, we would not stop adding the touristy places that fascinate us to our bucket list. We have been to the top of the Eiffel tower and the feeling is incredible and worth the queues and we would definitely take a ride up if we had to visit again.
Wouldn’t be that the snob tourist behaves like that whenever he/she cannot get what wanted or cannot enter where planned to enter, or cannot visit what expected to? I mean, a bit like the tale with the fox and the grapes if you know what I mean 🙂
There is always a huge debate on the topic of traveler and tourist since ages. I believe that everyone has their individual style of traveling and we should respect that. Your pictures are just breathtaking!
Meh – not sure about your post, do we need to label people? I mean I would say 1 and 2, what kind of traveller am I? Don’t really care… I don’t know what is wrong with some travelers judging how others like to see another country…Each their own!
Meh–that’s okay, as not everyone gets it. I think travel blogs should also examine attitudes about traveling, as I never wanted to write a blog that just lists something like “14 must-do things in Paris before you perish”; I wanted to go deeper. No, we don’t need to label everyone or judge, but being in such a touristy city as Paris brings out feelings about the sights, as it should, and I wanted to explore those.
nice post, although I don’t get pulled into being bracketed as a tourist or traveler or being a travel snob. For me, it is just travel, simple.
But I do relate to your Eiffel tower experience. i have heard exactly the same thing from people who have visited this iconic place. It is indeed a special tourist zone and definitely not the real Paris.
Interesting post and great pictures! Attitude is OK, it gets people thinking. I felt the same way about going up the Eiffel tower and I don’t regret not doing it. However, regarding the tourist crowd, I believe it depends on when in the year you travel. I was there during a Thanksgiving holiday years ago, and there was hardly anyone there, just the locals. It was lovely, especially the views of the tower from Pont d’lena with the surrounding naked trees; some with a few fall leaves.
After all, what type of a traveler you are depends on what kind of a person you are. If you are interested in culture and history you would prioritize your trip differently than a person that just checks off the sites on their travel list. I personally can get a rich experience by simply walking down the streets and picturing the life there throughout the history, including people that used to occupy those spaces. In Paris, the big one for me was going to the cafes that used to be the hangout places for my favorite artists. A travel snob or tourist? I can be both, but that doesn’t bother me, I would just feel fortunate to be able to travel!