POST CONGRESS TOURS
PST1 | Châteaux de la Loire: 2 days
Friday, September 16, 2011
We will leave Paris at 08:00 for a coach trip to the Loire valley, escorted by a professional guide. After a one and a half hour drive south from Paris, you will see from a very long distance the towers of the cathedral of Chartres, the most magnificent gothic building ever built in France (inside visit). Our tour will continue with the Château of Blois. It is certainly the finest example of the royal architecture from the 13th to the 17th centuries in the Loire Valley.
Driving along the Loire River, we will reach Tours.
Early evening, we visit Tours, where we shall make a walking tour of the old quarters of the Loire’s capital with the XVth century half timbered houses and others dating back the Renaissance period around Place Plumereau and the Hotel Gouin.
Dinner and overnight at Tours Hotel.
Saturday, September 17, 2011
Buffet style breakfast in the hotel. In the morning, the soft touch “or French douceur de vivre” begins with the visit of the famous gardens of Villandry composed of three pattern terraces: The water garden, the ornamental garden and the kitchen one. We certainly won’t leave without admiring the most incredible one: The garden of love! We go on with the visit of the Chateau de Chenonceau. Offered by King Henri II to his mistress, Diane de Poitiers and then decorated by Queen Catherine de Medicis, the chateau de Chenonceau was built like a bridge over the river Cher. The Great Gallery and the Queen’s Chamber have been restored and furnished with XVIth century chests and cabinets.
Lunch in a restaurant near the Chateau.
Chambord will be our last stop before returning to Paris early evening. In order to admire the former example of medieval planning fortress which is so delicately combined with an Italian Renaissance decoration much in the fashion of the earliest XVIth century. It is the second largest château of France after Versailles and its beautiful forest is still inhabited by wild animals.
Friday, September 16, 2011 & Saturday, September 17, 2011
Price per person in a double room: 550€ (tax included)
(Accommodation in a first class hotel)
Supplement for single room: + 70€ (tax included)
• Departure Friday 08:00
• Return Saturday around 18:00
Meet in the Lobby of the Lafayette Concorde Hotel
PST2 | Normandy: 2 days
Due to lack of participants, this tour has been cancelled. We thank you for your understanding.
Friday, September 16, 2011
We will leave Paris at 08:00 in direction of Caen, the capital of low Normandy where we will visit of the Memorial of Caen. This museum is entirely dedicated to the World War II and is certainly exceptional because of documents and films of great quality.
Our next stop will be in Bayeux where, after lunch, we will see the very famous Tapestry of Queen Matilda. It can be compared to a cartoon with realistic and comic scenes counting the conquest of England by William the Conqueror.
The end of the afternoon will be dedicated to the visits of very impressive sites of the Landing of 1944 such as La Pointe du Hoc and the American cemetery of Omaha Beach. Dinner and overnight in Caen.
Saturday, September 17, 2011
After a buffet style breakfast in the hotel, we will follow the very nice road of “La Côte Fleurie” with its very famous seaside resorts, created under the second empire by the French high society. The two finest cities still very in fashion today are Cabourg and Deauville.
We will then have lunch in Honfleur, a lovely sailing and fishing port.
Our last stop on our way back to Paris will be Rouen, the capital of High Normandy, where we will have a walking tour of the medieval pedestrian quarter of Le Gros Horloge and the Cathedral, immortalised by Claude Monet.
Friday, September 16, 2011 & Saturday, September 17, 2011
Price per person in a double room: 550€ (tax included)
(Accommodation in a first class hotel)
Supplement for single room: + 70€ (tax included)
• Departure Friday 08:00
• Return Saturday around 18:00
Meet in the Lobby of the Lafayette Concorde Hotel
PST3 | Provence: 2 days
Due to lack of participants, this tour has been cancelled. We thank you for your understanding.
Friday, September 16, 2011
Departure from Paris on the TGV train to Marseille. After three hours running at 156 miles per hour (260 km/hr) you will reach the capital of Provence, Marseille, a very exciting and colourful port. After lunch, you will enjoy a walking tour of the Vieux Port, historic heart of the city. Then, continue along the Quai du Port to reach the new port of La Joliette set up since the 19th century. Through the Old City, the Panier district, then to the Basilique Notre Dame de la Garde by bus (inside visit).
Your tour continues along the coastline over the Corniche Kennedy with its splendid villas to the Parc Balnéaire du Prado, overlooking the Frioul archipelago and the Château d’If.
The visit continues along the avenue du Prado, la Canebière and a pictures stop at the Palais Longchamp.
The dinner and overnight will take place in a typical restaurant of Marseille.
Saturday, September 17, 2011
After breakfast in the hotel, the morning will be dedicated to the vist of the most beautiful and cultural city of Provence: Aix-en-Provence, a former Roman town (35km of Marseille, 30 min). Some of the small streets have kept their evocative names, such as the rue Esquicho-coudo, a narrow passage dating from the middle ages.
Ruins of the old medieval ramparts may also be seen right at the top of the rue Gaston de Saporta. You will discover the “Saint Sauveur Cathedrale”, the “Arbishop’s palace, the town hall of Aix en Provence, the cité Comtal, the clock tower, the square of the hotel d’Albertas or again “the Madeleine church”.
After lunch, back to Marseille by bus to take a special cruise boat to discover the wellknown Calanques of Marseille and the Cassis bay with their turquoise waters and marvellous flora and fauna. After the cruise, return to Paris by TGV.
Friday, September 16, 2011 & Saturday, September 17, 2011
Price per person in a double room: 585€ (tax included)
(Accommodation in a first class hotel)
Supplement for single room: + 50€ (tax included)
• Meet at “Gare de Lyon”station around 08:00
• Return “Gare de Lyon” station around 20:00
PST4 | A day in Champagne
Depart from Paris by coach through the roads of "la Marne" to the cemetery of "Bois Belleau" commemorating the terrible battles of World War I. Arriving at Epernay, we will visit the cellars and taste the famous champagne of Moet & Chandon. After lunch, we will follow the road crossing the “mountain” of Reims to see the world famous vineyards. At the end of the route is the capital of the region, Reims. We will visit its superb cathedral where the French kings were crowned. Then we will continue on to the Basilica Saint Remy to seen the coronation place of the first Frankish king Clovis.
Friday, September 16, 2011
• Departure by coach 08:00
• Return 20:00
• Tour Cost: 170€ (tax included)
Meet in the Lobby of the Lafayette Concorde Hotel
PST5 | A day in Burgundy
Departure from Paris on the TGV train to Dijon.
After one and a half hour running at 156 miles per hour (260 km/hr) we will reach the capital of Burgundy to visit its marvellous monuments and to take the famous “wine road”. We will continue toward Clos de Vougeot for a short stop and lunch at the Clos de Vougeot restaurant. In the afternoon we will visit the famous “Hospices de Beaune” before coming back to Paris at 20:00 by TGV
Friday, September 16, 2011
• Departure by train 08:00
• Return 20:00
• Tour Cost: 150€ (tax included)
Meet at the “Gare de Lyon” station
PST6 | A day at Mont Saint-Michel
The Mont St Michel is a tower in the heart of an immense bay invaded by the highest tides in Europe. Aubert, Bishop of Avranches built and consecrated a small church on the 16th October 709. In 966 a community of Benedictines settled on the rock at the request of the Duke of Normandy and the pre-Romanesque church was built before the year one thousand. The village grew up from the Middle Age.
UNESCO has registered the Mont Saint-Michel as a world heritage in 1979 and this mecca of tourism welcomes more than three million visitors a year.
Friday, September 16, 2011
• Departure by coach 07:00
• Return 20:00
• Tour Cost: 190€ (tax included)
Meet in the Lobby of the Lafayette Concorde Hotel
PST7 | Impressionist Day
Due to lack of participants, this tour has been cancelled. We thank you for your understanding.
You’ll discover during this day the impressionism, not only the landscape and the urban scene but also the portrait or the still life.
Visit of the Orsay Museum in the morning
Tour of the impressionist section and the works of Monet, Manet, Sisley, Renoir and many others in the Orsay Museum. One of the most modern and interesting museums in Paris, Orsay has been installed in a remodeled 19th Century Railway Station.
Visit of the Giverny Museum
You will visit Monet’s house restored with the furniture and bright colours of the time and see his collection of Japanese prints. As you stroll through the French and Japanese gardens both created by Monet with impressionist colours, you come to the lily pond that provided the inspiration for his last works of art.
Visit of the Marmottan Museum
Henry and Marie Duhem were two famous painters from the impressionist and later on the post impressionist movement. But as well, Henry was a collectioner and donated to the Marmottan museum more than one hundred paintings, water colours, pastels and bronzes. This splendid collection can be seen as well as the most famous painting of Monet, the “Sun rise”.
Friday, September 16, 2011
• Departure by coach 08:00
• Return 18:30
• Tour Cost: 150€ (tax included)
Meet in the Lobby of the Lafayette Concorde Hotel
PST8 | A day in Versailles (King’s vegetable garden & Trianon)
You will discover first the King’s Vegetable Garden in the morning. It was built by Jean-Baptiste La Quintinie between 1678 and 1683. A few years before, La Quintinie had been appointed by Louis XIV as the Director of All Royal Fruit and Vegetable Gardens, and part of his mission was to build a vegetable garden just South of the Château de Versailles, to accommodate the court’s needs for fresh produce. For this purpose he was given nine hectares (about 1,000,000 square feet) of swamps, which he dried out and structured into a large central square with a fountain and thirty smaller gardens all around, in which he proceeded to plant a wide variety of produce, experimenting and inventing a few horticultural techniques along the way.
More than three centuries later, his Potager would still do him proud. It is just a bit smaller – some elements have disappeared or been replaced – but it is still planted with more than 300 varieties of fruits and vegetables maintained by the students from the school of horticulture, and it produces over 70 tons of produce every year.
After that, you will have lunch in Versailles. In the afternoon, you will visit the Grand Trianon on the garden which was a place of relaxation for king and the royal family, away from all the ceremony of Versailles! The Petit Trianon was built in 1760 for Louis XV and Madame de Pompadour, and in Marie-Antoinette’s time it was further embellished with the addition of a landscaped park and the famous Queen’s Hamlet, the Hameau de la Reine.
Friday, September 16, 2011
• Departure by coach 08:30
• Return 18:30
• Tour Cost: 150€ (tax included)
Meet in the Lobby of the Lafayette Concorde Hotel.
PST9 | Fontainebleau & Vaux Le Vicomte
In the morning, you will visit to the former autumn residence of the Kings of France. Besides great Kings such as Francis 1st (Renaissance), Louis XV (baroque style), Napoleon also lived in this Chateau and the south wing is today dedicated to his victories but as well to the way of living under the empire period with his son’s bedroom and the one of Marie Louise.
After lunch, enjoy a journey through the forest to the Chateau de Vaux. The chateau was built in the Versailles style. It is the place where the Minister of Finances Fouquet made King Louis XIV jealous with his unlimited expenditure.
Vaux is now a private residence, but its magnificent decorations, unique furniture and its “French” gardens still play tribute to the French style of life in the XVII Century.
Friday, September 16, 2011
• Departure by coach 08:00
• Return 18:00
• Tour Cost: 150€ (tax included)
Meet in the Lobby of the Lafayette Concorde Hotel.