Paris and Nice

Meet your tour director and check into hotel

Take a guided sightseeing tour of Arc de Triomphe, Champs-Élysées, Eiffel Tower, Les Invalides, and Notre Dame Cathedral.

Explore the world's largest art museum, the Louvre. This museum is housed in a Medieval fortress-turned-castle so grand it's worth a tour itself. You walk through the 71-foot glass pyramid designed by I.M. Pei and added in 1989, and step into another world--one with carved ceilings, deep-set windows, and so many architectural details you could spend a week just admiring the rooms. The Mona Lisa is here, as well as the Venus de Milo and Winged Victory (the headless statue, circa 200 BC, discovered at Samothrace). The Louvre has seven different departments of paintings, prints, drawings, sculptures, and antiquities. Don't miss the Egyptian collection, complete with creepy sarcophagi, or the collection of Greek ceramics, one of the largest in the world. (Please note the Louvre is closed on Tuesdays.)

Line up to climb to the top floor of this iconic landmark for a spectacular birds-eye view of the glittering City of Light.

The ultimate palace, Versailles was built by Louis XIII, and housed the royal family and its groveling court from 1682, when the Sun King moved in, to the French Revolution. Everything in Versailles is worth a look, from the 250-foot-long Hall of Mirrors, with themed salons- "war" and "peace" -on either side, to Marie Antoinette's faux country hamlet. When being a queen became too much to bear, she would pretend to be a commoner, tending her sheep and wearing peasant clothes. (Please note Versailles is closed on Mondays.)

LEAP Activity | Seize the Château!

This costume workshop is a lively role-play activity that puts you in the shoes of the monarchy, clergy, nobility, bourgeoisie, or peasantry to explore the issues underlying the French Revolution.

Claude Monet discovered this tiny farming village when he looked out the window of a stopped train. Impressed by its beauty, in 1883 he and his family moved into the pink stucco house where he spent the next 40 years planting his extensive gardens and creating some of the world's most beautiful Impressionist paintings. Spend some time wandering through the riot of natural color in the Clos Normand and watching soft light shine on the delicate Japanese bridge and lush water lilies that inspired some of his most famous works. See Monet's studio, preserved just as he left it, with supplies and sketches scattered around. Neglected for years and badly damaged during WWII, the house and gardens took 10 years to restore, but are now back in their full glory. Which just leaves one question: With all that weeding and fertilizing, how did Monet have time to paint?

LEAP Activity | Cover the Canvas

Live the artist life. Explore line, color, perspective, negative space and form, then paint a masterpiece inspired by the beauty of Paris.

Travel to Nice on the TGV (Europe’s fastest train). Then tour Vieux, Nice.

The Côte d'Azur's largest city spills down the hillsides to pebble beaches that line the shore. Your Tour Director will show you around the narrow pedestrian streets and tiny squares of "Le Vieux Nice" (Old Town), which is sprinkled with old palaces and mansions. Stroll down the Promenade des Anglais, which runs parallel to the water. Backed by Nice's grand hotels, the Promenade was built in the 19th century for the British who flocked here en masse.

Try your hand at making French food in this interactive cooking class. Lunch will be included in place of dinner today.

Participate in France's most traditional sport of boules, a collective name for games played with metal balls, equivalent to the sport known as bocce in other countries. Practice your underhand pitch as you play the game of Petanque. Throw the boule toward your certain target as close as you can, without hitting it. Become the master of this skillful game.

Enjoy a tour director-led sightseeing tour of the Monaco Cathedral, Monte Carlo Casino, and Prince’s Palace.

Cross over the border to Italy to visit the charming town of Dolceacqua, where Monet found inspiration for his work.