Cemetery in Paris
Also known as Cimetiere du Pere-Lachaise, Pere-Lachaise
FreeCosts nothing to visit.
Pere Lachaise is the largest cemetery in Paris and one of the most visited in the world, and it costs nothing to enter. The tree-lined avenues and carved tombs form an open-air museum of sculpture and history. Oscar Wilde, Jim Morrison, Chopin, Edith Piaf, Moliere, and Proust are all buried here. Budget travelers download or pick up a free map at the entrance and spend a quiet morning walking between the graves. It is one of the most unexpectedly moving free experiences in Paris.
The cemetery opened in 1804 on a hillside in the 20th arrondissement, and the climb up its cobbled avenues gives some of the best free views back across the rooftops. There is no ticket, no audio guide to pay for, and no queue, just a free map of notable graves near the main gate on Boulevard de Menilmontant. To have the avenues to yourself, arrive right at opening, which is the idea behind Pere Lachaise at Dawn. Travelers who want a second free cemetery on the other side of town can pair it with the quieter Cimetiere du Montparnasse, or climb the hill of Montmartre for another free Paris panorama.
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Canal Saint-Martin is a tree-lined waterway in the 10th arrondissement, threaded with arched iron footbridges and a chain of locks that still raise and lower passing boats. Napoleon ordered it dug to bring clean water into the city, and it opened in 1825.
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The Eiffel Tower is the most recognized structure in the world, built for the 1889 World's Fair by Gustave Eiffel's engineering company and never taken down. It was meant to be temporary, a 20-year exhibit, but its usefulness as a radio and telegraph mast saved it and it has stood in the 7th arrondissement ever since.
The Grand Canal is a cruciform artificial lake at the western end of the Palace of Versailles Gardens, roughly 1.6 kilometers along its long arm. Andre Le Notre designed it as the vanishing point of the garden's central axis and as a mirror for the sky, so the whole layout pulls the eye toward the water.
Ile de la Cite is the island in the Seine where Paris began, the spot where the Gallic Parisii and then Roman Lutetia first took root before the city spread to both banks. It is the historic heart of Paris, and almost everything on it can be seen for free.
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