Paris, France

1. Requirements to travel

• All U.S. citizens need a valid visa to visit France.  Make sure to plan far ahead for your visa because there is always unforeseen bureaucracy to navigate. Here's the Man's official site on visas
• A passport is sometimes complicated to get when sites say different things and then you have to get to a post office because for some reason that's where you get them and hope you brought all the right crap.  If you're lucky, then you have and you can fork out the cash, skedaddle on home, and wait 3-5 weeks for your passport to arrive.
• Make sure  you've got your health squared away cuz' it'd be lame to end your vacation early on account of an empty orange bottle.
• Since I'm assuming you're an average American, you'll need a plane ticket to get to France.  Book earlier because the longer in advance you purchase, the cheaper it will be.  Going in the off-season would be nice too, cuz it's cheaper, but you're an average American and you had to use your vacation days when you got sick. 

2. Shelter in Paris

• So an American walks into Paris...and doesn't know where to sleep! Oh no! But if you're young, the options are so mindblowing that you shouldn't be worried about where you'll rest your pretty little head.  Even a quick search on the first site Google gave me for "hostel" reveals shelter from $22 to $225.  Another thing about hostels is the amount of young, new faces you'll see and potentially make friends with. Yaaay!  If you're even more adventurous, check out Couchsurfing.org.  It's exactly what it sounds like.

3.Transportation in the City of Lights

• If you're young and spry, there are several options to get around. This relatively new method is pretty cheap and scenic for a tourist like yourself but may present a challenge when you don't know the city, the road laws, or possibly can't handle the road rage.  Never worry though because, like shelter, transport comes bearing many options as well!

4.Food in the biggest "foodie" city in the world

• Paris is a city just like all the thousands of others in the world.  When it comes to food you will find a range from fruit stands to 3-star Michelin rated restaurants.  Even the rise of the food truck has hopped the Atlantic.  Finding food is no problem in this city.  Deciding is the hard part.  I'm sure, however, that your budget will help make that choice.
• Remember, however, that you're traveling for the experience so don't avoid the haute cuisine entirely, if possible.  Or stare at the rich pigs as they eat while you make this face.

5.Safety

• As a tourist, you probably won't be spending much time in the unsavory neighborhoods of Paris.  This means, naturally, that the crime will come looking for you.  I'm talkin' bout pickpockets, y'all.  They will tend to hang out around areas with the most of these.  Tourists are like lost children so they are the easiest targets.  Plus, they are carrying around all their spending money unlike the locals.  Watch out for people with an unnatural interest in you.  You didn't just find love in the Most Romantic City on Earth.  You've found a petty criminal who has lured you into a false sense of security.  
• Like any other city on Earth, avoid being alone on the streets at night.  The freaks come out at night.

6.Culture and Etiquette

• As pop culture would have us believe, Parisians don't like Americans in their city.  This, of course, is a sweeping generalization and only sometimes true.  I've never been to this city but it is inevitable that somebody doesn't like Americans there.  It even happens in the US.  In order to avoid the "ignorant Yank" label, do your best at using French until their nationalist preconceptions give way to human mercy/pity.  Never begin the conversation in English because it's arrogant.  
• Tipping in France is included in the bills for transport and dining so don't feel obliged to give them anything extra.  Unless you want to make your countrymen look most generous among all the tourists.
• Europe is not America.  The people may look like the White Americans back home but they are not the same people.  Their values are different.  Respect them and they, hopefully, will respect you. 
• Just because they don't jump at the chance to help you doesn't mean they are rude.  That just means that they are French.  Northern Europeans are generally less outgoing with strangers in random public encounters than Americans.

Places to Go: 
France is the most popular country for tourists to visit so it's logical to assume they have a huge variety of sights to see.  Paris, with a range from the creepy catacombs to vivid Versailles, has something to suit everybody's tastes.  And just because all the tourists see it doesn't mean it's not worth seeing.  There has to be a reason it got so popular in the first place. Go there with intentions to discover why that was. 


1. The Palace of Versailles

The most enduring symbol of the luxury French royalty lived in. 22 acres of stunning scenery so manicured that it could put Disneyland to shame, 2300 rooms, lovely sprawling French gardens, miniature village, and all the reasons the poor revolted.  Versailles is located just far enough from Paris for the nobles to remain unaware of the trials of peasant life.  Today, the peasants are entirely welcome to see the way the kings lived. I hope you read this in a Robin Leach voice.

2. The Catacombs

When you get tired of all the pretty, perfect French enchantment of the streets of Paris, take a trip on down to The Catacombs.  You'll get the romance knocked outta ya.  They were originally stone mines but once they were no good for mining they just put all the dead people's bones in there...because that made sense. Anyway, it holds the bones of approximately 6 MILLION Parisians!  What's more, the catacombs only encompass a portion of a huge network of underground passages in Paris that only the most adventurous would dare to venture into.

3. The Eiffel Tower

If there is a structure that screams "PARIS!"...this is it.  It's visible from a huge portion of the city.  Being on the ground around it, however, does no justice to its creators' intentions.  Seeing Paris from the top is incomparable. Like seeing your house on Google Earth.
You know what else? There are two restaurants on it too.  It is the epitome of France.



                                                     4. Les Bateaux-Mouches

Eventually, you're gonna wanna get off your feet and let somebody else do the work while you soak up the sights and sounds.  While a double-decker bus would work just fine, it wouldn't be as fun as riding along the Seine in a bateau Mouche.  They were named after the neighborhood in Lyon where they were manufactured.  These popular boats offer an entirely different perspective of the city.  When you see everything come up and pass by, it makes you understand that it was all here before you got here and it'll be here afterwards too.

Of course, these are only a few suggestions within a humongous selection of attractions that 

The City of Lights has to offer.