Jaunted

Tags: Celeb Travel / Justin Timberlake / Eiffel Tower / Paris Travel / → All Tags

Justin Timberlake's New Costar: The Eiffel Tower

A romantic romp under the stars in Paris is the plot of a new perfume ad starring Justin Timberlake, shooting at night around the Eiffel Tower this week. Like an aging diva, the Tower won't travel for just anyone, so the singer/actor had to come to her.

The shoot, for Givenchy's cologne "Play," feature Timberlake and an actress crossing the Champ de Mars and scaling the tower at night. Since an earlier spot for the fragrance included Timberlake on a plane, this must be his destination—which makes sense, given that the brand has called Paris home since its founding in 1952. No sign of on-again off-again girlfriend (and fellow Super World Traveler) Jessica Biel on set, although the pair recently had lunch in Vancouver where she's filming the big-screen "A-Team" remake.

more ›

Tags: Travel Contests / Fashion Travel / Paris / Paris Travel / → All Tags

YSL Will Send You To Paris For New Years, If You Prove 'Parisienne'

Ahh, New Years in Paris, what a fantasy trip that would be. Although we got the dream New Years vacation out of the way a few years ago in Venice, it doesn't mean that we can't lust after the combination of fashion and free travel that the new contest from Yves Saint Laurent offers.

Here's the details, for all you wannabe holiday jetsetters: YSL is launching a new fragrance called Parisienne and they've devoted a mini-site to it, complete with a blog of Paris travel tips. To win a trip for two to Paris for New Years, you must also share a story and photos, specifically "about how you have experienced the spirit of Parisienne in your own life." There's also a chance of winning a YSL handbag and Beaute products, but we'll just take the trip thanks.

more ›

Tags: Fashion Travel / Fashion Week / Paris Travel / Events / → All Tags

The Top Five Paris Tourist Sites Affected By Fashion Week

The City of Lights will become the City of Photographer Flash Strobes in the next 24 hours as Paris Fashion Week officially begins tomorrow and runs through Thursday, October 8. Although this means that Paris will be on its best behavior with gleaming-clean upscale restaurants, the best window displays, and serious eye candy walking down the street, it also means that private parties and fashion shows will possibly clog up some of the sights that tourists regularly hit.

Since we want you to get the most out of Paris in the autumn, with a dash of the glamor of the Fashion Week thrown in, we'll let you in on the places to either hit or skip—depending on how much you love big crowds of pretentious people—in Paris for the next ten days:

Top 5 Paris tourist sites affected by Fashion Week, after the jump

more ›

Tags: Travel News / Paris Travel / Death / Thanatourism / → All Tags

Vandals Dare To Disturb Paris Catacombs, Awaken Curse?

Just ahead of Halloween, a creepy disturbance shutters one of Paris' most morbid destinations. Now tourists won't have the treat of walking among the 14th-century dead while city officials find the grave-raiser.

A tourist destination dating back to the 19th century, the Paris Catacombs, resting place of French Revolution figures like Georges Danton, contains bones dating back to the 14th century. Some 300,000 visitors a year trek out to the 14th arrondissement to check out the remains of more than 6 million Parisians, until earlier this month when an unknown number of vandals tipped over several stacks of those remains, making the path through the tunnels impassible.

more ›

Tags: Airplane News / A380 / Singapore Airlines / Airline News / → All Tags

A Singapore Airlines A380 Returns To Paris After Engine Trouble

A Singapore Airlines flight had to turn back mid-trip on Sunday after one of the engines on the plane—a giant A380 originating in Paris—decided to stop working.

The A380 is an ultra high-capacity airliner, designed by Airbus to compete directly with Boeing's 747 and its successors. It has two decks, four engines, and over 500 seats. All of which is a roundabout way of saying that it was loaded with almost 450 passengers and that they were probably not in the best of spirits after this:

more ›

Tags: Paris Restaurants / Paris Travel / Travel News / Food Travel / Quirky Travel / → All Tags

Pop-Up Restaurant Opens On Paris Rooftop, Sends Foodies Swooning

Earlier this year, we pouted and said a sad little "au revoir, notre amour" to the Hotel Everland, a single little hotel room which sat atop Paris' Palais de Tokyo and offered an unparalleled view of the EIffel Tower starting from $488 a night.

After a very successful run of just over a year, the pop-up hotel room left in April, but now Paris is reviving the concept in the form of a restaurant. Fashion Week Daily has the dirt on what's sure to be the next big thing on the Paris cuisine scene:

more ›

Tags: Fall-Foliage-Map / Fall Foliage Travel / Fall Travel / Outdoor Travel / Paris Travel / Thanatourism / → All Tags

Sweep The Autumn Leaves From The Graves Of Proust And Wilde In Paris

Alright, alright—Paris is merveilleuse at all times of the year, but during the autumn, certain sections of the city veritably come alive with the death of the leaves. Heck, the season even inspired a Barbie doll to use a walking stick.

There are the Jardin des Tuileries, Jardin du Luxembourg, Bois de Boulogne, and of course the pathways along the Seine River for premium fall foliage peeping. But for the most unique experience, we're turning a little morbid by recommending a stroll around Père Lachaise cemetery, where the autumnal colors stand stark against the gray and black tombs of figures like Jim Morrison, Marcel Proust, and Edith Piaf.

more ›

Tags: Literary Travel / Travel Bookstores / Armchair Travel / → All Tags

Literary Travel: Where Is Your Favorite Travel Bookstore?

Don't go until you're well-read: The L.A. Times' travel blog recently rounded up its favorite travel bookstores in the world, for those of us who still prefer the ability to doodle in the margins of a guide to pulling it up on a smartphone. We definitely want to check out their picks, but why so Eurocentric?

The Times singles out London's venerable Stanfords (even mentioned in a Sherlock Holmes story!), Paris' Librarie Ulysse and Rome's Libreria del Viaggiatore—and they all sound like the kind of dusty nooks in which to while away several happy hours planning our next adventure. But three just aren't enough!

more ›

Tags: Movie Set Travel / Paris Travel / Leonardo DiCaprio / Ellen Page / Marion Cotillard / Four Seasons George V / → All Tags

Leonardo DiCaprio Is Making Out And Dodging Explosions In Paris

Protecting Ellen Page from flying debris and making out with Marion Cotillard is all in a week’s work for Leonardo DiCaprio. Leo, Ellen and Marion are all in Paris this week filming the contemporary Sci-Fi thriller Inception, which is being directed by The Dark Knight’s Christopher Nolan. Very little is known about the film except that it takes place in "the architecture of the mind," whatever that means.

What we do know for sure is that Leo and Ellen filmed at Cafe Debussy and near the Pont de Bir-Hakeim on the Seine yesterday. This isn't the first time on the big screen for the bridge; it was also featured in National Treasure 2, Munich and Last Tango in Paris.

Leo invited a few family members along on the Paris trip, including his mother who seemed to be doting on her famous son. We wouldn’t be surprised if Leo put his family up at the ultra lux Four Seasons George V while they're visiting him in Paris. Right now, the hotel is offering a special Bed and Breakfast Package that includes a full American breakfast daily for up to two adults at the hotel’s La Galerie, Le Cinq restaurant or through In-Room Dining for $1170.00 a night. For that kind of money, you too could probably also be making out with Marion Cotillard.

Related Stories:
· PEOPLE Goes Inside Leonardo DiCaprio's Top-Secret Movie Set [People]
· Starbucks Coverage [Just Jared]
· Leo's A Mama's Boy [X17]

[Photo: Just Jared]

Tags: Beach Travel / Paris Travel / Events / → All Tags

Forget The Riviera; Paris Has The Hot Beaches This Summer

By now, we're pretty familiar with the fact that cities like New York, Amsterdam and Paris love to take a break from the hot, urban grind to get down by the shore of their rivers (or canals, in Amsterdam's case) and pretend for a moment that they're on the riviera.

Instead of pouring a dumptruck-full of sand onto the banks of the Seine in Paris, this year the City of Light is kicking it up a notch by having a whole month (July 20 to August 20) of beach atmosphere, water sports, and resort culture along a few patches of the river. Called "Paris Plages," which simply means "Paris Beaches," the event brings in 1,350 tons of sand, 250 sun loungers, 350 deckchairs, 200 tables, 800 chairs, 250 sun umbrellas, 50 palm trees, 40 hammocks… you get the idea.

There will of course also be cafes, sidewalk vendors, various swimming pools, and activities like kayaking, sailing, pedal-boating and hamster-balling (those inflatable wheels pictured above).

more ›

Tags: OpenThread / Museums / The Louvre / Tourist Tricks / → All Tags

Be Honest, How Long Did You Really Spend Inside The Louvre?

This recent article in the New York Times has us feeling a little sheepish. You see, last fall we went to the Louvre in glorious Paris and we did a predictably touristy trip around the museum.

First stop, of course, was the Mona Lisa. Then we decided to take an audio tour that delved into the history of the museum starting with its beginnings as a fortress in the 13th century. As for the art itself, um, yeah, it was extensive. But do we remember much of it? No, not really. We didn't even snap that many pictures (does the picture of the Mona Lisa condoms on Rue de Rivoli count?) And we were out of the museum in just under two hours, only visiting two wings. And the NY Times knows it.

more ›

Tags: Musems / Canal Street / Counterfeits / → All Tags

Spot the Fakes at The Museum of Counterfeiting

If you've ever hit up Canal Street in New York or Santee Alley in Los Angeles, then you know what most people are doing there: shopping for fake designer bags. Sure, the police have cracked down heavily on the counterfeit operations but that's only made the sellers of such dubious goods more ingenious.

On Canal Street, Asian women in preppy button down shirts, ball caps and (obviously fake) designer messenger bags ask passerbys if they want, "Chanel, Gucci, Prada?" If you say yes, they nod and say, "Come this way" while pulling out their Nextel phone and barking directions at someone on the other end.

You could be led into a hidden section of a small stall which is already selling a mass of watches, scarves and no-name bags or into an entirely new storefront in a different location or even, a mini-van. There you will find counterfeits galore from Chanel Classics to Gucci handbags, Prada messenger bags and every so often, a Louis Vuitton tote.

But these types of counterfeit operations aren't just limited to the U.S. Major cities across the world have their counterfeit culture. We've even seen counterfeits being hawked on Passeig de Gràcia in Barcelona in front of the real designer stores. And counterfeit designer products (and other fakes) are so wide-spread that in Paris, there's an entire museum filled with the wares.

more ›