Towering Above the Rest

The first thing we did on getting to Paris was eat lunch. Then we went to see the Eiffel Tower. Celebrated and clichéd as it is, I still got a huge kick out of it.

I feel an affection for the Tower. It was the tallest building in the world until 1929 and the inauguration of New York’s Chrysler Building. Not unlike our own CN Tower, which until recently (thank you Dubai), was the world’s tallest free standing structure.

We went there twice, the first on a Friday afternoon and the second late Saturday (the dual trips was due to my camera being on the fritz the first time and I wasn't going to the Eiffel tower camera-less). It was pretty packed both times. Even after reading about it, I was still shocked at how big it was. It’s really impressive. As we sat in the huge line waiting to go to the top we contemplated the tower. And seeing it in real life left me with some questions.

View from the top

Here’s one: What’s it made out of? Nicole made the good point that if it was made out of copper, it would have turned green over time. I didn’t know the answer. Until today. I found this really cool article about the Tower, explaining all the cool inner workings of the Tower like these:

"A 1,000-gallon tank full of water, which was once pumped in from the nearby Seine, provides the counterbalance needed to hoist the roughly 18,000 visitors per day up to the 377-foot-high second-level landing."

"Subterranean pumps send water shooting up to tower-top sinks and toilets. Dozens of miles of plumbing are integrated into the structure of the monument, exposing the pipes to the elements. Mini-heater coils prevent them freezing when the thermometer drops, so the sinks run and toilets flush even in the harshest winters."

Oh and in answer to Nicole’s questions, turns out it’s paint:

"It takes a team of 30 painters working full time over 18 months to spruce up the tower with a fresh coat of its signature bronze paint."

Nicole and I at the top

The fake island the Statue of Liberty is on