Visitors on the Eternal Notre-Dame virtual reality tour take an extensive tour of the cathedral during its construction, including this view over the city circa 1260. Extract image © Orange/Emissive/Amaclio Productions.
On the one hand, I have a natural aversion to recommending virtual reality tours for travelers. After all, we travel to be someplace, not virtually but actually. On the other hand, virtual reality tours, in addition to being entertaining, can be informative and insightful when there’s a historical or otherwise important unseen component to complement and enhance a visit to the real deal.
Now in their infancy, virtual reality tours will become increasingly immersive, seamless and sensorial in the years ahead. As they stand, aside from their entertainment value, do they help travelers on site understand and further appreciate what they’ve come to see?
Curious about the added value of the virtual reality tours now available within actual sight of two major monuments in Paris, Notre-Dame Cathedral and the Eiffel Tower, I took a test run of their respective magic goggles on site. For Notre-Dame that meant in a subterranean zone one hundred yards in front of the cathedral. For the Eiffel Tower that meant during a stroll along the Champs de Mars, the park that leads to the tower on Paris’s Right Bank.
Eternal Notre-Dame: Amaclio Productions’ virtual reality tour of Notre-Dame Cathedral
Notre-Dame is currently inaccessible to the general public, as it has been since the fire of 2019 destroyed its roof and steeple. The cathedral is scheduled to reopen in December 2024, though under what conditions is not yet known. The virtual reality tour, reached from an underground entrance at the far end of the square in front of the cathedral, is currently programmed to end on June 30, 2024.
Following along with a handsome, well-spoken electronic guide (choose your language), the virtual reality tour of Notre-Dame leads visitors to the doors of the cathedral then inside, through various steps of the building’s medieval construction, 19th-century restoration, and current rehabilitation. It’s an extensive tour. In 45 minutes, while walking and turning in all directions, visitors get a close-up view of the structure inside and out, from various heights, while encountering works and learning about its elements in stone, glass and wood. Visitors “ride” a platform to the upper reaches of the cathedral to stand near a rose window and then higher to visit “the forest” of oak rafters and beams that form the wooden framework, those elements that burned during the fire of 2019. Details are also given about medieval Christianity and the structure’s theological underpinnings. All is made understandable to a wide public.
Altogether, this is an excellent tour that’s as visually compelling as it is informative. And complementing the virtual tour, visitors then visit at their own pace an exhibition about the current renovation and reconstruction. Objects and models along with explanatory panels and interviews in French and in English provide visitors with a clearer understanding of elements touched on during the virtual tour: recreating the wooden framework of the forest, restoring stained glass, the grand organ and the bells, replacing stone vaulting and sculptural elements, and conducting research. By the way, you can keep up with restoration work here.
The combination of the virtual reality tour and the exhibition afterwards make for an exceptional and entertaining introduction to the cathedral for those with little prior understanding of the construction and current restoration of the cathedral and is equally fascinating for those already acquainted with Our Lady of Paris. The virtual tour last 45-minutes, to which you need to add departure time and time to visit the post-tour exhibition, so count 70-90 minutes altogether.
Be sure to get a good look at the façade of Notre-Dame and a side view as well before taking the virtual reality tour. Then, after the virtual tour and exhibition, now armed with a deeper appreciation and understanding of the architectural and artistic glory of the cathedral, reconsider the actual façade and take a walk around the full perimeter of the building.
Practical considerations
There’s a cost to virtual reality tours that may be prohibitive to some. The experience at Eternal Notre-Dame costs 30€99 for adults and 20€99 for children under 17, though on certain days and times adults pay the children price, particularly off season.
Groups of up to six people set off together at the same time, with individual headsets speaking in your chosen language. Each person wears a headset and carries a backpack containing what is essentially a laptop computer while walking along the underground maze. Precise instructions and indications keep you moving and prevent you from bumping into other visitors. The glasses/headset adjust well and the tour is captivating enough that it’s easy to forget the equipment and enjoy the walk. However, the backpack is bit cumbersome, and for anyone with a bad back, carrying it for 45 minutes may be uncomfortable.
Brief pauses between scenes within the virtual universe can be momentarily confusing, but the lit path and your virtual guide will return soon enough to point you in the right direction as you walk.
The minimum recommended age is 11, though children as young as 8 may be admitted. However, given the weight of the backpack and the need to precisely follow lit directional indications so as to avoid bumping into walls and, especially, other visitors, this virtual reality tour may not be appropriate for a small and fidgety preteen. Or you can hold your child’s hand as guidance.
For further information and reservations see Eternal Notre-Dame.
Eternal Notre-Dame was produced by Amaclio Productions, a company that has developed other virtual reality and sound and light shows in France, including at the Invalides in Paris, the Cité de l’Histore at La Défense (Eternal Notre-Dame is also available at that site), Mont Saint Michel, and the Carrousel of Saumur.
Viality Tour’s Eiffel Tower virtual reality and actual walking tour
While Viality Tour’s virtual reality tour of the Eiffel Tower doesn’t have the same high production value as Amaclio’s well-financed Notre-Dame tour, what makes it worthwhile is that this tour has its iconic monument in plain view and is given by an actual human guide, and a delightful one at that.
The tour was developed by the young start-up team of Vladina Flaquière and Michel Dang. Vladina herself serves as your guide. The goggle-wearing virtual portion of the tour takes users through the construction of the Eiffel Tower from 1887 to 1889 and into the Universal Exposition of 1889 for which it was built. Much of the exposition sprawled along the Champs de Mars, the very park where you’ll be walking. The Champs de Mars formerly served as the parade grounds for the nearby Military Academy (Ecole Militaire).
Vladina herself rather than an avatar is your actual guide. Speaking French or English depending on the scheduled or private group, she explains what you see in the goggles as you stand and turn in 360 degrees. You do not walk while wearing the goggles. Instead, between virtual scenes, you then remove the goggles and approach closer and closer to the actual tower. During that time, the tour continues with the actual Eiffel Tower in view as Vladina provides further details about what you see today and answers any questions you may have. So this is both a virtual and an actual tour, lasting about 75 minutes, accompanied by your affable guide and with numerous photo ops along the way. Vladina has worked as a licensed guide at various chateaux in Brittany, the Loire Valley and Versailles, before teaming with Michel to develop Viality Tour. She continues to guide at Versailles.
If you take the tour, you may or may not meet Michel, the equally affable tech half of the team. Michel holds a masters in marketing and worked as a junior product marketing manager with Netgear before he and Vladina partnered to create Viality Tour. Michel does the computer modeling with the assistance of a graphic designer as well as the team’s communications work.
With or without actually going up in the tower, this is an excellent introduction to it. If unwilling to deal with the tickets, lines and crowded elevators, the Viality Tour—both its virtual and actual realities—can serve as your informative visit in and of itself.
If interested in the Viality Tour and also planning to go up the tower, try to sync the two by scheduling the Viality Tour so that it ends 15-30 minutes before the timed ticket you’ve purchased (well) in advance to go up. That will allow for a nice segue from one to the other while allowing you time to go through the security line at the tower. (Viality Tour will not purchase your Eiffel Tower ticket.)
The 75-minute tour costs 29€ for adults and 19€ for children 8 to 17. Children under 8 are not accepted. Groups can consist of up to 10 people.
For further information and for the tour schedule see the Viality Tour website. With sufficient advance planning, privatization for your own group may be possible upon request.
Vladina and Michel plan to extend the Viality Tour concept to other major monuments of the city over the coming years.
© 2024, Gary Lee Kraut