Feel French and fancy without ever actually flying to Paris
It’s a hard life for our junior reporters. A new luxury landmark hotel opened in Macau, so our JRs packed their overnight bags and checked in to the Parisian for a weekend to check it out
The hotel’s Eiffel Tower looked stunning when it was all lit up. Have you ever wanted to see the Eiffel Tower in Paris? Of course you have, but who’s got the time between studying and hanging out with friends to travel halfway across the world to see it? The Parisian Macao Hotel promises a very similar experience though, is only an hour away from Hong Kong, and is much cheaper to get to.
Fine living and fine dining
Checking in
The check-in lobby is grand and one of the most decorated areas of the hotel. The luxurious furniture is inspired by the over-the-top lifestyles of Louis XIV (who ruled as King of France between 1643–1715) and Louis XVI (1774–1791), to a replica of the famous painting The Coronation of Napoleon, every single detail about the lobby helps transport visitors to an era when the French royalty was at its peak.
We had more than 20 minutes to appreciate all the art and attention to detail – the check-in assistant wasn’t very used to the check-in process yet. This is understandable, as the hotel opened very recently and the staff may not have enough experience yet.
The room
The impressive rooms only add to the truly immersive French experience that the hotel is trying to create for its guests. Every room or suite has an elegant, retro style poster of the Eiffel Tower, one of the landmarks of Paris. Even the wallpaper is French-themed, and is patterned with a street map of Paris.
Since the 1:2 scale Eiffel Tower has always been advertised as the main attraction of the Parisian hotel, we eagerly opened our curtains in the hopes of getting a glimpse of it. To our disappointment, the view from our room was of a construction site, and a couple of other hotels. We later found out that not all of the guestrooms overlook the much lauded tower – in fact you can only see it from a third of the hotel rooms. Keep this in mind when you book a room here if this is something you particularly want.
Even though we went for a non-smoking room, the smell of tobacco still lingered in the air despite the hotel’s best efforts to mask it with air purifiers, so we opted to move rooms.
Dining at Lotus Palace
Lotus Palace, one of the signature restaurants at the hotel, completely blew us away. The traditional Chinese dishes contrast with the modern setting and is a perfect mash-up of Eastern and Western culture. This restaurant is an ideal place to take a break when you’re resting your feet after a huge shopping spree or when you want an escape from the non-stop pace of a city that never sleeps.
Veronica Lin
Oh! The things we can do
Aqua World
We took advantage of the sunny weather and went to Aqua World – a small water park situated inside the Parisian hotel.
The first thing that we noticed was the huge ship in the middle of the park. The ship is designed to look as Jules Verne-esque as possible (like a sci-fi airship), and it was equipped with water guns, tipping buckets, web crawl tunnels and other nautical features. Within moments of boarding the ship, we were completely soaked. We went up a tower that had two tunnel slides and took turns sliding down it. The slides weren’t exceptionally fast – and were the perfect speed for a child. Aqua World was smaller than I had been expecting and I felt like I had done all that could be done after a short while, but the sounds of children laughing could be heard all through the evening. On weekdays the entry fee to Aqua World is HK$160. On weekends, public holidays and summer holidays the entry fee is HK$180.
Guest staying at the Parisian or another Sands China Ltd. property can enjoy a 10% discount.
Going up to the Eiffel Tower
The highlight of our tour was going up to the Eiffel Tower to admire the skyline of Macau. The sheer size of the tower took my breath away – even though this replica is only half the size of the original in France, it still feels very real. At the very top of the tower on the 37th floor there is an observation deck where we could see the whole Cotai Strip. It felt as if we were on top of the world. On weekdays, it costs HK$168 to go to the observation decks on the 7th floor and the 37th floor. On weekends the cost goes up to HK$188.
At night we were treated to another Eiffel delight. The tower lit up with rainbow coloured lights and it was amazing to see. I believe that the Eiffel Tower in the Parisian is set to be one of Macau’s must-see landmarks – and will definitely be an ideal backdrop for visitors when taking photos.
Christy Cheung