@suepj Thanks, the hotel has a car park. I sent an email to reserve a spot just in case.
@Griffin36 Thanks. The TollTickets site says that the device could arrive as late as the 28th since we’re not in Germany. Any experience as to whether it really takes that long?
@_Brian Thanks, that looks straightforward and we have enough time for the sticker to arrive.
Really, really don’t drive in Paris. It’s a honking, horrible experience if you are not accustomed to it. And parking is awful. La Defence is on line 1 (yellow) and will get you in and out of Paris faster than you can drive. It’s the main tourist used line so is pretty clean and reliable. And even faster is RER A, but slightly grubbier.
You can get 3 day passes but remember you will need zone 2
I never got mine delivered, I picked mine up at the Stop24 harbour shop at Folkestone Services on one of my trips over, I stopped using them and went with bip & go when I became resident in France, they were delivered to my house here and didn’t take long, bip & go have been excellent.
Agreed. And there’s a reason why most people in Paris drive old cars. If your car isn’t already missing a wing mirror or riddled with dents, it will be after driving in Paris for a few days!
Me, I’d never drive in Paris. 
I hate driving in general.
My husband on the other hand? Paris, Rome, Athens, Chicago, New York, LA, any big city, no problem and no fear. 
Right-side or left-side driving, he’s a pro.
We’re taking the car instead of TGV for a few reasons: faster to get out to Versailles for the “early” morning fountains with music, and the ability to stop wherever we want for food and shopping along the way. A boot full of French wine is a nice way to end a vacation. 
We’re suggesting leaving the car at the hotel and use the metro/RER for travel in the city.
i learnt to drive at Marble Arch in London, and am still happier driving in cities than wiggly mountain road. So London, Rome, Madrid, Athens - no problem. But Paris is not driving but spending time being frustrated sitting in jams or being sworn at by people who have just side swiped your wing mirror. And spending time you could be in a museum looking for a parking spot.
Leave the car at the hotel and enjoy yourselves. Also means you can h e a nice drink in nice bars.
Take the RER to Versailles!
I don’t think you fully understand the two biggest problems of driving in central Paris.
Firstly, it’s not potentially dangerous, like say Jo’burg, where you have a combination of fast insane driving, thousands of badly maintained vehicles and hijacking potential if you stop at a red light. No, central Paris is actually the reverse, traffic is so congested and moves so slowly that it can take forever to cover even very short distances as gridlocks can occur at every intersection.
Secondly even if you get to your destination, it’s unlikely that you’ll easily find anywhere to park!
Instead, use the metro and RER, but don’t forget that Paris is comparatively small compared to London, and it’s a great city for walking around.
That may be because this isn’t primarily a site for offering advice on tourism - rather opinions on living in France. You may be better off checking the forums on something like TripAdvisor…
True, but TripAdvisor is full of tourists who do touristy stuff, and bots making fake recommendations.
SF is full of people who live in France (or spend a lot of time there) and who can hopefully offer a different perspective. So far, I’m finding the posts here more useful than TA. 
The other must do in Paris is the markets. Rue Cler holds No 1 spot on the tourist trail, and it is still quite special despite the tourists. But arm yourself with the list of markets and the days they operate and as you wander the street of Paris (hopefully on foot!) make sure you try to go via some of them.
We used to live in the 19e so love the Place des Fêtes market, which is less upmarket. Take a turn around Buttes Chaumont (the parc) and then on to the market where you can watch women (it is always women) stretching pastry for galettes which is fun. And then carry on to place Jourdain (where metro is) for great patisserie and next 140 bakery then divert to rue Villete with cafés of all types, then back onto rueBelleville right down to the chinese/vietnamese area and stop for Phõ.
And Rose of Tunis, oriental patisserie on belleville also (there is another posher one in the 15e on rue cabourne)
But really just about any market is fun.
The biggest issue is deciding how many of the great bits of Paris you can cram onto your time available. Not a bad problem to have
Me too. But super collision damage waiver is your friend🤭 Driving your own pride and joy amongst motoring savages, as I did only last December around l’Étoile is another matter.
Also don’t be surprised if your car is 'moved’when parked, by other people trying to make a half-car gap into a full-car gap, so they can park.
It’s not uncommon to come back and find you literally can’t get your car out ( and it may be in a different place). Without, possibly, participating in similar sorts of moving other cars, yourself, to get your car out.
I used to drive in Paris and it was OK if you planned your route and timing carefully. But like London, over the years the city government blocked off nice shortcuts and made useful streets only one-way. And generally deliberately made the city impassable for motorists (Ms Hidalgo Mayor of Paris is particularly militant).
Plus the worst, too many quiet routes and discreet options got found…on Google.
I wouldn’t drive in Paris now because I’m not a nutter. They’re even beginning to make it hard for motorbikes now.
Though if you really must, a well-planned tour route in a car round the most famous monuments was fabulous at 01.00am and can be done in 25-45mins easy, they’re all lit up and beautiful and the big avenues will be relatively, practically empty.
None of my family who live in central Paris bother with a car, more of a nuisance than anything else. They keep their cars in the country, those that have one. Otherwise if they need a car they rent one.
Paris - is any of it not touristy? (st Denis…)
I didn’t think of the following things as particularly touristy when I was there - except Latin quarter.
Across the river from the Marais is the latin quarter - and down the road is the institute monde arabique.
The Sorbonne and the Pantheon (maybe that’s touristy?)
Then the St Sulpice church, maybe also St Germain church, Jardin du Luxembourg, and over to Tour Montparnasse for a film (haha, the views). - perhaps via Sevres-Babylon with its nice square? Walk up Rue de Sevres - I recall restaurants in the small street.
I see the catacombs are near Montparnasse - never done that (yet).
Major tourist destination for the Basilica and tombs of past Kings.
The Institut du Monde Arabe has a great restaurant & tea room, well worth going to only it’s Ramadan right now so possibly not the best time, they close before Iftar.
Ah, for a moment I though I was having a Blondie moment … it has the Stade de France, well known tourist spot for Liverpudlians? (and Madrileños).
It is (was) the place I was thinking of, however seems levelled up now,
No doubt adopting policy from our esteemed UK crim leader temporarily expunged to the Truss deserts.
So many places in France, so many in Paris, does feel time to schedule an extended Paris revisit 