They say that the best time to visit Paris is in the spring. August, however, has one huge advantage: the French have largely vacated the city. As a tourist, it is a great pleasure to explore city streets that are half deserted, even if it is often hard to find restaurants that are open. Even the longtime French obsession with smoking is diminishing. An increasing number of Paris restaurants have non-smoking sections, and there are even a handful of completely non-smoking restaurants, mostly in tourist locations such as museums. The majority, however, remain all smoking, and if you ask for non-smoking they sit you next to someone who is not actually smoking at the moment.
