France- smoking
 

Is smoking allowed in public places, such as restaurants; museums;shops;theaters,atc?
Thanks

melissa

It seems like it's encouraged. The French are professional smokers. Really though, museums, shops are smoke free.

Definitely in restaurants, it's prohibited in every museum & most shops I saw (presumably for the protection of the exhibits/merchandise, not you). Not sure about theatres. But they definitely love to smoke.

No smoking in museums and shops. Restuarants usually have no-smoking sections but in many they are small areas and adjacent to smokers so you really need to be careful about this if you are smoke-sensitive.

Smoking in France is actually down (we have family in Paris and none of our relatives smoke) but it is still pretty common. If you want to visit France you just kind of have to "work around the smokers", sometimes going to eat at "off hours" is a help as there are less people in the restuarants. Sitting outside to eat is not usually helpful because of smoke.

I was in Paris last week and I saw the expansion of a sandwich spot next to the St.G de Pres and across the street from the Hotel Madison to a self serve sit down and on many of the tables there were signs to Consider the health and comfort of others and it was a no smoking place. Quite unusual for France and certainly a sign of the times.

The restaurant smoke would be noticeable to us usually. But now that I think back, I don't recall being bothered by it during our March visit. Obviously people are smoking less nowadays.