This weekend is the 20th edition of the Nuit Blanche. Organized on the first Saturday of October since 2002, by the city of Paris, this opus will be no exception to the rule. From 7 p.m., this Saturday, October 2, nearly 200 cultural events will take place in Paris and all around the capital.
A sports edition
This edition is an opportunity for the organizers to prepare for the 2024 Olympic Games since it will be placed under the sign of sport. The GR75, the Grande Randonnée trail created in 2017 for the Paris 2024 application and which allows you to tour the capital on foot while connecting it to 13 neighboring towns, will be heavily used.
The flagship event, the Audax, is a complete loop of the GR75, i.e. 50 km, at a sustained pace (6 km / hour). Organized by the Paris committee of the French Hiking Federation, this represents a real physical challenge.
Mythical places to contribute
Fortunately, no need to have the training of Yohann Diniz to take advantage of the White Night 2021. Since the courses, much shorter and fun have been designed to allow participants to walk by rediscovering the historical infrastructures of the Olympic Games of 1924 which will host the events of this edition of the Nuit Blanche.
The “North” route: Porte d’Aubervilliers – Porte des Lilas
This course of nearly 6 km will take visitors from the Linear Forest, an ecological reserve along the ring road, to the Georges-Vallerey Olympic swimming pool via the Saint-Denis canal, the Villette park, the Porte de Pantin, the Butte-du-Chapeau-Rouge park to get to the swimming pool. There, DJ Barbara Butch will host a “Pool party” where everyone can come in swimsuits with the participation of the French artistic swimming team.
The “East” route: Porte de Vincennes – Grands Moulins
Almost 9 km long, this route will take participants through the Porte Dorée in the 12th arrondissement before crossing the Bois de Vincennes and then heading towards the Jacques-Anquetil velodrome, which will host the 2024 Olympic Games. stage Mohamed El Khatib and the musician Alban de la Simone will offer a performance, while the members of the Vélo-Club des Vétérans Parisiens will offer spectators a demonstration of their unaltered talents. The route then continues through the Léo-Lagrange sports center (12th arrondissement), the Bercy park, and the esplanade of the National Library of France, and ends at the old flour mill in Paris, Les Grands Moulins. The most motivated can sign up for the Robin Decourcy’s walk, which offers to do the 8.7 km in Trek Dance, a participatory artistic walk, which combines strong rhythm and dance on the course (reservation required).
The “Center” course
The start of this “100% Intra-muros” route will take place in front of the Town Hall where the choreographer Mourad Merzouki has imagined a choreographic walk, broadcast on giant screens in front of eight district town halls and five municipalities of Greater Paris, for everyone passers-by, who will then be able to watch a performance by the French breakdance team, a new Olympic discipline. The route will take visitors to discover artistic projects throughout the capital, passing by the banks of the Seine, the Museum of Modern Art, the Quai Branly Museum, the Jeu de Paume, the Canopée des Halles and the Centre Pompidou.
The “West” route
The shortest of the four. It will extend over nearly 4.5 km to join Balard at Porte d’Auteuil, along the GR75. He will pass by the André-Citroën park, the Garigliano bridge, to stop for a bit at the Trinquet Village (16th district), the Mecca of Basque pelota in Paris. Walkers will find a little disco flavor there with a Roller dance party. After this musical interlude, the route will fly to the Parc des Princes and the Jean-Bouin stadium, before ending in the Jardin des Serres d’Auteuil.
Take part in an urban hike in Greater Paris for Nuit Blanche https://t.co/2tZN3Q98W5 pic.twitter.com/oh4gJ7caDc
– Enlarge your Paris (@EYParis) September 29, 2021
Other initiatives offer walks for this special evening. Enlarge your Paris, for example, in partnership with the Métropole du Grand Paris, offers four urban hikes departing from Paris to discover the banks of the Marne in Alfortville, the Saint-Cucufa wood in Rueil, the Stalingrad city in Malakoff or the wasteland Cultural Kilowatt in Vitry.