Paris has a worldwide reputation as the city of love, and it earns it. But if you have already done the Eiffel Tower and the candlelit dinner, the city has a great deal more to offer a couple. Here are twelve things to do together in Paris, six classic and six rather less so.

One of them is our own: the immersive escape game Batman Escape in Paris runs missions from 2 players, which makes it one of the rare group activities that genuinely works as a date.

Six romantic places to visit in Paris

Short on ideas for Valentine's Day, an anniversary, or simply a weekend together? Start here.

Climb the Eiffel Tower together

If you are visiting Paris, the Iron Lady is unavoidable, and there is more than one way to see her. Built for the 1889 World's Fair to mark the centenary of the French Revolution, she rewards the effort of the stairs.

Take the steps to the first two floors and read up on the engineering as you go, then use the lift for the third floor and the view from the top. Book online: the queue is the only unromantic part of the experience.

Say it on the Pont des Arts

The Pont des Arts has been a listed monument since 1975. Crossing the Seine in the centre of Paris, it offers one of the best views of the riverbanks, and it is better still at night.

The bridge once carried up to 45 tonnes of love padlocks, left by couples from Paris and everywhere else. They were all removed in 2015 and the railings replaced with glass panels to protect the structure.

Couples still come for the view, and proposals still happen there. The padlocks are gone, the reason people came is not.

The Wall of I Love You in Montmartre

Less famous than the Pont des Arts, the Mur des Je t'aime is a genuine monument to love: a wall in the small garden of Square Jehan Rictus, in Montmartre.

It carries the phrase written in 250 languages across more than 40 m² of enamelled lava tiles. Free, open every day, at Place des Abbesses. Ten minutes well spent on a walk through the neighbourhood.

A date in Montmartre

Montmartre may be the most charming quarter in Paris, and it holds up whether you are a first-time visitor heading for the Sacré-Cœur or a Parisian who thinks they know it.

Tea rooms and small bistros do most of the work, but the gardens are the reason to linger:

• Parc de la Turlure, quiet and almost always empty
• Square Louise Michel, below the basilica
• Jardin Sauvage Saint-Vincent, open only on certain days and worth timing

Walk the Champs-Élysées

An obvious choice, and none the worse for it. The avenue now leaves considerable space to pedestrians, and it puts the Arc de Triomphe, the theatres and a long line of cafés within a single walk.

Go in the early evening rather than at midday, when the crowds thin and the light does the work for you.

The Château de Versailles and its gardens

Versailles is unavoidable for anyone who loves history, but it is the gardens that make it worth doing as a couple. They are large enough to lose an afternoon in, and far enough from the palace that you will often have a corner to yourselves.

Proposals happen there too, which tells you most of what you need to know.

Six less obvious things to do together

Paris is not only the Louvre, the Arc de Triomphe and the Sacré-Cœur. Once the landmarks are done, this is where the city gets interesting.

See Paris from a balloon

The tethered balloon in the Parc André Citroën lifts you above the city for a few minutes. Short, yes, but the view is genuinely remarkable and the tickets are inexpensive.

It doubles as an air quality monitor for the city, and on a clear day it climbs to around 300 metres. An easy way to surprise someone without planning an expedition.

A boat on the Seine

Take a river cruise, or hire a small boat and run your own. Depending on the route you will be on the water between an hour and a half and three hours, which is long enough to see the city change as the light goes.

It is the one activity where doing nothing together is the point.

Notre-Dame in virtual reality

For a different angle on the cathedral, the VR experience takes you through its history and lets you meet the figures who shaped it. A good option when the weather rules out walking.

Play an escape game as a couple

This is our favourite of the twelve, and not only because we run one. An escape game is the rare activity where you have to cooperate to succeed, which makes it a genuine test of how well you work together, wrapped in a story.

Batman Escape runs three missions in 3,000 m² of sets under official DC Comics licence, with live actors in every session. Two of them play from 2 people, so you are not padding out a team with strangers. We have written a fuller guide to playing an escape game for two in Paris if you want the detail.

Dinner somewhere that is not just a restaurant

Paris does intimate dinners better than anywhere, but it also does something more unusual: immersive restaurants, where the room is part of the meal. Underwater, in space, in a 1925 Orient Express carriage.

We have listed the best of them in our guide to immersive restaurants in Paris, which pairs well with any of the activities above.

A long, slow brunch

Whether you want all-you-can-eat or something more refined, Sunday brunch is a Parisian institution and there is no shortage of addresses. Les Jardins du Faubourg, Les Triplettes de Belleville, The Hood, Le Café Aristide, Le Potager de Charlotte and Solis are all reliable starting points.

If you would rather something more relaxed, the Gotham City lounge bar is open whether or not you are playing, and it also handles birthdays and celebrations if the date happens to be one.