220 torchbearers carried the Torch, from Thierry Henry at the start on the Avenue des Champs-Elysées to Yannick Noah, who lit the cauldron in front of the Hôtel de Ville. The show was exceptional with the Concert de Paris, accompanied by the Radio France Orchestra, and fireworks from the Eiffel Tower. In a few days' time, France will enjoy the great experience of hosting the Olympic Games after a wait of 100 years. 

At the heart of the Bastille Day celebrations, the Olympic Torch appeared in the presence of Anne Hidalgo, Mayor of Paris, and Tony Estanguet, Chairman of the Paris 2024 Organising Committee. Escorted by the horsemen of the Cadre Noir de Saumur regiment, the Torch was proudly carried by Colonel Thibault Vallette, gold medallist at the Rio 2016 Games. This was followed by a series of sequences on the theme of the Olympic values. 

After this prelude, the Torch was taken to the famous Champs-Élysées, where it was awaited by football legend and coach of the French U-23 Olympic football team, Thierry Henry, who took the it out of its Louis Vuitton-designed case to start the day's relay. The first 'torch kiss' took place with Romane Dicko, an Olympic champion in judo who is preparing for the Paris 2024 Games. 

The Olympic Torch lit up the iconic sites of the French capital, along with a whole host of entertainment organised by the City of Paris. It then went to the Petit Palais Museum, where four opera singers (the D.I.V.A) performed famous opera arias, before being taken to the political institutions: the Senate, the Jardin du Luxembourg park and the Assemblée Nationale, the site of the French Parliament. 

It lit up two Olympic cultural projects: the Venus statues by Laurent Perbos and a performance by 30 dancers of the Théâtre du Corps choreographed by Marie-Claude Pietragalla and Julien Derouault. The Torch went to the Panthéon for an artistic performance by Yohann Bourgeois, to Saint-Germain-des-Prés for a jazz concert by Thomas Curbillon, and to the hotspots of Parisian student life - Sorbonne University and Saint Geneviève Library. 

The Relay passed through the Andalusian garden of the Grand Mosque of Paris, before heading to Notre Dame Cathedral, where the Paris Fire Brigade put on an artistic display. It also visited the forecourt of the Institute of the Arab World, where a collective work by Zepha was exhibited, and a tribute was paid in front of the Mémorial de la Shoah. In the Marais, it crossed the legendary Place des Vosges and stopped in front of Victor Hugo's house. 

It then went to the Place de la Bastille, where the crowd enjoyed a dance performance auspiced by the Cultural Olympiad: 200 amateur dancers from the Paris Opera were joined by stars Dorothée Gilbert and Hugo Marchand, as well as 32 swans from Nureyev’s interpretation of the Swan Lake ballet. A tribute to the victims of the 13 November 2015 attacks was held in front of the Bataclan, where Republican Guard cellist Arthur Lamarre performed. 

The Relay then moved on to the Place du Colonel Fabien, where it pulsated to the beats of DJ Cargo, the Rue des Martyrs, the Opéra Garnier, the Place Vendôme and finally the Louvre, which welcomes more than seven million visitors every year. After the concert, the former tennis icon Yannick Noah lit the cauldron for a moment of sharing with the Parisian public. The City of Paris fireworks display from the Eiffel Tower rounded off the day in style. 

An extraordinary day called for extraordinary Torchbearers. 220 people carried the Olympic Torch, including basketball player Nicolas Batum, fencer Enzo Leffort, boxers Brahim Asloum and Mark Traoré, athletes Valérie Frehaut and Sasha Zhoya, and former skier Sandra Laoura. Para athletes such as Tanguy de la Forest (para-shooting), Frédéric Pasquier (wheelchair handball) and Luca Platania Parisi (para-fencing) were also present. 

The day was also marked by the presence of celebrities, such as Claudie Haigneré, the first European woman in space, the multi-award winning pianist Lang Lang, the actor and slam artist Souleymane Diamanka, Pierre Garnier, the winner of Star Academy, a musical tele-reality show, and Rayane Hechmi, winner of 'La France a un incroyable talent' (the Gallic version of Britain's Got Talent), as well as Jin, a K-pop icon and member of the band BTS. 

Claudie Haigneré, the first European woman in space, carried the Olympic Torch, as did a former Miss France Sylvie Tellier, who is also a founding member of 'Les Bonnes Fées', a charity set up by former winners of the French beauty pageant. 

Among the Torchbearers were inspiring people such as Lucia Teixeira, a caretaker who fled fascism in her youth; Micheline Abergel, who founded the Toi Femmes to raise awareness of violence against women; Lassana Bathily, the hero of the Hyper Cacher hostage crisis; Léon Placek, one of the last living witnesses to the tragedy of the Drancy internment camp; and Jean Turco, a former politician and the oldest Torchbearer of the day (106).

Coca-Cola, a sponsor of the Olympic Torch Relay, also organised a Team Relay in PSG colours. 22 employees of the Parisian football club ran alongside two of the club's former stars, captain Blaise Matuidi and Laura Georges. At the end of a very exciting day, the lantern in which the Olympic flame is carefully guarded was taken to spend the night in the Saint Jean room of the Hôtel de Ville.