If you are going to Paris soon, pay a visit to Science City
http://www.cite-sciences.fr/francais/indexFLASH.htm
Apart from an interesting Titanic artefacts exhibition, there is also an aeronautics and space section. Of particular interest is a flight simulator. This is as real as it gets. You sit inside a real cockpit of a TB9 Socata Tampico with your instrucor infront of a huge screen and you actually fly the airplane with real controls. Caution - you have an audience behind you who are listening to your conversation and watching your every move. The instructor can select a variety of scenes from VFR to extreme IMC with lightening.
What's more ITS FREE! (Included in the entry ticket) and when I went last Monday I spent a full 30 minutes and did 4 circuits.