Our last day in Paris has arrived :( I cant believe how quickly this week went by!!!
It is pretty humid here in Paris, even though the weather in August is in the 70’s-80’s. The temperatures are not hot, but it is humid which makes it feel a little hotter than it really is and of course, makes you sticky and sweaty everywhere you go. Almost every day we’ve been here there has been little drizzly rainstorms, nothing heavy, more like a misting from the sky, and we have been glad that we brought our umbrellas. Last night, around 4:00am, we had a serious thunderstorm. There was super loud, booming thunder that woke us both up, and then it hailed really hard and the sound of the hail on the street and the buildings sounded like it was raining golf balls. We’ve been sleeping with our window open every night and the sounds of the street life below have been good for sleep background noise, so the sound of the rain, hail and thunder was a nice treat. But, the heavy rains made it super humid today and it felt like the hottest day yet, even though it is pretty cool outside. It is so weird how that happens.
Anyway, today was a great day! We started the day on time (hooray!) and Stanley visited the market down the street while I was showering and came back to the room with some delicious bread, cheese, meat, cookies, waters, butter… everything to have a delicious breakfast in the room before we walked up to the catacombs. The catacombs opened at 10:00am this morning and when we got there a short line had formed, but nothing terrible. We waited maybe 15 minutes to get in and then we were on our underground adventure. This place was WAY cool!!! It is definitely one of my favorite places visited on this trip and is on my list of “Must Do’s” for anyone visiting Paris. It is a 1.75km walk, underground, in the catacombs of Paris. Paris has miles and miles of catacombs beneath the city, most of which are off limits and closed to the public, but you can tour this one section for a small fee of 7,50 Euro per person… totally worth it!!! After paying your entrance fee, you walk down a spiral staircase of about 190 steps and then follow a narrow and rocky pathway tunnel with low ceilings through the mazes below. The area is dimly lit by lights hanging off the sides of the tunnels every 50 feet or so. It is very dark, very moist and very creepy. Along the way are some areas that have sculptures carved into the rocks (we’re not sure how long ago or why) and after a long while of following the mazes, you finally reach a doorway that tells you that you are entering the “Kingdom of Death” (and not to take flash photography to honor the solace of this place). Oooooooooohhhh!!!! Now, Stanley and I were both expecting to see “some” bones here and there, maybe a shrine or two, but what we experienced was nothing at all of the sort. For the next 20 minutes or so of walking, all, and I mean ALL as in EVERY wall in the catacombs (both the tunnels we were walking in and the ones that you could see that branched off in all directions), were filled and covered from floor to ceiling with the bones and skulls of thousands of Parisians from the 1700’s and 1800’s that were moved there from several cemeteries due to some kind of unsanitary problem they were having back then. So basically, during the nights, they dug up the bones of all the graves in each of these cemeteries, and then moved them, by wheelbarrow to these catacombs and placed them along the walls of the tunnels. It was amazing and even though we weren’t allowed to use flash on our cameras, a lot of the pictures turned out great thanks to Stanley having a mini flashlight on his key ring. Way to go Stanley!!! When we were leaving the catacombs, they made us show them the insides of our bags because apparently people steal skulls and bones from the catacombs, can you believe that!?! Stealing dead body parts from the tunnels beneath Paris… some people are just too unbelievable. When we were leaving, there were three skulls on the table by the exit and he told us those were found in people’s bags as they were leaving. Wow is all I can say about that! Anyway, come to Paris and visit the catacombs – it is really one of the coolest things we’ve seen here.
Afterward we walked back to the room to wash up and check on Stanley’s head… he ran into the ceiling while we were down below and scraped it up a little, one of the disadvantages of being tall in small spaces. He’s ok though, just a flesh wound! Then we walked down to the metro and caught the line all the way across town to the Red Light district to see the Sacred Heart Cathedral. This place is last on my list of places to visit in Paris, in fact, I would say to just skip it all together and not even bother coming to this area of Paris at all. I hated it here and I hated it from the moment we stepped out of the metro and started making our way up to the streets. This area is much dirtier than the other areas of Paris we’ve visited. When we were trying to leave the metro, there was a horde of African Immigrants who swarmed the people trying to leave the metro by pushing them aside so they could enter the metro through the exit booths so they didn’t have to pay. There had have been at least 50-60 people who were pushing their way into the metro; women with strollers that didn’t really fit through the exit doors, with babies strapped to their backs, and men and children, all mobbing the people trying to exit so they could get in. It was a crazy and dangerous situation, one which Stanley and I had enough sense to just stand aside and wait until it was over. Up to the street, all around the metro exit were more African Immigrants who were trying to sell food and souvenirs to the people who were coming up out of the metro. After we got away from all of this, we walked through a crappy neighborhood to the top of the hill to where the church was. It was super crowded up there and there were people sitting and lounging about in every direction. Once nice thing about this area is the view of the city. The church on the outside is impressive, but not all that old, only late 1800’s (our Cathedral of the Madeline in Salt Lake is older than this church) and the inside was very plain, no photography allowed, so I couldn’t take any pictures. We both felt the same way about this church so we didn’t spend much time there and decided to head onward to the Opera District to see the famous Opera House. I will be glad if I never have to visit this area of Paris again.
We arrived at the Opera House and the metro stop is just outside, the initial site of this building is amazing. It is very fancy from the outside with large golden sculptures on the roof and around the gateways. Inside is even more amazing and it is definitely one of my favorite places visited on this trip. I imagined us getting all dressed up to attend a show here and wished that we would be in Paris long enough to experience it (although I’m sure it’s $pendy!!!). The grand staircase was gorgeous with all the marble and statues and lighting, and the grand foyer… all I can say is WOW!!! Chandeliers, mirrors, gold, marble… it was breathtaking! Oh, and this opera house was the inspiration for Phantom of the Opera by the way. Definitely a must see when in Paris.
Stanley read in our Paris book that there is a Harry’s Bar (Hemingway’s favorite hangout in Venice and apparently in Paris as well) down the street from the Opera House, so we walked down there hoping for a drink and maybe some lunch. Unfortunately it was closed and didn’t open until dinner, so we were bummed about that, but we took a picture to commemorate the moment ☺ From here we traveled across town again to see the Picasso Museum and we were both disappointed with the exhibit. They would not let us take photos, and the museum did not hold any of the famous pieces. Picasso’s work is pretty strange to begin with and a lot of the works here were ultra strange. There were paintings, sculptures, drawings, etc. It was cool to see some his works that we didn’t know about, but it would have been really nice to see some that we did know about. Oh well.
Tonight we’re going to enjoy a nice dinner at a place down the street that the man at the hotel lobby recommended to us, then we’ll go to bed early so we can be awake and alert tomorrow morning for our train ride back to the airport. Our flight is at 10:30am tomorrow but we’ll need to make time for the train ride back to the airport and leave enough time to get checked in. We have a direct flight from Paris to Salt Lake and we get home in the early afternoon, which will be really nice!!! What a great trip this has been!!! I absolutely love traveling with Stanley and we had such a nice time on this trip. There was only one moment where I got upset about something (I can’t even remember what it was about now, and Stanley just smiled at me, gave me a hug and said “Hey, you’re not permitted to be angry at me in Paris!” It instantly made me smile and that is how our trip has been… just happy, joyful, fun, exciting, and full of adventure. I really am the luckiest to be able to have such an amazing travel partner to experience all these wonderful vacations with! I’m already looking forward to our next adventure together. – Michele
Stanley here…
As I write this, a MAJOR thunderstorm is roiling over south (Left Bank) Paris where we are in the Montparnasse neighborhood. In fact, a very loud thunderous lightning bolt just landed nearby (no delay between the flash and the sound), though we can’t see where. I had no idea the Paris had anything but mildish weather events, situated as it is well inland along a slow-moving river on a rolling Continental Atlantic plain. Wow.
Catacombes…
I have to second what Michele said about the ‘Catacombes’. This place was eerie and very mysterious. During the Nazi occupation of N. France (and Paris) during WWII, the French Resistance (often called the Underground) set up its clandestine headquarters in the Catacombes where no one thought to or dared to look for them. The Nazis thought they were based outside of Paris and few people ventured down to this ‘Kingdom the Dead’. All the while Le Pen and his compadres were laughing it up, safe right under this Left Bank neighborhood and plotting their guerilla war against the hated occupying Germans. Vive La France!!
Sacred Heart…
The Sacre Couer (Sacred Heart of Jesus) church/basilica offers excellent views of Central Paris but is located in a bit of a rough neighborhood quite outside of Central Paris. Two businessmen funded its construction after France’s (and Paris’s ) survival of a Prussian siege during the Franco-Prussian War of the 1870s. Yawn. I know. But this church doesn’t have the history or long-standing icon-status that other churches have in Paris (Notre-Dame, Sainte Chappelle, Dome Church, The Pantheon & etc.). Nice view though. Interesting architecture, a blend of Roman and Byzantine styles. I bought a metal model of the Eiffel Tower from a street vender for 5 Euro. (He started with a price of 25 Euro! Ha, that’ll teach him to try and sell ME stuff). A visit to Paris could safely avoid this place unless you SIMPLY HAVE to see the Moulin Rouge and if you do then you have to come up to this part of town anyway (Montmartre aka Red Light District) so you might as well see the Sacred Heart Church.
The Opera…
I wasn’t too enthused about seeing this one until we got there. Amazing, gorgeous. It would be worth a return trip just to see a show or concert here. Total old-world gilded glory and class that we Norte-Americanos are constantly striving (and failing) to build.
Picasso…
I’ve never been a big Picasso fan and I am still not. I felt obligated to drag M over to this shabby museum full of greasy beatniks because I am to teach “All the Major European Artists” as part of my Advanced Placement European History course next year. ‘What the hell?’ I thought, yeah, what the hell? – is right. Give me the Renaissance Masters or RODIN or the WHOLE CONTENT OF THE ORSAY over these Modern ‘Art’-Postmodern (I’d say Post-mortem) ‘Art’ cubist hacks. Please. That said, I shall try to be open-minded and teach the subject objectively (is that possible? … subjects taught objectively?). Just thinking about it makes my soul hurt.
Overall Assessment…
Paris is well worth the visit and though M and I are a bit hyperactive do-everything travelers, it is best to plan at least 4-5 days here to do it all justice (and that’s JUST Paris/Versailles mind you). A day or two is only enough to begin to scratch the surface (like our ONE DAY BLITZ of Rome last summer), it will leave you wanting more time. We felt that over this last week, we’ve really gotten to see much/most of what Paris has to offer to visitors. Also, I have to say that I couldn’t ask for a better traveling companion than my wife, Michele. She is adventuresome, funny and easy-going (even with feet covered in blisters, roasting hot or at the end of a whole day’s worth of walking and being on foot). What a fun trip this has been ☺
~SEA
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