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Paris – Highs and Lows

As with any place that millions of people visit every year, you can expect to wait in line at most attractions in Paris.  Even in the lower season, this has been the case.  To try to improve our odds of seeing the highlights with the fewest people possible, we usually apply our Disney rules: get there early, head straight for the main attraction, circle back later for what we missed.  This has worked out great for the most part, having won us one-on-one time with the Mona Lisa and Versailles’ Hall of Mirrors, among other things.  There were 3 places, however, where the wait caught us.  We spent over an hour each waiting on the Catacombs, the Eiffel Tower, and Sainte-Chapelle.  They were all worth the wait, and even made some of our “tops” lists (Anna really liked the tower, and Sainte-Chapelle was K’s fav church), but if you ever plan to make this trip yourself, make sure you have some water and a pastry or two to help pass the time while you wait.

THE CATACOMBS

Our “lowest” day was when we decided to embrace our darker sides and explore the Catacombs.  Paris is a beautiful city, full of amazing stone buildings.  A conveniently close natural resource is the huge amount of limestone 70 feet below the city.  Hundreds of miles of tunnels were created as they quarried the stone.  At some point, demand for land got high enough that they needed to generate more supply.  Someone noticed all of that prime land being wasted as cemeteries, so they exhumed the bodies and placed the bones in the tunnels.  About 6 million skeletons made their way down, unfortunately marked only by the name of the cemetery that they formerly occupied.  You can only walk about a mile due to the instability of some of the tunnels, and I think the bones in this area were arranged much more carefully than elsewhere (for the tourist $’s), but it is still quite a sight.

A big 'ol pile of them bones

A big ‘ol pile of them bones

SAINTE-CHAPELLE
It’s easy to get a spiritual high in a place like Sainte-Chapelle.  It is pretty small, compared to most other churches in Paris, but King Louis IX went all-out with the stained glass.  The chapel was built near the palace (all of these palaces have their own church on-site… guilty consciences?) in order to store the holy relics the king bought.  These included pieces of the Cross of Christ, pieces of the Holy Lance that pierced Jesus’s side, and the Crown of Thorns (now on display at Notre Dame).  The stories depicted in the stained-glass recount several significant events in the Bible.  The king went ahead and chronicled himself in the stories as well, highlighting his role in the receipt and transfer of the relics to Sainte-Chapelle.
Grins in Sainte-Chapelle

Grins in Sainte-Chapelle

The reliquary at Sainte-Chapelle

The reliquary at Sainte-Chapelle

THE EIFFEL TOWER
Easily our highest point in Paris was when the kids, Pa and I went to the top of the Eiffel Tower.  It won the “competition” for an entrance piece for the 1889 World’s Fair – competition requirements being a 300 meter, 4-sided metal tower in the location that Eiffel designed it for 5 years earlier.  Like virtually all things new (the glass pyramids of the Louvre, the art nouveau Metro entrances, etc.), the Parisians originally did not care for the tower, and many lobbied to have it removed.  Obviously it stayed, maybe because of how photogenic it is.  -ALaff – 9/30/15
La T.E. on approach

La T.E. on approach

Up close

Up close

Mesmerizing

Mesmerizing

One of the few times it's OK for your kids to get high

One of the few times it’s OK for your kids to get high

 

3 thoughts on “Paris – Highs and Lows

  1. Michael

    Ups and down huh?? Sounds amazing to me regardless, remember some of us are still in darker places. I hope you are showing off your basketball skills over there. Hope the family is well, enjoy.

    1. 4laffs Post author

      Hello Mike. Thanks for the comment. Sorry it took a while to respond. We are having a great time, and when I need an extra boost, I think about where I am not. We actually picked up a basketball in Paris, and are carrying it with us. We have a date set in Guillin, China with one of the guesthouse hosts to meet him on the court. Brought the knees, ankles, and hopefully the A-game. Keep me posted on the changes there.

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