Crazy Trip: Day 2: Paris Paris and more Paris

The plan for the day was Musee du Louvre, then the Catacombs and here and there. After a lot of calculations and recalculations we decided to stick to t+ tickets instead of Paris Visite Pass, hence we were to take another 10 tickets today morning. We started at around 9 am, we actually got late, hence I tried to see if we can book tickets to the Museum, there were three sites, but none seemed genuine. The museum itself does not sell online tickets. We ran for the metro, breakfast in hand. Me and Kiran had a coffee and a croissant (or two or three), Venkat for some unknown reason had just one croissant. We changed once and reached Musee du Louvre in about 20 minutes. Rushed inside, the queue was starting to build up. After baggage check, we went down, where we got the tickets and the map.

Time to describe Louvre now. It is a palace turned museum. Entrance to the courtyard is free, which contains the famous glass pyramid, along with the water fountains (a copy can be found in Infosys Bangalore Campus). The entry is through this pyramid, you have to go two levels down (for tickets). The museum has three wings: Denon, Sully and Richelieu, and 4 floors. Now, I knew that “Monalisa” is housed in the Denon wing, hence we started our journey from there. Little did we know, it was a long journey.

The Denon wing houses mostly sculptures and Greek and Roman antiquities (not antiques), the 1^st floor of Denon is paintings section and has the Monalisa by Da Vinci, and the Wedding Feast by Veronese. I do not remember how much we spent in this wing, but it was a considerable amount of time. Unlike others, we did not rush to see the Monalisa, instead looked through whatever came our way. Hence, in no time we covered beautiful wooden statues of Jesus, Mary Magdalene, and old wooden altarpieces. We also saw the Captive by Michelangelo, the Cupid and Psyche by Canova, and Aphrodite (Venus de Milo). As expected we lost count of time, and all our other plans were going to waste. But, so much for the plan, I surely was enjoying this. Saw some unique pieces like the two tome sculptures where the dress is made of a colourful stone, and the head and body parts are made with marble.

It was getting late, hence we decided to follow the map and finish off the main attractions, starting with Monalisa. I could see the huge queue now, and the crowds were swelling inside too. But thanks to the hugeness of this museum, I never felt choked. Well, Monalisa is not one of my favourite paintings, but still there is a different thing to see the original piece. When we reached the room, I can see her from a distance. There was a huge crowd and even though flash photography is prohibited in all corners of Louvre, people were flashing their cameras, mostly because they were shooting in auto mode. I can understand how bad their photos were coming since the Monalisa is covered with a protective glass (the only painting in the whole museum). This painting occupies one wall, it is not huge, just that there is no other painting on the same wall. This room is full of masterpieces, the altered Madonna of the rocks is also housed here, and so is the huge Wedding Feast at Cana.

Napoleon's Dining Hall

Now, we were really short of time, and our last item was to see the Napoleon’s apartments. We were thinking to give it a miss, but thanks to Venkat’s pestering, we looked for it. After going past the Winged Victory for three times, we found our way to the Richelieu wing. On the way up, we landed up in Cour Marly, which is a open courtyard with sculptures. Took some rest there, since our legs were already revolting against us. Napoleon’s apartments were just fantabulous. So much of grandeur and show. The whole set up was of red and gold, looked really magnificent, specially his drawing room, with huge mirrors, chandeliers and plants looked the most grand of all. That was the last bit we can do in Louvre, the clock was ticking 2 pm, and we were getting late. We hurried outside, ignoring the other great pieces of art, took some photos outside and then we were on our Metro to the Catacombs.

Lunch was from a road side stall, by now we knew enough French to get food. Poulat means chicken, fromage means cheese, tomat means tomato. Speaking of language problem, we did not find much difficulty in getting along, guess they have also learnt that English is necessary to survive in tourism industry. No offence to any Parisians, but I have heard stories about their rude behavior towards English-speaking people. But we did not encounter any, maybe since we of course looked like tourists with maps and cameras. It was veg panini for Kiran, for me and Venkat it was chicken. Freshly made, and I think the best panini I had in the whole trip.

With lunch in hand, we queued up for entry into the Catacombs. It is a 2 km long underground tunnel, hence only 200 people are allowed at one time. We guess we were lucky to get inside in about 30 minutes. I knew the history of the tunnel, but I had to answer Venkat’s endless queries. To repeat, this place was a quarry for stone in the 17^th century, but quarrying was closed since it led to land fall and accidents. Since then parts of the quarry has been used as cemetery. As of now, it is the final resting place for 6 million Parisians. It has been opened to the public since 1867, after the the-then overseer of the quarry (who stopped illegal quarrying), decided to arrange the bones and the skulls in a beautiful (!) manner. Since, then the catacombs have been open, and has huge number of footfalls every year.

It is surely the weirdest places I have ever visited. It starts with the normal mine kind of feeling, with very narrow passage and wet floors. Then it develops into a very complex network of tunnels, lined with skulls and bones of human. It was my first tryst with real human skeleton, and boy, it was chilling. But at the end of it, it was a nice experience. I even touched a few skulls and bones, and let me tell you, it is not a good experience at all. But the funniest part was Venkat, first of all he questioned “Where is the meat?”, to which I was feeling like bursting out laughing, controlled myself after taking pity on the other people. Then, he got so scared, that he ran off and exited soon. Actually, most of the people were scared. After some time, it felt like, it was only me and Kiran, who were strolling, and all other who entered with us, were gone. We were happily photographing the dead. Thanks to a big cross sign which says that this place was blessed, we were not feeling scared at all. With the worry of Venkat being possessed, we came out only to find him standing outside with a broad smile. He started giving lame excuses, but I know he was scared. He must be cursing us about why did we spend so much to see skulls and bones.

Skulls at Catacombs of Paris

Our next stop was Notre Dame Cathedral. Took metro till there. It is a very good thing about Paris, you can go to any place using the metro. It is very well connected and covers all the major attractions. It was about 5 pm when we reached there, but thanks to the long European day, there was ample light, and the cathedral looked beautiful in the golden light. Our Lady of Paris cathedral is just beside the river Seine and is very fine example of French gothic architecture. I found it having a similarity with the Westminster Abbey in London. Completed in 1345, this Cathedral was vandalized several times, but it has been restored now. This is where coronation of Napoleon happened, in 1804. I lost Kiran and Venkat while entering, since there was a queue, and I was in the queue and went inside in the flow. Once inside, you cannot help but notice the hugeness of it. The high altar has Mother Mary with Christ’s lifeless body. We cannot go very near to the altar, but we can go all round it. The many chapels have wonderful paintings. The stained glass work is awesome, there is a huge Organ too. After seeing all the interiors, when I was coming out, I found Kiran and Venkat.

Our next destination was Pantheon. We walked till there, Venkat was complaining, but we did not listen. The Pantheon of Paris was built as a church, but is now secular place and has the final remains of various famous people like Victor Hugo, Marie Curie and Louis Braille. It is again a neoclassical architectural piece, which the façade modeled like the Pantheon of Rome. It was closed by the time we reached there. Hence, we just took a round and a few photographs, and we were actually done for the day.

On the way back, we thought of doing some shopping, hence we exited in Opera, only to find the shops were far beyond our reach. While going back, we discovered that the t+ tickets work in one direction only, means that you cannot exit and enter the same station unless it is an end station. Though I am still not sure if that was the correct interpretation. We went walked to the next metro stop to find out, but there also the tickets did not work. But the lady at the ticket counter was kind enough to let us in after checking that the ticket was first used less than a hour ago.

Next big decision was dinner. Well, I am really not sure what Venkat wanted to eat, he did not tell us also. Anyway, we got down one stop ahead of our hotel (which was a bad idea), and had dinner at one of the local pizzeria. It was fun to order stuff with so much of sign language and yes-yes-yes, no-no-no’s. Finally, I got my tortellini, Kiran got vegetarian Pizza and Venkat got chicken. The pizza sauce (or flavoured olive oil) which they gave was really nice, and enhanced the taste too much. My pasta was really cheesy and tasty, though Venkat’s Andhra tongue found it bland. After dinner, we walked almost 2 KMs to reach our hotel, hence it was a bad idea to get down at that stop. Actually our hotel is near the junction of a major international highway, hence there are many flyovers and exits, which made us loose our way. And though we could see the hotel, we could not find any road to reach there. But finally we did, and then what else. The legs were crying for rest, and we obliged them.


Loss Section:

• 10 t+ tickets: 12.50 Euros
• Louvre Entry: 10 Euros per person
• Catacombs Entry: 8 Euros per person
• Dinner: 35 Euros