For something completely different we decided to take the underground to the underground and see the Parisian catacombs.
We started our adventure when we descended a seemingly-endless spiral staircase to about 30 metres below the city. Then the tunnel tour began. Not for the claustrophobic, nor the very tall.
The catacombs are a series of tunnels, full of dead people (ossuaries). The Parisians ran a bit short of cemetery space in the late 1700s, and the place was getting a bit squiffy with dead people, so basically they dug up the bones of 6 million people from all the cemeteries and relocated them to a section of the abandoned limestone quarries beneath the city.
The bones aren’t just thrown in any old how, they’re neatly stacked. That’s how you fit so May people in. There’s more to the story but that’s all you need to know.
These walls of bones go on and on, as you would expect a few million skeletons to do. The relocation of bones went from 1774 to 1859.
There’s 300 kilometres of tunnels beneath the city, but only a few kilometres have been converted to catacombs. Most is strictly off limits, although they are frequented by the cata-philes, people who love to explore and do crazy stuff. There is even a squad of police who comb the tunnels looking for dodgy stuff, and finding it. The dodgy stuff has included bars and gambling dens, and there are infrequent rage parties.
We were in there for two hours, and that is more than enough. It would be very, very dark if the lights went out, and you might start to hear things….
Back to the apartment to prepare for the evening’s highlight, dinner and show at Moulin Rouge. Not much in the way of photos, as you’re not allowed to take any during the show, you’ll have to Google some for yourself.
Summary. Great show, great dancing, great spectacle. Definitely worth a couple of hours of your life and a couple of hundred Euro from your wallet. They do shows at 9pm, 11pm and 1am. I’m guessing the dancers don’t have any trouble getting to sleep afterwards.
The best bit about the show is that the Moulin Rouge is literally at the bottom of the hill. We had a 300-metre walk home.
Stephen and Michelle
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