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April 15, 2008
The Catacombs
One of my favorite things that Brent and I did in Paris was touring the catacombs. My friend Molly had been to Paris a few years earlier and told me that I had to go see them, and she was right.
Here's one of the explanation boards before entering the catacombs:
There was very little light and no flash allowed in the catacombs, so most of my pictures are really dark and blurry. At some point i started using my miniature flashlight to get some better photos, but unfortunately I didn't think of that until later on. I have some really cool videos too, but Google Video is awful and hasn't worked for me for a long time. Here's what I have, though.
First, we had to walk through these long, dark, stone tunnels:
We were by ourselves for most of the time in the beginning, so it was really creepy!
Sometimes there were little holes in the walls that would lead to other rooms:
"Stop! This is the empire of death":
Brent:
The catacombs are filled with more bones than you can imagine, all organized in patterns like this:
I wonder how this guy died:
Brent translated this as "Where is death? Always in the future or the past, barely is she present, that already she is no more" but he said he wasn't entirely sure. Is anyone out there fluent in French and could help?:
I think Brent took this picture:
Brent:
Maybe I shouldn't be smiling... what kind of face do you make in a picture like this?
A lot of the people buried in the catacombs were executed during the French Revolution. Here's a good example:
And that's it for the catacombs, weren't they creepy? The only problem was that after walking through the tunnels under Paris, we were let back up to the street in some completely random place. We had no idea where we were, so we wandered until we found our way to the metro:
Next will be our real trip to the Eiffel Tower!
-Lauren
Posted by lauren at April 15, 2008 10:11 AM
Comments
SO cool. and yes i took the skull and crossbone picture. we need to go back there. when i looked at the photos again and thought of mexico, a part of me thought "no! don't! there are crazy people hiding in the bones!"
Posted by: brent at April 15, 2008 11:03 AM
brent - Mexico definitely scared me too. Every time I hear a noise ANYWHERE, I'm convinced someone is hiding in the bushes, my room, behind the milk cartons in the grocery store....anywhere.... just to leap out and kill me with a whip.
Posted by: Lauren at April 15, 2008 11:05 AM
I think the catacombs are so creepy. I'm especially creeped out that there are people who like to arrange bones in patterns! Ugh.
Posted by: M at April 15, 2008 12:12 PM
M - Brent and I said the same thing! While we were down there, we were like.... who took the time to do all this? And why?
Posted by: Lauren at April 15, 2008 01:26 PM
ack! sooo creepy!
Posted by: cupcakes at April 15, 2008 04:14 PM
I was going to ask you if you went to the catacombs. That is great. I've always wanted to go!
Posted by: jocelyn at April 15, 2008 05:01 PM
cupcakes - it was VERY creepy! you should visit though if you ever have the chance!
jocelyn - you should go! and bring your camera, there's a lot that i didn't get pictures of just because there wasn't enough light, but you might get away with it with your really cool flash
Posted by: Lauren at April 15, 2008 06:05 PM
that part of history is awful . Was it in the time of the great plagues? g
Posted by: G at April 15, 2008 07:15 PM
G - I'm sure some of the people died of the plague, but a lot was actually the French Revolution.
Posted by: Lauren at April 15, 2008 07:19 PM