the adventure concludes..

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the adventure concludes..

(this was the last day, so we just did what we could untill it was time to catch the train back to Amsterdam.)

DAY ELEVEN:
The last day in Paris, once again we were up early the beds really weren't getting any more comfortable. But this morning we actually needed to be up early we'd planned to be at the Catacombes by 10:00am just as it opened, so we left the hotel at about 8:30 and brought our bags down stairs, be were really hopeful that we could leave it in the lobby of 'Hotel De Sully' so that we didn't need to haul it around Paris the last day. Luckily we could, so all our bags were down stairs and we headed out towards the Catacombes. We went to the bakery for breakfast along the way stopping at the bakery that was under management, it was open again! So I got my daily chocolate croissant and we sat outside in another gorgeous day. Luckily the catacombs was only a couple of stops away on the metro and by the last day we were absolutely nailing the subway system, so we were there in no time.

We arrived and unfortunately a lot of the other people had, had a similar idea to arrive to the catacombes early. So we still got there and had a couple blocks of line to wait through and with not a lot of shade and very little movement, it turned into a bit of a long morning. It was about an hour and forty-five minutes wait before we'd finally arrived at the front of the line. Even though we still had to wait, we were thankful we got there when we did because the line had pretty much doubled in time. We got to the booth and paid for our entry then headed down the 136 steps that'd take us to the catacombes.

It got to about 14 degrees underground and rather dark but all the paths where intriguing non the less, the Catacombes is an underground site that is used as the final resting place of skeletal remains from the 19th century. The catacombes consists of a lot of tunnels and dark paths but when we got to the part of the catacombes that had all the bones and we were mind blown. There were so many bones! And they were all stacked in patterns and in order, it was quite pretty, but then you remembered that all the bones used to be real life people and you kind just went back to the initial reaction of "oh my god."There were dates along the way, and slabs of concrete with writing in the walls, there where a few tomb looking things and i think i over heard a guide saying alot of the bone clusters where family and they'd be arranged together. The catacombes was more for the rich or the powerful people to be placed as it was a way to remember them and clearly it's worked because 200 years later people are still going there. Attraction wise, The Catacombes was a different experience to all the main attractions. They were all beautiful and big, but the Catacombes had a sort of gory side to it and a bit more of a story which was really quite interesting and intriguing. So i really enjoyed them. Then there was the 83 stair hike back to the top and then we were done.

Once we'd emerged from the Catacombes we had to sus out where we were and get to the nearest metro station that could take us back to 'Bastille' so that we could check out the market. The market looked pretty big, unfortunately we'd run into a bit more rough luck, and we were just catching the end of it. So we saw everyone gradually packing up, but by the looks of the parts of market that we saw it seemed like the market was more food involved selling lots of seafood, cheese, meats, fruit and veg, and breads. There where a few clothing stalls but they all looked the same so it didn't seem to be anything really special. We did grab a Crepe for lunch because by this stage we were absolutely starving, I had sausage and cheese, mum had Nutella and banana and my little sister had egg, ham and cheese. Mine wasn't to great, i should have played it safe with Nutella! But mum couldn't finish hers, so i didn't go completely without trying one.

With the market nearly closed, we figured we'd walk to the hotel and collect our bags. Then make our way to the central station where we would catch the Thalys back to Amsterdam. We were a couple hours early, but that was easily fixed with a cafe stop and we found another bakery nearby to collect some supplies for the train trip. Then we continued to wait around a little longer, and before we knew it, it was 4:20 and we were boarding the train. The train trip went reasonably quickly, i still had a couple of blog entries to get out of the way.. so here we are.

The plan from here is to get home, SHOWER and stretch the toes, then sleep in a decent bed and get a good nights sleep. So we'll see how it all goes tomorrow..

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Photos

bones. bones. bones. bones.
the lighting wasn't enough to capture all of this photo, but if you use your imagination, the pattern of the skulls is a heart within all the other bones.. and i over heard that there is a likely chance that all the skulls belong to family, that being arranged together is common in the Catacombes.

The Catacombes.
in the ceiling you could really notice the layers of the rock/ground and i thought that was really quite pretty.

The palace.
This was in catacombes, it had been carved out of the stones.

bones. bones. bones. bones.
another bone design arranged around a structure. I can't remember reading what was symbolic about the design.

rocks. rocks. rocks. rocks.
this is the structure of the tunnels just rocks stacked on top of one another just to hold back dirt and any loose soil.

Just a glimpse of the line.
here's the mine in front of us, you can see it going all around the front and it still went for another 5 meters after.

Just a glimpse of the line.
and here's a glimpse of the line behind us, and it continued easily another block around. and this is only just as the catacombes had opened, by the time we reached the front the line had nearly tripled in size.

althoughh...
from the line it was still a gorgeous day, and the scenery was nice.. besides the sunburn we didn't have much to complain about.

another sculpted palace.
This was in catacombes, it had been carved out of the stones.

fossil and rock conditioning.
this was a bit of a display of the sort of stones used to structure the passages and pathways, and a few fossils found within the tunnels.

Structure at its finest.
this is a passage, just look at the architectural design of it and all this was made for underground. It really puts into significance the importance of the site.

bones. bones. bones. bones.
Another photo of the lined bones and the arranged skulls.

The staircase down.
this is a photo of how narrow the stairs where.. all 186 stairs.

bones. bones. bones. bones.
with the dull lighting on the bones, and all the shadows that where casted it made for some really eerie photos.

impressiveness!
here's just how high the ceiling got in some places. and the design that had gone into it.

etchings and moss.
i'm not entirely sure how this got here, or what it quite is.. but it looked cool so i took a photo.

bones. bones. bones. bones.
here you can see the bones go all the way from ground level to the ceiling.

bones. bones. bones. bones.
here's what looks to be a coffin, of someone in power or of high significance.