Paris part 2

After Lies and I had dwelled among the skeletons for a while, we skipped off to do what you should always do when you are visiting Paris for the first time...the tower!

After waiting over an hour to see some bones though, we were rather apprehensive about the line up to go up the tower. Sure enough, when we got there there were a few people about and Liesl, I assumed somewhat jokingly, pointed out that if we wanted to take the stairs up we would not have to wait in line. She was right of course, there was no queue to climb the stairs at all! When I laughed it off, she said she would have done it if I was keen. That was a flat out challenge. So climb we did. I don't know how high it is or how many stairs it was but I think it is safe to say that it is a fair way up.

Actually, it turned out to be not as bad as you might imagine and of course the views over Paris from the top and from the viewing points along the way were well worth the effort...and surely they look more stunning after you feel like you have earned them. One of the best things about walking up was all the little signs along the way that gave you some trivia about the tower and gave you an excuse to take a breather. Did you know that some crazy kooks actually rode motorbikes down the stairs sometime back in the 70s. Crazy!
We were indeed a long way from home...
And you never know who you might meet along the way! You have to assume this guy had a sense of humour but he was walking around as if wearing a Napoleon replica hat was part of his everyday life. So funny.

Of course everyone wants to have their photo taken in front of the tower, so Liesl and I took several 'selfies' to try and achieve this. This one is my favourite. Can you see the tower? I promise it is there...somewhere :)
On the way to the tower, we walked through Luxembourg gardens, which are always beautiful.

This time, all around the edge of the garden was an exhibition of huge photographs that had over the years appeared in a French current affairs magazine. They all had small captions explaining the shot. They were so beautiful, so sad, so uplifting, and just so stunning that strolling the streets was given new meaning. This is one of the things I love most about Paris. Art, beauty and unexpected inspiration surrounds you at every turn.
Makes you want to skip with joy...

xxx

The Sister Adventures...part 1

Liesl and I have just returned from a wonderful 3 week adventure , which I am again going to have to blog about in pieces! As this was her first visit to Europe, Liesl insisted that we visit Paris. Of course I was only to happy to acquiesce to that request! Paris is truly a lovely city. And I am not a city loving girl! But once again, I was completely charmed by it and easily managed to find wonderful things to see and do for the full 5 days we spent there.

The trip did not have the easiest of beginnings for poor Lies though. She came over following a 6 month stint working in Kentucky at a horse hospital there. She had a hell of a time getting out of the USA and lost her luggage along the twisted mad dashing route from Lexington to Bergen. This was made complicated by her arriving in Bergen late on Friday and us scheduled to fly to Paris early the next morning. This meant that she had no stuff and could not dump all the things she meant to leave in Bergen while we backpacked around. Fortunately we got it in Paris eventually. Unfortunately we had to drag a huge amount of unnecessary shit around for the rest of the trip. Fortunately, much of the unnecessary shit turned out to be useful...especially the bottles of booze, the sewing kit and the nail polish remover!

We began our stay in Paris with a stroll along the street market by our hotel and coffee and lunch in a cafe. Then we headed for the Catacombes. Spooky.

You descend straight down into unbelieveably long tunnels under the city. All stacked with the bones of formerlly living breathing people just like you and me. Kilometers of them. Arranged from floor to ceiling. Bones. Human bones. Human bones beautifully arranged in tunnels under the city. A city seething with living breathing people that will end up as bones. Bones like the thousands of others you see. Bones of people just like you and me.

It was a rather intense and very interesting experience.

Surprisingly there were loads of other living breathing people just like you and me that also wanted to see the catacombes that day. We lined up for over an hour to get in. We lined up to see skeletons. We lined up with hundreds of other people to see skeletons that day. Strange?

True.
xxx