Day 4 April 4, 2025

 This morning we don’t get up until 9 AM which is extremely unusual for Richard. He’s a real early riser but I think I walked the living hell out of him yesterday. 

I’ve made reservations to visit the Catacombs of Paris today, but it’s not until 230 so we don’t rush getting ourselves ready this morning. In fact, we hauled two mattresses down from the upper loft to make the bed more comfortable for us tonight. I have to say that that is one of the worst parts of this little apartment. The bed is not meant for us creatures of comfort. 

Today I’m going to give Richard a break and we’ll take the Metro down to the Catacombs. The transportation system in and around the Paris area is amazing. There’s the RER train system, the Metro and buses and trams. And there are all kinds of other things like taxis, Ubers and thousands of bicycles and scooters and motorcycles. 

The catacombs are a network of about 300 km of tunnels under the city of Paris. Around the end of the 1700s the city was beginning to collapse due to all the tunnels that had been dug to remove limestone to build a lot of the structures in Paris. The King hired someone to reinforce the tunnels. Around about the same time, the city was experiencing pollution pollution problem with all of the graveyards in the city. The water was becoming contaminated, and something had to be done. The decision was made to dig up the remains in the graveyards of the parishes in Paris. The bones of about 6 million people were transferred to the tunnels and placed in what they call the Ossuary in the catacombs. You are able to go down in and view about 2 km of tunnels and part of the ossuary where the bones are placed. It’s quite an eerie feeling to be 20 metres under the city of Paris walking around.

From there, we walked over to the Montparnasse Cemetery, which is 47 acres of the most unbelievable mausoleums and resting places for the dead. It is one of four cemeteries that exist in central Paris since the removal of all of the church graveyards. It is so beautiful and peaceful there, and they are still burying people in these cemeteries to this day.

Now it’s time to relax in a park so we walk over to the Luxembourg Gardens not too far from the cemetery. The park is filled with people enjoying the beautiful weather. It was 23°C today. We sat for a while and watched some men playing bocce ball in the park and then started to make our way back to our own neighbourhood in the 9th arrondissment. 

We catch the M4 back and stop for a bite before returning home. 

It was a long day, but if yesterday was our cathedral day, today was definitely our day of the dead.