Our final day in Paris took us to the city's very top and bottom. We started at the bottom: The Catacombs.
A short walk from our usual breakfast spot, the Catacombs is a famous underground ossuary housing the bones of many of the people originally buried in Paris' largest cemetery, Les Innocents. During World War II, Parisian members of the French Resistance used the tunnel system as a headquarters of sorts. Having some of this history in mind, Heath was initially pretty excited about the tour. That changed when we saw a sign stating that walk-throughs usually took about 45 minutes. As we began our descent down the windy staircase underground, Heath looked a tad bit nauseous.
For comic relief, there was an American professor and her daughter tagging along and the mother kept wanting to give Heath dissertation advice. Hilarious.
Here are some of the pictures from our underground adventure...
From the Catacombs we hopped on the train and headed directly to the Eiffel Tower. The first thing you notice at the base of the tower are two lines...one long and one short. The long line is for all the people interested in taking the lift (or elevator) to the "second floor" roughly 50 stories up. The short line is for all the putzes who think the stairs are the way to go. We were just those putzes.
It's funny because Heath was all about the stairs and was kind of teasing me for lagging behind. No shock to any blog follower: I'm not much of a stairs girl. But when we got to the second floor and needed to take the lift to "the summit," the tables were turned. Heath was NOT a fan of the elevator or, as he put it, the death trap. When we got to the very top he was hesitant to even go too near the railing. I managed to pull him over for a couple pictures. If he looks a little worried in one or two, now you know why.
[eiffel's structure]
[me in the cage]
[eiffel's views]
After our descent, we caught our breath in the little park next to the tower. From Eiffel we stopped to view the Grand Palais further along the river. Alas, we never made it to the Latin Quarter — next trip!
[the park]
[towards the palace]
Our restaurant of choice this evening was Bofinger, near Bastille Place. Highly recommended by several co-workers as well as our guidebook and Michelin guide, Bofinger opened in 1864 and has served some of the most well-known Parisians since. Our experience didn't necessarily live up to the hype. The building itself was gorgeous, and the food was good, but not GREAT.
I had oysters, salmon with spring vegetables and then chocolate mousse. Heath had pumpkin soup and the beef tartare, which essentially looked like a big, uncooked hamburger patty. After unsuccessfully trying to convince me to switch with him he did manage to dive in and enjoy it. He did not finish it, but he made the best of it. He followed up with the same dessert I had...we obviously didn't pay close attention to each other's orders.
[bofinger]
So now we're back in the room, packed and setting multiple alarms so that we don't miss our plane tomorrow. We're ready to head home and hug our dog. :-)
[our little corner of paris]
[views from our room]
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