Paris Catacombs, Paris funnily enough 07

Another trip back in the way back when machine

The Paris catacombs are one of the highlights of my exploring trips taken over the couse of two days in the summer of 07, very well lead by OT we covered quite a lot of the touristy sites.

The trip cost me quite a bit as within half an hour of seeing off from home this was the state of my car,

http://www.forlornbritain.co.uk/imag...Catas/PC00.jpg

after quickly rearranging transport and catching the intercity to Paddington i just made it across London to Waterloo just in time to catch the Eurostar. After a few relaxing beers and a planning session comparing maps on the train we had a good idea of what we all wanted to see and how we were going to go about of it. after the metro trip and a quick stop of at the supermarket for supplies we made our way to the entry point descretely kitted up and headed under ground.

First stop the Le Passe de Muraille (man in the wall) named after a black and white french film about appropriately enough an man who could walk thorugh walls.
http://www.forlornbritain.co.uk/imag...Catas/PC01.jpg

Then pn to the ram room where we stoped off for a bit and enjoyed some french beer
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Then over to the castle room which was surprisingly small and difficult to photograph
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A short distance away is the flower room.

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which contained this shaft showing how far below the city we were about 90'

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We then stoped off at the foxy memorial which is supposidly dedicated to a photographer who spent a lot of time down the catas.

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then on to one of the popular party rooms Le Cellier

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then a short distance away we stoped to visit the robot in La Plage

http://www.forlornbritain.co.uk/imag...Catas/PC18.jpg

we then headed up to the Carrefour de Morte (Crossroads of the Dead) and the bones.

http://www.forlornbritain.co.uk/imag...Catas/PC16.jpg

we did a little more poking about in this area before heading off to our bed room for the night in the Pharmacy Shelter which was used by the Germans in WWII. On the way we met a group of three cataphiles the only people we saw down there once setting up our beds a a quick meal it was bed time the night was damp loud and cold.

The following morning we headed of to pay our respects to Phibert's grave,an explorer from long ago who explored the catacoombs by candel light one night his light went out and became lost his skellngton was found years later.

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We then headed down into the SalleZ for breakfast a quite complicated area where we navigated pillar by pillar, were we found the music room.

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Until finding the ballon room where we stopped to cook our self heating meals, we made it homely with ballons pinched from MCD's

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we then took a look around Val-de-Grâce and the war time bomb shelters under the hospital a starway here lets you climb up and see the streets of paris from below. no pics form here i was fucked by this time, our route back was a little complicated as we popped of to see some other sites like the cube room, the black crawl and we even found one of the original grave monuments marking the comunards but my camera stayed in its bag until i had a second breckfast of crepe's chocolate and beer in one of the sample rooms then i got some energy back so out the camera came.

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one of our final stops was the art gallery where graduates of the mining institute ad a new mural every year. some quite dodgy.

http://www.forlornbritain.co.uk/imag...Catas/PC15.jpg

we then had to decide on our way out we had heared of a open man hole in the north which opened up in to a park but in the end we decided to go back out the way we entered, and a mad dash through a building site followed by the shouts of some pissed off parisiene workers, As we waited for the metro back to gare de nore an aged frence man eyed up our dirty helmets before coming over and informing us "there are caves under the city you know" we laughed before disapearing onto the train. Back at gare de nord we enjoyed a well earned kebab and a beer or two before sleeping all the way back to blighty.

it was tough going at the time but now ive just been reminiscing I want to go again :)