Day 8 & 9

Paris is slowing down for me. Or rather, I'm slowing down on Paris. I've seen what I want and I'm ready for La Rochelle. Normandy is first, and I really can't complain, because it is so beautiful, and I get to sit on a bus and read my books, but the schools from Richmond are joining us for that, and they sort of invade our space.

Yesterday we went to Eparnay in Champagne to visit a ... champagnerie? Anyway, its called Castellane, and they give us a great tour of the process of making champagne. Which isn't much different than the process for sparkling wine, but we seemed to wander into the right neighborhood for champagne itself. ;)

We took a regular train out there, and picnic-ed in a park and met some very friendly provincial ducks. We picnic a lot, which keeps food costs down cuz we're eating sandwiches n things. I has some frites (french fries) and a sandwich called a croque madame, which is a rendition of a croque monsieur, which is a grilled ham and cheese sandwich kind of. Mine had a sunny side up egg on it, which is what distinguished the two. There are eggs on many strange-ish things here...like pizza. Its really good though.

Ok so then we went to the ballet, which was terribly disappointing, and I'm glad I'm blogging about it now rather than last night, cuz I would been quite a grump. The ballet was nice, kind of a provincial theme here too; a peasant girl frolicked around with the village to back her up. But our seats were horrible. Noone sat together, and everyone had folding seats in an isle behind a pillar, or the wings so far up and over that the stage is completely out of view. I cannot believe they sell those seats. They weren't even the cheapest ones. Dr Janc did NOT tell us they were obstructed view seats. Lesson learned about that though, NEVER AGAIN. I am considering trying to find tickets to an opera when we return through Paris.
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Ok and today was Verseilles. Which is so enormous, I can't even begin to describe. It was very cold and windy and rainy though, so that really afflicted the visit. The sun came out a bit as we were released into the gardens. They are also unbelievably huge, and are kind of a labyrinth. I eventually split from the group and had a really nice walk around, and then took the train back to town by myself. Which is so easy. The metro system in Paris is extremely user friendly, and we've been trucking around enough that I almost felt like I fit in today.

But my reason for bolting was really that I wanted to go to the Catacombes, and I did. And they reminded me of the maze at Verseille, except in ancient tunnels beneath Paris, and instead of shrubbery, there were bones. For a MILE. There are hundreds of miles of quarries beneath Paris, which have been used for a variety of purposes throughout the centuries, including aqueducts, war shelter, even sneaking around in Les Miserables. But anyway, at one point in the 18th century, many of the cemetaries in Paris were disposing of bodies unsanitarily and some crypts broke, and there were some problems. So the city decided to move everybody in several graveyards into the catacombs. And I'm not positive, but it looks to me like there are millions of peoples' remains. It was the creepiest place I have ever been in my entire life.

Day 7

I'm a day behind. I'm scrapping the attempt to post something daily, cuz I get all stressed out and behind. But I will continue to post when I can and tell fun stories. So things aren't going to be so chronological right now.

Right now we sort of have a free day. It is Sunday, and he had scheduled that we take ourselves to the Louvre. I am recovering. I think I'll go when we come back through from La Rochelle. I need a down day. I know I'm in Paris, but yikes was yesterday nuts.

We started with Dr Janc, and went up to the basilica of Saint Denis. Legend goes that he was beheaded somehow down at Montmartre, picked up his head, and walked up to this church. Now is is the Necropolis for all of the French monarchy. Seriously, all of it, except, like, 4 Merovingians. Hay, ima teach you some french history.

French Dynasties:

Merovingien

Carolingien

Capetiens

Valois
Bourbon

This all gets a bit shady with Gaul being all territories n things for a long time, and then with Napoleon mixing things up. But anyway, there are a LOT of tombs.

Then Amy and I went to the Orangerie, which has a lot of impressionism and a collection of Monet's Nimpheas (waterlilies) that are.... oh maybe 50 feet long. They're huge.

Then we had lunch and got sort of served by a very Parisian waitress (this indicates rude to the point of almost mean), but I had ratatouille for the first time, and its super good! And then we went to Centre Pompidou. This is modern art. Some standard Pollock, Dali, Rothko kinda stuff, but also much much more that is so beyond most people's conception of art, that the place turns into this sort of outer space sort of experience. The building itself has inside-out architechure, and includes a library, many stages and theatres, galleries, bookstores, etc etc. Acutally I think the Walker has a lot of the same characteristics- We sat in a media gallery (which looks like a computer lab) and listened to some ... sound art?

Then we went and tracked down the club we had found to attend. Its right beside the Moulin Rouge and we were pumped to go, but wiped out. So grocery store, nap, then go out was the plan, but it was 830 by this point and we had planned to go out at 10ish, so my nap didn't happen. But the club. OMG. Called La Locomotive, and it was fantastic. 3 levels with different music. 5 bars, couches, and people. it didn't open till 11 so we were right on time. And we danced and mingled and it was awesome. But the time came to figure out if we were taking the metro back, and it seemed ludicris to me to spend e10 for a single hour somewhere, so some left, and some stayed. So we danced some more, and there was some leopard lady and lots of glowsticks and it was great. But then noone really had any money, and we were pretty sure a cab would have ripped us off, so we walked. This morning I look back and can't believe it. Here I'm gonna google how far we walked. Keep in mind that this is post big day, post dance club, in heels. ok.

It's 5.5 km. Thats 3.4 miles.

Gah.

This is so nice today though. I've been itching for a space to take care of, and so I cleaned up, made some coffee, and scrap-booked. Our rooms have kitchenettes, tvs, a little desk with internet... ahhhhh.