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In: Travel Tips |
Paris may be renowned as one of Europe’s most vibrant and interesting capital cities, but once you’ve climbed the Eiffel Tower, pushed through the crowds in front of the Mona Lisa and done a hunchback impression at Notre Damme what’s next?
If you want to see a different side to the city of romance why not grab some cheap flights to Paris or hop on a Dover to Calais train and check out some of these less-visited but no-less-impressive sites?
The Catacombs
This incredible ossuary, packed with 6 million people, becomes creepy once you learn that the term ‘ossuary’ means ‘A site made to serve as the final resting place of human skeletal remains.’
That’s right, the 6 million packed into these tight tunnels aren’t about to go anywhere quickly. In fact, the crowded masses actually make up the walls of the tight tunnels.
Featuring seemingly endless rows of bones from centuries of previous inhabitants of Paris, the catacombs clearly had an interior decorator with a dark sense of humour, as skulls, femurs and other appendages are used to create elaborate patterns which are so elaborate that you often forget you’re staring at a pile of corpses.
Find the entrance by Metro stop Denfert-Rochereau, admission €8 for adults.
Le Musée des Vampires
If you haven’t had enough of hanging out with the dead then Paris’s vampire museum is the place for you. Ostensibly the collection of a vampire-obsessed eccentric crammed into his living room, this is much more than a few Twilight posters and a set of plastic fangs.
This unassuming town house in the Parisian suburbs houses an impressive exhibition of books, pictures, posters and memorabilia tracking the history of the vampiric legend and its popularity in modern culture, there’s even a mummified cat.
The owner/curator has an impressive knowledge of vampires, having written books on the subject, and speaks fluent English, so you won’t have to find an obscure occult French phrasebook.
The nearest Metro stop is Porte des Lilas, but as any good vampire buff knows you can’t enter a house without being invited, therefore you have to call ahead to make an appointment to look around the museum. Call the curator’s mobile on 06201 22832 to book your tour.
La Défense
As anybody who has worked in a city knows, there’s nothing worse than being on your way to your job only to have swarms of non-stressed tourists clogging up your daily commute. Well now it’s your chance to be that person who stops dead in the middle of the pavement to take a photo, happily oblivious to all the people rushing around you in suits.
La Défense is Paris’s financial district at the westernmost edge of the city and stands out as a haven of modern architecture and impressively creative office blocks. The most notable of these is the Grande Arch, which looks more like a cube with a hole through the middle and is visible from all over Paris.
Visitors used to be able to travel in lifts to an exhibition centre at the top of the arch, which affords an unrivalled view of the city, however this was closed to the public after an incident in April 2010. You are still free to walk around the base though and admire one of the most stunning pieces of architecture in Europe.
The nearest Metro stop is, predictably, La Défense.
Le Musée des Égouts de Paris
For those non-French-speakers amongst us that translates as the Museum of Paris’s Sewers. Yep, it’s time to get down and dirty as you explore the ancient tunnels beneath the city’s streets, just remember to hold your nose.
You can take a tour of the tunnels or explore at your own pace; they may be designed to carry the waste of humanity, but the sewers are actually a pleasantly atmospheric place and if you’re keen to learn something there are interesting displays dotted around for you to read.
The nearest Metro stop is Alma – Marceau and admission is €4.10 for adults.
Whether you want to go round the bend, hang out with the dead or watch them rise again, then Paris has a wealth of the weird and wonderful for you to visit.
Picture by albany_tim
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