Having arrived off a night train from Zurich, I had about 6 hours in Paris before having to catch my flight.
[Saturday, Aug 19, 2000] The Catacombs, Pantheon
Exhausted from the overnight train ride, I wasn't going to waste my last day in Europe. I arrived at 6:45 AM, locked up my belongings, and set out to visit the Catacombs. Unfortunately, I arrived before 8:00 AM, and the Catacombs do not open until 9:00 AM, so I had to stop for breakfast. Twenty meters below ground level, the Catacombs are a vast network of galleries in which lie the remains of over six million Parisians. From the end of the 18th century until the great town-planning works undertaken by Haussmann, these bones were gradually transferred from Paris graveyards to the former quarries of Montrouge, which became the Catacombs in 1810.
Walking through the low, dark underground tunnels to the Catacombs alone proved to be an eerie experience.
Having only an hour before having to head to the airport, I took a metro over to see the Pantheon, but didn't have enough time to see the interior. The Pantheon started life as a church (1758-89), and since the Revolution, the crypt has contained the remains of some important national heroes (Voltaire, Rousseau, and Zola...).
Time to catch an RER back to CDG for my journey back to Canada... and the vacation is over.