On my itinerary for today was to visit a new farmers market -- yesterday's "bombed-out" and am running short on healthy food (although surviving for a while on croissants, pastries and chocolates has crossed my mind!) Got there only to once again discover there was no "there" there -- at least today. Am relying on a website that lists the various "marches" occuring in Paris -- at first, I thought it was me messing-up, now it's become clear that whoever set-up the website isn't maintaining it particularly well. Had another interesting walk around a new (to me) part of Paris so not all was lost.
While wandering, I had noticed a huge park-like area towering over me on a hillside for maybe a half mile or so, surrounded by a high, black, ornate metal fence-- thought it odd that there would be such a large park and I wouldn't have noticed it on the map, but, oh well. Finally ended-up back at the Metro station after doing my reconnaisance -- I seem to have developed a "method" to my exploring -- if you think of the Metro station and the surrounding area as a "pie" with the Metro at the center -- I head off one of the slides of a slice of the pie for a quarter to half mile, walk the arc along the top of the sllce and then return to the Metro down the other side of the slice -- then repeat until I've walked most of the tops and edges of the pie -- seems to be effective in seeing what's in that area. Today, it was boring so stoped after just a few slices.
Anyway, when I got finished and was standing at the Metro station wondering what to do next, I noticed that the Metro statin was actually on the corner of this park I had seen earlier, and that there was a large gated entrance close by -- so off I went to see what it was -- turned out to be the Cimetiere du Pere Lachaise -- the world's most visited cemetery. It opened in 1804, has over 70,000 tombs (dedicated to whole families across generations, and sometimes multiple families -- not sure how they manage to fit in the remains of twenty to thirty people in a four foot by eight foot plot of land) and I came across headstones dating to 2016 -- it's a big place with people buried almost(?) on top of each other -- no wasted space.
Yes, Jim Morrison of the Doors is buried here -- and no, I didn't look for his grave or take a photo. Others buried in the cemetery include names like Chopin, Balzac, Proust, Gertrude Stein, Edith Piaf, Pissaro, Modigliani, Isadora Duncan, Oscar Wilde, Yves Montand, etc.... There aren't any markers like what we call "headstones" -- it's mostly small, ornate chapels (8'H,4'W,8'D) and some huge, over the top large and fantastically decorated "temples" -- that's the best word I can think of to describe them.
Walking around in the cemetery was both quaint and challenging -- the formal pathways were eight to ten feet wide -- totally uneven, old rounded cobblestones -- I don't think there was anything approaching "level" in the entire place except under some of the monuments, plus remember, it's on a fairly steep hillside. Unlike most of the other people I saw, I spent most of my time scrambling around on small, really narrow, overgrown informal dirt and stone paths separating the tombs -- it was the only way to see many of them. Even though I didn't do that much distance, my legs let me know they were getting a good workout!
It was a very peaceful, quiet setting -- no commotion, minimal noise and very few people (I fortunately missed the busloads of tourists arriving just as I was leaving). They had benches in a few spots, under some trees, where you could sit, rest, reflect and just take it all in. The depressing side was that so many of the tombs/monuments had been vandalized or neglected -- on many of them, the stone was so weathered, you couldn't even read the inscription -- talk about being "lost to the ages"! Once again, not a place I had planned on visiting, but a place that I'm glad I was fortunate enough to see.
