Today was a travel day for us. We checked out of the Hotel Monge around 11AM, leaving our luggage their so we could see Notre Dame and the Catacombes.
We had seen the inside of Notre Dame yesterday, but we didn't climb up to the top of the bell tower. Today we did just that. The line was about an hour long. And for $7.50 each, we had the privilege of climbing the 380 steps up to the top of the bell tower. They weren't normal stairs either, but very narrow spiral staircases! The trek up was definitely dizzying, but the vistas at the top were worth it. It was cool to see the gargoyles up close. The weather was sunny with a bit of haze and not a cloud in the sky.
After walking back down the 380 steps, we went to a bakery and had lunch. We split a ham and cheese sandwich and a nutella crepe.
After that we took the metro over to the catacombes. There was a line of about 30 people, but it only took 5 minutes. The catacombes are huge! They are 25 meters below the street (down yet another spiral staircase). The catacombs in Paris alone make up approximately 186 miles of tunnels! Only about 1 miles worth is open to the public. It was really cool, with rows and rows of bones, separated by a row of skulls every 2 feet or so. It was interesting how they used big bones (like femur bones) and skulls stacked neatly in front to form a wall, and then filled in behind it with all the smaller bones. We spent a good 45 minutes down in the catacombes. When we finally came to the surface, we were nowhere near when we entered. Our map didn't cover this part of Paris (it was not downtown) so it took us a while to find the nearest metro stop (it ended up being 2 stops away from where first entered the catacombes!) We went a long ways underground.
Next, we headed back to our hotel to grab our bags and then took the RER to Marne Le Vallee and Disneyland Paris. We got to our hotel around 5:00PM, the train ride only took 30 minutes. Out hotel is the Dream Castle hotel http://www.dreamcastle-hotel.com/content/en/1.php which is less than a mile from the Disney complex. The hotel is brand new and very nice. Definitely the most "American" hotel we have stayed at. We are on the 3rd floor overlooking the gardens.
Tonight, we took the free shuttle to Downtown Disney (they call it Disney Village) and had dinner at Chef Mickeys. They had a prixe fixe menu for $34. You got an appetizer, main dish and dessert. Our waittress was very pleasant and spoke excellent English. I had Mushroom Soup, ribs with french fries, and chocolate fondue for dessert. Bobbi Jo had a mozzarella/goat cheese/tomoato tart, Penne Pasta and chocolate fondue. After that we walked around some of the Disney hotels, looked in a few of the shops and then took the shuttle back to our hotel.
Sorry for no pictures, I'll try to post some in the next couple of days.
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