Napoleon's Tomb

Today Nicole, Emma and I ventured out to see Napoleon's tomb. It is located in this magnificently beautiful building that has the dome covered in gold. You can see it from many areas of the city and one can't help but be totally enamored by it.

We took a metro line to get there that we hadn't been on before, so that was excitement number one. I'm pretty sure it took us under the Seine so that was an experience. Also the entire interior of the metro was blue, so Nicole mentioned it felt like we were in a submarine, and it really did feel like it.

Anyway, we got to Napoleon's tomb and it was just as beautiful as imagined. I'm still in complete shock every time I see the stone buildings so elegantly carved. Napoleon is buried in this very large, brown casket (though it does not look like a casket). When you enter, his tomb is in a depressed region, you can see it from the floor but have to enter the crypt to be eye level with it. Surrounding his tomb on the first floor are two of his brothers and a few other people. The whole room is amazing, with painted ceilings and gold everywhere. When you go down into the crypt there are carvings on the walls that are beautiful as well.

In the buildings surrounding Napoleon's tomb are different museums, and we went into the WWI & WWII museum, which was really interesting. They had uniforms from nearly every army involved in the wars, all of which were very interesting. They also had a lot of the weapons that were used, (i.e. machine guns, grenades). To see these items in real life was really awesome.

We came across a tiny little holocaust exhibit, which was probably my favorite of the afternoon. They didn't really have much, but the little they did have had a profound effect on me. They had some clothing that the prisoners were forced to wear, some pictures that the prisoners had drawn and a few pictures. The atmosphere around the materials was definitely dreary, more so than any other area of the museum.

After walking around for a while we decided that we needed to sit somewhere, so we proceeded to find a cafe to hang out in for a while, which proved to be quite a task. We wanted to relax and munch on something, but didn't want to get too expensive. We walked for a long while before we found something that would work, which happened to be just a little concession stand a few steps away from the Eiffel Tower. Emma got a crepe and I got some fries (which weren't too tasty) and we sat under the Eiffel while we snacked away. What better place for a picnic?