Hélène went down into the bowels of the capital. Not the catacombs you can visit for 10 euros. No. The 350 kilometer-long catacombs have been closed to the public since 1830. The entrance to the Underworld is hidden at the bottom of a tunnel on the old railway line of Paris's Petite Ceinture. Here, you'll find a passage leading straight to...
The smell of rancid mixed with that of old beer. Moisture entering every pore of the skin. The sound of my heart beating and water dripping. Here I am in the catacombs. If you've taken the official tour, you'll know 1/800th of the surface area of the quarries.
The catacombs we sell to tourists, cramming 6 million bones from over 150 cemeteries, don't scare even the most timid of visitors. A group of Australians stand in front of the exit and find the visit "artistic and romantic". Antonio and Alessandro, two Italians, agree that this is the "coolest and most fun" exhibition they've ever seen in the capital. Screened like a cellar, this part of the quarries features wide aisles and a straight, resurfaced floor.
Nothing to do with the quarries condemned by the city of Paris, a refuge for adventurers in search of thrills. 350 kilometers of galleries - dug to mine limestone - forming a city beneath the city. A macabre city beneath the sewers and metro. The price of adventure: a fine ranging from 60 to 3750 euros if you're unlucky enough to cross paths with a cataflic (a policeman from the Brigade de l'Inspection Générale des Carrières).
My best friends in the belly of Paris? A flashlight. And "Sauvage" (cataphiles never give their real first names) who, at 39, already has 18 years of descents behind him. This building janitor by day has made the catacombs his playground by night.
To survive, the tourist in me (i.e. someone descending for the first time) has to respect certain rules.
RULE NUMBER 1: PROTECT YOUR HEAD.
"If you break a leg, we can always get you out," Sauvage warned me. But if you fracture your skull..." So I watch out for my noggin when I go through a cat flap, which is more like a mouse hole than a cat hole. After two hours of wandering through a dark, disquieting gut, of having to let my legs drag in murky, icy water, my ears finally adjust to the oppressive silence. The silence of death. "When you hear a noise, the contrast with the silence can lead to some pretty serious bouts of paranoia," admits Lena, who descended in 2014. Old memories of horror films resurface, especially as the mythology of the catacombs contributes to this psychosis, with stories of cataphiles lost and dead underground."
I WAS EXPECTING HUMAN CORPSES, BUT ALL I FOUND WERE DEAD BOTTLES...
We set down in a large room known to regulars as "La Plage", where the walls, which have been completely tagged, have been given a new lease of life. Time to bring out the candles, wine and beers.
To enjoy a drink underground, you don't have to be claustrophobic. Nor should you be afraid of emerging with your body riddled with bruises. And don't be afraid to spend endless minutes in cold, brownish water. If you're afraid of bugs, don't bother. Scutigers (a kind of centipede) have made the quarries their home. You need to be in good health: an evening in the catacombs could indeed be akin to an army survival course. "Be careful where you step," warns Sauvage. I could fall into an unconfined, endless pit.
We set off again. I crawl over sandy, then muddy ground, flashlight in mouth, on the lookout for a possible landslide. The rat-sized gravel tortures my knees, which are already bruised from the evening. Gritting my teeth, I can't stop myself from crying out in pain, tiredness and irritation. Especially when I have to slither like a snake through a hole 50 centimetres in diameter. I'm stuck.
When, after seven hours, I finally manage to extricate myself from this gloomy maze, I'm delivered. It's three o'clock in the morning, and yet the moonlight and streetlamps are so powerful that it feels like daylight. From now on, if I come across a soul white with dust, chalk and sand in the streets of Paris, I'll know that it has probably returned from the Kingdom of the Dead.
From article: https://www.neonmag.fr/viree-clandestine-dans-les-vraies-catacombes-de-paris-471108.html
