I was finally able to do the walking tour that I heard so much about. Three of us met outside the Fontaine Michele where a "free" walking tour met. There is not a set fare for the tour. Instead, you pay after the tour is over what you felt it was worth. I was told to pay around five Euro so we went with that. During the three hour walking tour, our guide took us around and gave us stories of various things that happened in French history around the buildings we were walking by. This includes stories of the French guillotine, Marie Antoinette, the early history of Paris, and the resistance during World War II.
One thing that I learned was by looking at a statue, how to tell the cause of death of any individual riding a horse. If the front two legs are down, it means that the individual died from natural causes. If one front leg of the horse is up, it means that the individual died from unnatural causes (assassination, etc). If both legs are up, it means that the individual died from battle.
After the tour, we went to the Notre Dame cathedral. The gothic architecture was incredible. The thing that I liked the best was the display that was shown how the cathedral kept expanding from the original design.
That night, we went to the Industry Museum which was a large museum that was kind of random. Exhibits had an array of differences that varied from cat food to packaging peanuts to space rovers. One thing that I found interesting was the display of the industrial revolution. It had interactive displays that allowed us to gain more perspective on technology in the industrial era.
