Walks in Père-Lachaise
There are cemeteries where you pay your respects, and then there is Père-Lachaise, where you stroll as if through a novel. It opened in 1804 with just thirteen graves: nobody wanted this plot of land on the edge of Paris. It took some cunning, moving Molière, La Fontaine, Héloïse and Abélard here, to start the fashion. It has never stopped. Today, across forty-four hectares of cobbled lanes, sloping paths and tall trees, lie more than seventy thousand graves, and it is the most visited necropolis in the world.
This walk takes you to meet those who made it legendary. You enter by the Porte des Amandiers, greet Colette, then head down to Héloïse and Abélard, the most famous lovers of the Middle Ages. Chopin is waiting a little further on, then Jim Morrison, surrounded by his admirers, then Molière and La Fontaine, neighbours in stone. Further on is the grave of Édith Piaf, before the Mur des Fédérés, where the last fighters of the Commune were shot on 28 May 1871, and where everyone falls silent. Finally, Oscar Wilde, Delacroix, Balzac and Proust accompany you to the Porte Gambetta.
Here, household names rub shoulders with anonymous people and forgotten sculptors: Père-Lachaise is also an open-air museum, with Gothic chapels, romantic steles and grandiose monuments. You see how a whole life can fit into a few metres of stone.
Each stop is a story, with its division and path so you never get lost. The map leads you from one grave to the next, in the shortest order, so you do not go round in circles in this maze of greenery. Allow two to three hours of relaxed walking, good shoes and a little curiosity.
Come as you would to visit old friends: they have a lot to tell you.