noctilien

in paris, the metro runs till 2 am weekends, but the RER (the train lines that run out into the suburbs, but also across paris) apparently does not run that late. last night, this led me to take the metro to a st. michel to transfer to the RER to go home, but regrettably left me stuck. there does exist a night bus (not as cool as the Knight Bus; see Harry Potter) that runs through the night, which is called the noctilien.

the problem with the noctilien is that it has practically no documentation. at the stops, it tells you the name of the other stops, but has no map of where they are, like the regular bus lines. thus, you have to kind of guess from your knowledge of paris geography where it goes. it is also difficult to find an entire map of the noctilien system. i actually have one, but unfortunately neglected to bring it last night.

consequently, i found a few noctilien stops, but they did not go where i wanted to go. so i walked. st. michel is the stop right by notre dame and the latin quarter. my apartment is by the eiffel tower and the champ de mars. so i walked halfway across paris, perhaps two miles or so. the nice part was that this was all right by the seine, so the walk was pretty, with the exception of the huge lit "bateaux mouches" (the tourist boats) sign. i could have taken a taxi, but it was a nice walk, and i was not tired. the moral of the story: take your noctilien map when you are out late.

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just a note: i've got a huge pile of emails/facebook messages to sort out. if it's you i haven't gotten back to in a timely manner, sorry, i'm not ignoring you, i'm just behind a bit.