Nortre Dame de Paris

After our bus tour we crossed the bridge on our way to The Nortre Dame Cathedral.
Here we come Quasimodo.
I have always wanted to visit the Cathedral from Victor Hugo's book Hunchback of Notre Dame.  

The Cathedral is over 800 years old. The entire population participated in the construction, some offered money, others labor, while others helped with knowledge and the planning of the cathedral.
The construction began in 1163  many tailors, sculptures, carpenters, and glass blowers worked endless hours to complete the cathedral in a little over 100 years.  The building was finally completed  1272. 

The cathedral is dedicated to Mary, the Mother of Jesus hence the name
"Notre-Dame" or "Our Lady".
There are 37 different works of art that show Mary from sculptures, paintings and stain glass. 

Here are the famous Gargoyles.  I kept waiting for them to come alive.  They looked so real.
These Gargoyles are carved stone sculptures.  Some of the Gargoyles have long spouts to help the water escape from off the roof and away from the side of the building.  They really were pretty fascinating.  

The guy holding his head is Saint Dennis the man who brought Christianity to Paris, France.
He was beheaded because of this act and legend said that he picked his head up and continued to preach to the people. 

The cathedral for the most part was super dark.  They did have several chandeliers that helped to light the beautiful architectural around. But it really was quite dark throughout the cathedral.  

You can see all three levels of the cathedral. 

I wish I could have heard the Grand Organ Play.

Look at all the beautiful stain glass windows.
This cathedral was just beautiful.

Rose Window  also called a wheel window,
where beautiful stain glass tells Biblical stories and beautifully decorates the Cathedral.

I took some fun pictures as I changed the colors.
It looks really awesome.

Look at all the details on this architect beauty. 

Nortre Dame de Paris came alive at night. 

Beautiful!

This was the back of Nortre Dame from the boat cruise.