Day three and we set out early (ish) to head out of the city to the very famous Chateau de Versailles which was a royal house during the time of all those crazy Louie fellows 😉 Louie the XIV moved his entire court there. The result was that something that what used to be a second rate place for royals to hang out, got dressed up beyond most people’s wildest imaginations at the time.
It is a short metro hop out to the estate and fairly easy get tickets once you are there. The estate itself is huge. This is a long day tourist activity – wear comfy shoes! The place is divided up into three main areas to check out, the main palace, the gardens (which are free) and lastly the Petiit Trianon palace with the hamlet village nearby, which was where Marie-Antoinette used to spend a lot of time. (Petit Trianon was given to her by Louis XVI and the village was built for her as well).
The never ending gardens!
The day is very interesting, but you need plenty of pit stops to keep your enthusiasm up! We explored the gardens on one side first, there were lots of little fountains and areas to go into. The King and Queens gardens were cool, but the King’s had more flowers and such. There are statues everywhere, influenced by Roman mythology. Louie XIV quite fancied Apollo the most, so the gardens are lush with Apollo statues.
In the King’s garden, happy to have found some flowers.
This theme continues in the grand palace, large high ceiling rooms with marble walls and fireplaces. We did a tour with an English guide which was quite good. There are themed rooms with whole ceiling paintings that have been kept restored, along with many other original portraits and furniture. It is mind boggling – the culture was so based around the king. It was expected that the royals be on display all the time, even in the bedchambers. There is so much history in the place, especially since Napolean later took up residence there.
Our tour took a bit over and hour and was pretty crowded, which seems to be unavoidable in the hot season. We wandered back out and down through the other half of the gardens, towards the little palace. I should mention the giant canals in the middle as you walk down. Louie also loved Venice quite a bit. There are plenty of coffee places and rest stops along the way to admire the place at your own pace. I think a picnic would be pretty good out there!
The palace, so shiny and gold!
Petite Trianon is very pretty, and it’s easier to cope with I guess. It isn’t jaw droppingly magnificent like the palace, as it wasn’t there for show. IT is still worth a look, Greg wasn’t that fussed about it. There is an outside marble pillar area, where the royals could sit and have lunch overlooking the gardens. Marie-Atoinette was into roses apparently 😉 You can walk still further an check out the hamlet village, which contains some old cottage style house, which are all very pretty.
We slowly wandered back, it was pretty late in the day by this time! We still managed to muster up enough energy to go out for dinner!
Note:
1. During our long walk we saw a bunch of tourists on little golf buggies hooning around the estate…and slightly more funny looking, a group on segueways!
2. My take on the very packed French history is not to be taken seriously at any point. But it did pique my interest in that period.
The Queen’s Hamlet was built for Marie-Antoinette about 1783 so that she could play at being a milkmaid, so we were told. When we visited Versailles we bought the Visitor’s Guide as it has wonderful photos that we found were difficult to take on our camers (along with the fact there were always other tourists in the way).
Beautiful little house.