Day 22

Today, me, Isabelle, Camille, Zana, Grace, Otis and Eleanor went to Versailles.

We took the Metro for a few stops, then transferred over to the RER. We got to the Versailles train station after about an hour.

By the way, French advertisements are WEIRD. Here's one for Orangina that we see everywhere:

Anyway, we bought our (very expensive) tickets online beforehand, so we were able to skip the atrocious lines. We still had to queue for almost an hour to go through security though. Here's a picture of the palace from the bottom of the hill in the town. You can't really see the whole thing. It's absolutely ginormous.

The palace itself is about what I'd expected. Just room after room of mindboggling luxury. Everything inch was gilded.

Isabelle kindly took a few pictures of me!

Anyway, the real surprise-- and the one that kept us there all day-- was the gardens. Looking out from the palace, there's a vista that goes for miles. But what we didn't realize at first was that the Versailles estate goes for 8 million square meters and includes two other palaces-- the Grand Trianon and the Petit Trianon-- and THEIR respective gardens.

Here's an aerial photograph taken from HALFWAY DOWN the vista, looking back at the palace (found this online.)

 And here's the rest of the vista:

On either side you've got manicured gardens with hedges hundreds of feet high

We found lots of little nooks

And had a picnic in the less manicured part of the grounds

It just kept going... and going... and going...  I think we spent about five hours walking in the grounds. Everywhere there were gorgeous flower beds and busts of famous people, fountains, and Grecian-looking stone structures. The two other palaces were like mini versions of Versailles, though their interior decor was far less gilded. We learned that those palaces were built as "recreational residences" for the King. Huh? As if Versailles wasn't luxurious enough! I suppose his ministers didn't follow him when he went there.

Anyway, it was a LONNGGGGG day. I was ready to leave a few hours into exploring the gardens. My legs were sore, and my capacity for wonder was diminishing. It was just so overwhelming! Anyway, I'm really glad that we went. It was quite a spectacle.