Not a new post, but it was out of order, so I moved it.
I wanted to take my Mom to Versailles while she was here. Despite having been to Paris on more than one occasion, she had never been out to the palace, which seemed a bit odd, given that it seems to be, judging by the crowds at least, at the top of everyone's list of things to do while in Paris. We thought about going on a weekend, when, at least in theory, the fountains in the gardens would be running, until we discovered that not only would the adults cost an extra 7€, we would also have to pay for the kids to get into the gardens (under 18s are typically free for national museum sites in France). Blaise and I both thought that (based on our experience) the fountains weren't worth the extra cost, and so we decided to go on a weekday. That meant either a Wednesday, when the kids are out of school, or the 13th, which was Ascension Day and therefore a day off from school.
The weather forecast for Wednesday, May 12, promised to be drizzly in the morning, with clearing skies and sun for the afternoon. Since we would start inside the palace and then work our way out to the grounds and the "outbuildings," that sounded workable. After a trip to the grocery store for lunch food, we headed to the RER station. Ninety minutes,2 transfers, and a brisk 15 minute walk later, we were ready to buy our tickets to the chateau. Then a quick trip through security, and we, along with approximately 2.47 million other people, were inside the chateau. (We have friends who went to Versailles the following Sunday, and who, evidently, spent a hour in line to buy tickets and then had to wait in a huge line at security.)
First stop, the main palace, which, as I said earlier, was very crowded, perhaps due to the 40+ tour buses lined up outside. Our tickets included a free audioguide, but by the time I realized where we went to pick them up, the tide of people had carried us past them, as well as the maps to the chateau. Fortunately, it's difficult to get too much off track at Versailles--you just have to let the crowds carry you along and you're sure to find your way out eventually. We looked into the ground floor of the palace chapel, which was blocked off (you could see in, but not go in). My kids were quite disappointed to discover that there was a school group inside the chapel, where they weren't allowed to go, and I got to hear about how they never got to go on interesting field trips and it wasn't fair. Then we headed off through the various rooms of the palace. I won't bore you with the details as I'm sure that there's a virtual tour of Versailles somewhere on the internet. (Try here, for example.)
Next, a bathroom stop followed by a trip out into the gardens for lunch. Did I say that it was supposed to be clearing and sunny by afternoon? Well, perhaps it was sunny somewhere, but it was still heavily overcast where we were, though at least it had stopped drizzling. We found an out of the way bench, and proceeded to eat our lunch. Then we headed through the gardens in the general direction of the grand canal. En route, we spotted several dirt paths snaking away into the trees, and the kids begged to be allowed to explore them. Eventually I acquiesced, and so they bolted off down the trail, with Mom and I following at a more leisurely pace. (Blaise decided that he had too much to do to be able to afford to take an entire Wednesday off, particularly as he'd not been able to work very much at all on Tuesday afternoon because of our visit to the Gobelins, so he decided not to come with us.) After a brief game of hide and seek in the bushes and fallen tree trunks, we lured them out and finished our walk to the grand canal.
From there, we headed down the walk to the Grand Trianon, where the king could go if the pressures of palace life got to be too much for him. Cherry had picked up a small stick on the way through the gardens, and woman working security was kind enough to ask her to put it into my coat pocket while we were inside, rather than ordering her to throw it away outside. Cherry, however, was quite embarrassed by the whole affair, and insisted that she needed to be carried through the rest of the Trianon.
Next, we went to Marie Antoinette's estate. By this point all three kids were beginning to get a bit cranky, and so we only saw the Petit Trianon. There are also various gardens and other buildings associated with her estate, not to mention a working farm (which we saw some of on our way back to the exit to the gardens). The kitchen was by far the best part, and we talked about what was missing--obviously the refrigerator, since there was no electricity back then, but there also didn't seem to be any places for food storage, or facilities for washing hands, dishes, or food. Perhaps the food was brought in just before preparation, and washing was done outside.
We had promised the kids that they could play around outside if they cooperated inside, so we let them play for a little while, though not as long as they would have liked. Then we headed back past Marie Antoinette's farm (sheep and horses) to the main palace and then out and back to the train station.
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