Ver*sigh*.... Si Belle

Bonjour!
This post is a bit late but better late than never.

We were lucky enough to get to take a little trip to Verseilles last Saturday. Verseilles is home to one of the greatest cheateaus (castles) in the world. It was commissioned by Louis XIV, the self-proclaimed Sun King, to be the most luxurious castle in all of France. He succeeded, and now has his name on one of the greatest castles in the world.

As you walk up to the chateau at Verseilles, you see a building that is rather long and large, but for the most part ordinary. Until you see the golden gates on it, and then you realize that it is not so ordinary.

We took a tour of the inside of the castle first. And it's hard to imagine that someone actually LIVED in this place. It was clearly built to impress people, and the rooms in the castle are the equivalent of having an movie theatre in your house today. We walked into one bedroom and saw a bed. I thought well this must be where the king slept, but psych! It's just for show. Regardless to say the inside is magnificent and if you get the chance to check out all the pictures on facebook (when I finally am able to put them up) you'll get to see all the pictures of the inside: the bedrooms, the ante chambers, and the loooong beautiful hall of mirrors.

Let me just stop here to mention what else was going on at the castle of Verseilles. Jeff Koons is an American artist and he makes large metal sculptures that look like plastic or are models of real people or real things. As shown in the picture in this part (Michael Jackson and Bubbles), you can see that these sculptures are blatantly contemporary. Now what would contemporary AMERICAN art be doing in one of the oldest of FRENCH structures? The answer eludes the French as well as myself. To me, this whole exhibit is a joke. Why would you put an attraction in a castle as beautiful as Verseilles? The ticket sales must have been slow and they must have wanted something REALLY drastic to boost them. But this exhibit is degrading. Enough said.

We finally went outside to the gardens, and this part was truly the most beautiful sight that I have seen in Paris so far. The fountains and the flowers and the beautiful rows of trees. It was simply marvelous.

As we ventured through the gardens, we saw many different structures that were built throughout the grounds. There was a small mansion where Marie-Antoinette 'dressed up and played with the sheep' as Katy put it. Another small structure where Marie-Antoinette entertained her guest. But the most stunning sight, something straight out of a fairytale story book, was this small pond with a few buildings around it that just make you want to sit down and have a picnic. There were SWANS swimming in the pond. TWO of them! It was awesome. I figured out how to take black and white pictures, so I took some nice ones that will be on facebook soon.

So after a looong day of walking we finally wrapped up our tour of verseilles and took the train back to Paris. Katy and I went to the Moulin Rouge and more of Montmartre that night... but that's for a later post. :-)

I'd also like to say a special hello to my Nana who I know is reading this from home printed out from the internet. Miss you Nana and I hope you're enjoying this little bit of France!

A la prochaine
Justin