Advertisement
Published: June 21st 2015
After packing our few picnic things, it was time to jump on the beautifully decorated train to Versailles for a picnic and a show - "Les Grand Eaux Nocturnes et La Serenade Royale de Louis XIV" . This one of the few things I pre-booked early. I thought watching people dance to live music in period costume in the Hall of Mirrors would really bring history to life.
The train was really easy, and we just had a short stroll to the Chateau after the trip. We stopped to load up on caffeine on the way as Isabel was starting to flag after our journey. It was a good opportunity to practice our French - "Un caffe au lait, sil vous plait" is turning into the phrase of the trip so far, as I am downing plenty of coffee in an attempt to keep going! We are surprised that the café owners generally understand us, or that an apologetic smile and a "Je suis tres desolee..........." together with something about how terrible our French is seems to make them miraculously switch to excellent English.
At that point I was beginning to question the wisdom of such a late night
after our long plane ride, but it was really fun, and there was a festival atmosphere in the gardens afterwards as people strolled around listening to beautiful French Baroque music and looking at all the fountains in full flight. We bought a couple of glasses of good red wine and sat at a little table overlooking the gorgeous parterre garden while we ate all our treats from the shopping expedition. Baguette, brie au truffes, big fat cherries and fig paste - yum!
I had underestimated how gorgeous the gardens really were. Last time we were at Versailles I don't think any of the fountains had water running, and it made such a difference to how spectacular they looked. We began to explore and look at all the fountains lit so beautifully for the evening the hedges made everything a wonderful surprise as the paths opened up into various courtyards filled with sculpture and running water. After the grand finale of fireworks over the Grand Canal, we all agreed that it seemed just the right thing to do on your first evening in France! It was truly spectacular, although we started to feel the toll of having been awake for
most of 40 hours by the time we hobbled home from the Metro at midnight.
Advertisement
Tot: 0.2s; Tpl: 0.031s; cc: 8; qc: 50; dbt: 0.0879s; 1; m:domysql w:travelblog (10.17.0.13); sld: 1;
; mem: 1.1mb
