It was an educational experience. I wanted to get a couple of cans of fizzy to drink, and we noticed that most of the multipacks on the shelves had been torn open and that cans were missing from them. At first we thought that people had ripped the packaging open and stolen a single can, but that didn't make sense since so many packs had been tampered with. They would have to be the least subtle thieves ever. It then dawned on us that the French aren't really know for their soda drinking habits. Their water is famous; their wine drinking infamous...but, had we ever heard of anyone washing down their coq au vin with a can of sprite? We theorized that maybe people don't buy a whole multi-pack (terribly uncouth don't you know). Maybe people just grab the one can that is more than enough, and be done with it. Since we couldn't find individual bottles anywhere we put our theory to the test. It took us a good few minutes to build up the courage to do it, but after glancing up and down the aisle to make sure that nobody was looking, we ripped open a packet of drinks and quickly placed a couple in the trolley. We strode away, outwardly nonchalant, inwardly feeling like criminals. At the check out came the moment of truth. Were we to be reprimanded? The man in front of us was buying wine, lots of wine. He looked at our fizzy like it was poison. Note to self- it's ok to bust into multi-packs in Paris.
Stocked up for the day, we navigated our way along the underground to the train station, munching on our newly acquired breakfast of chocolate brioche as we went. We made good time since we'd ditched the push chair in favour of the Baby-Bjorn. Before we knew it we were buying our train tickets and, since none of the trains had their destination posted, we were desperately hoping that we'd boarded the right one. It was an enormous double decker train that hadn't been updated since the seventies and we were almost the only passengers aboard. Thankfully, as a few more people filtered through we heard mention of Versailles-Rive Gauche, which put our minds at rest since that was where we intended to disembark.
Charlotte, who had somehow fallen asleep in the busy Gare St-Lazare, spent the journey napping, only waking as we arrived in Versailles. We were a little wary about leaving the city centre. We were worried that we'd board the wrong train, or miss our stop, or not be able to figure out how to get back again, but it turned out to be an easy adventure for us. From the train station we had a ten minute walk through the sleepy city. A right turn and a left turn and a wide cobbled street later, and there it stood in front of us, the Chateau de Versailles; the Palace that out-did every other.
Standing in the interior court of the Palace
We'd bought tickets to tour the Palace beforehand so we thought we'd avoid any queue's. How wrong we were. A line wound its way around the courtyard and even with our tickets in hand, we found ourselves at the back of it. It's not so terribly hard to wait in line though when your baby is well rested and you have such surroundings to look at. My Mum told me that I'd seen the palace before. She and my Dad had taken us to see it when we had our family holiday as children; We'd had our photo taken by one of the fountains in the gardens. I had no recollection of this at all. As my Mum said, "Maybe if they'd had a keyring." We hadn't gone on the tour on that occasion, so it was the first time going inside the Chateau for all of us. After making it through security, we found ourselves in the courtyard and we spent quite a while just taking in the building- the pillars, and arches, and gold- and we found a spot on the facade where we changed Charlotte's nappy, so that was dead classy.
If we hadn't been blown away by the scale of the place while standing outside, we certainly were after venturing inside. We were ushered along an enormous corridor, lined with giant marble pillars, which led to the apartments of the Sun Kings daughters. Huge square rooms with delicately carved walls, each daughter with a sitting room all of her own. A music room with floor to ceiling windows where the gardens can be seen from wherever you stand in the room. These private apartments for Louis XIV's daughters were gorgeous, feminine, and each a little different depending on which girl they were designed for, but as we saw more of the Palace it was obvious that they were private quarters. It was in other areas of the palace, where the King did his entertaining, that he really showed off.
The Royal Chapel, seen from the ground floor
There was a huge crowd around the doors of one of the rooms, and since I can't read a map to save my life, I didn't have my bearings and wasn't sure what everyone was looking at. I wrestled my way to the front to see what all of the fuss was about, and once I got there I never wanted to move again. I just wanted to stand, and look, and be amazed. The Chapel, which was Louis XIV's last major building project, is stunning. The floor is inlaid marble. The ceiling is adorned with paintings and sculptures from both the Old and the New Testament. The walls are lined with white stone arches and pillars, gilded with gold. The ceiling of the chapel is the highest of any in the palace, and above the ground floor entry way is a balcony, where the Royal family alone would sit and look out over all and listen to Mass. After moving on to see other areas of the Palace, I was excited to see the Chapel once again, this time from the balcony perspective once we got upstairs. It's kind of heartbreaking that the architect who was building the place died before it was completed.
There's no doubting that the grand apartments were for show, with their allegorical paintings on the ceilings. Room after room dedicated to the Greek Deity's. With the Apotheosis of Hercules depicted above their head, I'm sure nobody would ever question the power and prestige of the King who summoned them.
After a while, one grand masculine room begins to look like any other, but then you step into the Hall of Mirrors. The 233-ft hall is one of the most famous rooms in the world. The walls are lined by beveled mirrors, which reflect the 17 arcaded windows, which in turn overlook the gardens. Everywhere is gold, and light, and Chandeliers. We walked slowly from one end to the other, staring up at the painted ceiling and into the reflections of the mirrors. Charlotte, who had pretty much had enough at this point suddenly calmed down and seemed to enjoy it as much as we did. One of the most famous rooms in the world. The room where the German Empire was proclaimed, and I'd almost forgotten that we were standing in the corridor where the Treaty of Versailles was signed in 1919. For some reason I never imagined that those signatures were put to paper in such decadent surroundings. It seems a little distasteful really.
We had a hurried look at the Kings Bedroom, which you enter through the hall of Mirrors. Rich and grand, and the hidden doors that people could sneak in and out of didn't go unnoticed. We made our way back outside, where we found a quiet spot in the Gardens. (Or it was quiet until we arrived with a hungry Charlotte.) Lunching out of the way, we had a little time to enjoy the gardens. In fact, we barely touched upon the 247 acre grounds. Somewhere, we knew there was Marie Antoinette's own Palace but from where we were, we couldn't even spot it. We did find the orangery, which has to be geometric gardening perfected. Charlotte was back in high spirits with a full belly and she enjoyed the fountains and bright colours of the flower beds.
It seemed like wherever we stood, the Palace just looked bigger and bigger. I don't know if it's even possible to take a photo of the place that even beings to do it justice. Knowing that one of the King's purposes for building the Palace was to keep tabs of the French nobility, it still seemed hard to believe that the sprawling Chateau before us once housed all the nobles that had been summoned to live there out of suspicion. No wonder the peasants on the estates were planting the seeds of revolution- it seems like they must have been the only people who weren't invited to move in! For us, all of these centuries later, a tour of the place was an incredible way to spend the morning; I'm sure a long walk around the gardens would be a lovely way to spend the afternoon, though we had other lovely things planned. So it was back to Paris.....
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