Versailles!!!!

NOTE: I posted about my day yesterday under this entry. Blogger was broken yesterday, so I couldn’t post! Lame, I know. But read yesterday’s before today’s! Merci! J

Today was the most epic of all days thus far in Paris.

Today we went to Versailles!!!! I’ve been obsessed with this castle for as long as I can remember. I even wrote a 13-page paper (in French) about it for my French 361 class last semester. Louis XIV is my favorite!!!! Love le roi soleil! Needless to say, I was absolutely ecstatic to go today.

We met with the Croissy group (Casi, Kara, Paul, Toni, Caleb, Amy, and I) at 8:00am sharp to grab a bus, to another bus, to another bus to Versailles. It was a LONG ride! We had a few mishaps today too. A girl in our group named Kara accidentally bought a parking ticket thinking that it was a bus ticket and got a nasty fine from the bus patrol people. I didn’t even know they patrolled! I felt awful! 20 Euros for a bus ticket fine to be waived is crazy. L We were also supposed to meet a group that lives in the city at the entrance of the castle, but we couldn't find all of them! We found Lacey and Sarah eventually but never found Mckenna and Erin.

We got to Versailles (the city) at 10:10am and were STARVING! So naturally, we searched for a pastry shop, found one, and partook of the deliciousness that is French pastries. I got a raspberry croissant thing and a key lime-ish tart. So delish! After breakfast, it was off to the castle!

Caleb got a picture of me when my raspberry fell off of my pastry. I was a little bit upset!

Once we got to the ticket office, the line was HUGE! We waited for about 20 minutes in line hoping that our “magic” student art cards would get us in for free. Paul went first to talk to a lady at the ticket booth. I wanted to go with him (I was nervous about speaking French to them...no clue why), but he made me go to a different cashier by myself. I explained that I was a student, showed her my card, and she said I could go in for free! I must be either 1) very charming or 2) speak decent French! I’d like to think that it’s a combination of both. J Paul, on the other hand, was told that the card wasn’t valid without a passport or something, so she was super rude to him and said he had to pay. Glad I went to my own line! Once we all presented our cards at the visitor’s center/security person, she let us all into the chateau for free. Magical! Every different building that we went to today was free admission! We totally saved like 20 Euros. It was beautiful!

So I’m gonna try something a little bit different today. I’ll give a history of the chateau of Versailles (courtesy of Wikipedia) and then post a bunch of pictures and explain them a little bit. After all, a picture is worth a thousand words, right? I took over 200 today so I’ll have to narrow it down to the best ones. Oh! And I’ll post some videos too. Get excited!

So the history (brief one, of course) of Versailles:

“The Palace of Versailles, or simply Versailles, is a royal château in Versailles, the Île-de-France region of France. In French, it is known as the Château de Versailles.

When the château was built, Versailles was a country village; today, however, it is a suburb of Paris, some twenty kilometres southwest of the French capital. The court of Versailles was the centre of political power in France from 1682, when Louis XIV moved from Paris, until the royal family was forced to return to the capital in October 1789 after the beginning of the French Revolution. Versailles is therefore famous not only as a building, but as a symbol of the system of absolute monarchy of the Ancien Régime.”

The article is massive, so if you want to further educate yourselves, go to: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Palace_of_Versailles

Me touching the most BEAUTIFUL golden gates that mark the entrance to the castle

Entrance to the castle. How amazing is that?!

Ceilings of the first room in the castle

Ceiling in the second room

Really cool sculpture of Louis XIV before the Hall of Mirrors

Entrance to the Hall of Mirrors

Pretty sculptures made of gold along the sides

I'm just looking at myself in a mirror that countless French kings and queens have looked in...no big deal

More statues

The queen's bedroom. So FANCY!

Represent, America! In the hall of battles, the Battle of Yorktown is depicted. Paul failed at getting the whole painting in, but George Washington is at Versailles!

Chateau (part of it) view from the gardens

Some of the ladies (Me, Amy, and Kara) in front of the castle! Can you tell I'm excited to be there? :)

Incredible view of the canal from the landing next to the chateau

Me and the canal

Amazing fountain #1! I know there's a story about it...something about people turning into frogs. But I can't remember.

The Apollo fountain!

Amy, Kara, Casi, Toni, and me in front of the Apollo fountain

We got to rent row boats to ride in on the canal! Caleb, Casi, Kara, and Amy were on one boat and Paul, Toni, and I had another one.

Then we ran into Sarah and Lacey and Lacey hopped into our boat too! SO MUCH FUN!!!!

There were a million pretty flowers...so I took pictures of a lot of them

Of course we had to have a jumping picture. Love Versailles!

Fleur

Encore

The Grand Trianon - kind of a home away from the castle for when the king wanted space

The Petit Trianon - Marie Antoinette's getaway house. The king built it for her so that she could escape the stresses of the castle. (It was originally built for the King's mistress but he eventually gave it to Marie Antoinette).

View of the main castle from the farm grounds

On our way to Marie Antoinette's farm/village. She had a whole "peasant" village constructed so that she could see what it was like to be poor. It's like a village straight out of a Disney movie. So cool!!!!

One of the cottages/gardens

Love me some lillies

GORGEOUS purple flowers. See the bee?

Another cottage in the village

And another

BEST DAY EVER!!!!

Well those are only a few pictures, but I have more of pretty much everything if you want to see more!

After Versailles, we got on the RER C to head back to Paris. I successfully crashed for the entire ride back into the city! It was a nice nap after a long day on our feet.

When we were trying to get off of the train, Paul dropped his Carte Navigo (train pass) on the train and couldn't get it back before the doors shut. It was a major bummer! They cost almost 100 euro for the month, so I hope that we can figure something out for him so that he can get into town with everyone. After trying to see if anyone got off the train at the next stop to return it, we decided that it was time for dinner. We went to the Latin Quarter and I had my first real restaurant meal in Paris! I ordered Spaghetti Carbonara (memories, right Momma?) and it was DIVINE!

After a long day full of fun, it was time to get on the RER A and go home to Croissy. Today was such a blast and I'm SO glad that I was able to go! Tomorrow: Brussels, Belgium with Mckenna! (Anything you want me to grab while I'm there, family??) Until tomorrow!

Here's a fun memory of today: me trying to row the rowboat.