Having been to Paris a few times, K and I have not explored beyond Paris to visit the Palace of Versailles before. Hence we decided to put Versailles on our itinerary, as friends who have been there have said it is definitely worth a visit.
From Senlis it was more than an hour's drive to Versailles. We had to drive around Paris to get to Versailles. We were careful not to enter the boundaries of Paris as it is a low emission zone and we didn't have any sticker/ pass that allows us to drive through it. This was to be a big day for us as we were expecting a full on day of walking and exploring.
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| Arriving at this magnificent palace with real gold on the roofs |
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| Whee! |
And... we were right.
Versailles is a city but most people go straight to the palace and that was what we did. We simply had no time to look outside the palace walls because this palace is massive! We walked so much that day and barely covered half of it.
As we had a time slot, we had to make sure we weren't late. The usual checks - bags, security, vaccination - before we were finally through the door and into one of the squares within the palace. We did the House tour which was meant to be 90minutes but it felt much longer. K loves history and this place was amazing for him. Typically I would be keen too and don't get me wrong, I did. But as soon as the kids started fussing because they were bored, my attention shifted to them and away from the paintings and rooms. The kids did their best but they were confined to their buggies and moving from room to room looking at all the paintings bored them out eventually. Isabelle kept asking if we could leave, and Gabriel kept crying and whining. Eventually I had to make two bottles of milk for them - their comfort food - as it was approaching lunch time and we had no idea when would we finally emerge from the house.
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| Patient Gabriel |
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| It was in this great hall that I stood in a corner, making two bottles of milk for the kids haha |
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| Playful Izzy who kept asking "when are we leaving?" |
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| In the famous Hall of Mirrors |
K did really well and packed a sandwich lunch for everyone that morning. He even packed fruits and yoghurt pots for the kids, and juice too. We weren't sure the lunch options on this estate and wanted to play safe, and decided a picnic lunch would be fun and economical too. Once we got into the gardens, wow our minds were blown. It's huge! Where do we start? Where do we picnic? We decided on a spot for our lunch. After lunch Gabriel fell asleep on the buggy. We studied the map to get our bearings and we decided that taking the estate train would be a more efficient method to see more things. We had to wake poor Gabriel up and he was not happy. We alighted at the lake which was near another garden with the different open areas with piped in classical music which was very nice. We then spent the afternoon exploring this part of the estate.
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Look at this! It's only one small part of the gardens. We only did a bird's eye view of this garden.
Had no time to walk down the many steps to walk amongst the plants and trees. |
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| Bird's eye view is sufficient |
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| The steps leading down to that garden |
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| The garden right outside the palace |
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| This was another part of the huge estate, right after we alighted from the estate train |
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| The musical fountains |
Finally after a few hours exploring that afternoon we left close to 6pm which is the time they close. People started strolling out towards the main gate and of course, taking the chance to snap their last few photos of this tres grande et manifique palace. We were really tired and were so glad we parked our car near the gate.
And then the parking charge hit us straight in our heads when we saw the fee at the barrier. 27EUR! Whoa! Of course they will make you pay an arm and a leg for it, hehe the price for parking right outside the palace gates. I can imagine that most people with tired legs after a day of walking, would by now willingly pay for this parking charge anyway.
Overall a very interesting day spent looking at this magnificent and grand palace. If you would like to cover more ground, I would say two full days here. I'm sure there are other touristy places outside the gates within this city, but definitely overshadowed by the Palace of Versailles. You just can't trump this place.
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