The next few posts of Paris are a lot more chill than than the earlier ones so it is going to be going a lot faster... Again I'm sorry! I'm not good with computers at all :) So this is just gonna be mostly pictures with my comments thrown in every now and again... As well as some of the history... But you can skip that part if you like. It interests me because when I see something beautiful and old I wanted to know the reasons behind it, the history, how it can to be, etc...
Wednesday morning I woke up and I met the kids of the family we were staying with... Stanislas, Capucine, and Valentine, the adorable big-cheeked baby! High energy and adorable :) I love kids!
I had a croissant for breakfast. Haha that was my first one in France. Special huh? It is about a 20 minute drive from where we were staying to the city of Versailles which is pretty much just a suburb of Paris with a giant castle there :) Capucine was so funny because she kept calling me Melissa and she would ask/tell me things in French but she talked so funny and kid-ish I guess that it was nearly impossible to comprehend anything! I was instantly in shock at how big this place was! To be exact... 700 rooms, more than 2,000 windows, 1,250 fireplaces, 67 staircases, and covers an area of 19,800 acres of land.
I had a croissant for breakfast. Haha that was my first one in France. Special huh? It is about a 20 minute drive from where we were staying to the city of Versailles which is pretty much just a suburb of Paris with a giant castle there :) Capucine was so funny because she kept calling me Melissa and she would ask/tell me things in French but she talked so funny and kid-ish I guess that it was nearly impossible to comprehend anything! I was instantly in shock at how big this place was! To be exact... 700 rooms, more than 2,000 windows, 1,250 fireplaces, 67 staircases, and covers an area of 19,800 acres of land.
The site began as Louis XIII’s hunting lodge before his son Louis XIV transformed and expanded it, moving the court and government of France to Versailles in 1682. Each of the three French kings who lived there until the French Revolution added improvements to make it more beautiful but the most famous of those would definetely be Louis XIV.
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| Notice his lovely high heels! |
He reigned for 72 years as an absolute monarch. He was often called the Sun King because like the sun he believed all power radiated from him. He had a very exquisite, refined, and lavish lifestyle which is evident through the Palace of Versailles which costed an exuberent amount of money to build and maintain.
This is the view out from the front gates... It was such a huge area! I could picture a horse drawn carriage pulling up to the enormous castle!
It was all paved like this...
It was so crowded! The line to get tickets was over an hour! But for students with IDs it's free so me (using Marine's ID) and Jeremy just went into the castle
This is the Royal Chapel where each day the Court would attend the king's mass
The Altar--- Communion, for the Order of the Holy Spirit ceremonies, the baptisms and weddings of many children of France were performed there.
This is the Cliquot organ
Haha would not want to be this guy!
I don't see how that thing belongs with its surroundings!
This is the Hall of Mirrors! It was used for masked balls, weddings, and celebrations.
Pretty much all the ceilings were painted like this...
The Treaty of Versailles which ended World War I was signed in this room on the 28th of June 1919.
Because mirrors were luxury objects at the time, the 357 mirrors illustrate the extravagant style of the Sun King.
This is the bed chamber of Louis XIV... It faced the rising sun as the King wished
This room was the bed chamber for Louis XV... It is smaller (easier to heat) and southern facing
Just a small part of the gardens
Everything in the castle had gold trimming
And lots of chandeliers!
And lots of chandeliers!
These are the Queen's bed chambers... A total of 3 queen occupied this room and 19 children of France were born publicly there
Marie Antionette being the most famous! "Let them eat cake" :-)
The Palace was invaded on October 6th, 1789. Marie-Antoinette escaped through this door which led to the internal apartments and servants' quarters.
Some creepy monster...
Some paintings had these weird white paper things stuck to them. I don't know what they are for exactly but I'm guessing preservation of the art perhaps.
Some paintings had these weird white paper things stuck to them. I don't know what they are for exactly but I'm guessing preservation of the art perhaps.
Every little girls dream! Being crowned a princess! :)
Paintings of royalty where the reigning king could look back on the legacy he had to live up to
There was so much intricate detailig everywhere you went!
I wouldn't want to come out those doors!
...where the great battles in France are depicted by way paintings.
I call this the Hall of a Million Heads! :-)
The Hall of a Million Wigged Men!
I could just imagine how painful it would be to be the person who had to carve out that ceiling!
Haha this was hilarious... So all day I had been seeing old, fancy, expensive, gold-trimmed, and royal things! And then I walk into this room and this was the carpeting!
I think I'm prettier and worth more than Versailles anyday! Haha JK! :-) It is pretty though...
It was really pretty out so it was so great!
It had like 2 heads! Major bizarre!
The gardens in Chateau de Versailles have about 1,400 fountains and the waters used in the fountains are drawn from the River Seine. About 6.2 million liters of water is needed in every hour to run these fountains.
There are also 300 various statues, busts, and vases that dotted throughout the extremely huge gardens
Seriously... Versailles is enormous!!!
Capucine all day was running around, jumping, and skipping. She was quite the messy eater at lunch too! Haha I thought it was adorable!
A few difference I noticed... You have to pay extra but if you do, they put TONS! French like themselves some cheese! They didn't have banana peppers which are like my favorite! And it wasn't called a foot-long because they use the metric system! Nicolas had gotten a foot-long too and he was like "Is this the American portion?" Haha :-) Why yes it is! I got the Italian! Yumm!
This is a water cup that I know my brother Josh would be furious with! Haha he is hilarious with the size of water cups! He'll go off for like 10 minutes about how mad it makes him! But that's why I love him so much!
Just in comparison to the normal cup! Seriously one swallow...
I first saw these at school and thought they were so weird! But this was actually my first time trying them... Rotisserie Chicken and Thyme Lay's Chips!
Looks about the same though right?? The trash can says "Merci"! :-)
So... We headed back and I was freezing so I crawled under the covers with my iPod and fell asleep toasty warm for a few hours... That night we headed to a dinner with Pascaline's family at her parents place. It took a long time to drive there! An hour and a half maybe... I didn't mind because it was fun to see Paris just driving around at sunset! Pascaline had to go to the bathroom the whole time so when we got there she bolted upstairs!
It was a very fun night! I didn't know most of the people but they were all very nice! Pascaline's dad trying out his English was pretty funny! He was fond of the expression "Shut your beak!" Haha made me laugh! They would have me speak to someone just babbling in English and see if they understood and at one point, I spoke English as fast as I could just rambling on about a day in the US... Haha I got a round of applause at the end! I asked Nicolas what it was about and he said like one sentence out of the whole thing so I don't think he understood as much as he would have liked! Haha Marine was pretty sad everyone was there except for her. This is Pascaline's parents and siblings...
One thing that did surprise me that some of Marine's cousins who are like 16 and 14 were drinking wine or champagne... I always got offered but I stuck to my apple juice which is my kid wine!
As the night went on and Nicolas had more and more to drink... He spoke more and more English which is about the funniest thing you can imagine! Haha :) and I was speaking in French (mostly) about how we are waking up at 4 AM to go to the Louvre...
So by the time we were heading out, I was pretty hyper! When we got off the elevator, which only fit like 3 people, I pressed all the keys and Pasaline was like "Alyssa! Oh la la" Haha it was such a fun night and well just a great day in general!!!
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