Opulent Versailles

I love Paris stay-cations. There is so much to see in and around Paris, but if you live here the tendency is to get complacent and postpone the outing to another day. It usually requires vistors to properly get us going. We've had my parents staying and this has meant more site-seeing action in the past ten days than we usually manage in ten weeks. Our latest trip was to Versailles. It takes about an hour to get there by metro and RER from our place, door to door. We should really go more often.

The scale of the Chateau and gardens is totally over the top. The Chateau is HUGE, the stables are HUGE, the gardens are HUGE. No wonder there was a revolution, so much opulent extravagance, while the majority of the population were starving. 

Here is a view of the Palace from the gardens.

We didn't go into the Chateau but we did wonder around the gardens.

Apollo's ornamental lake.

Apollo and his horse drawn chariot.


Dauphin's Grove.




The Flora ornamental lake.



An avenue of trees running away from Apollo's ornamental lake.


Looking back up towards the Chateau.


Gold.


A maze by the Chateau, with a dusting of snow. Despite it being mid March, we of course also had snow!



For more information about visiting: Chateau de Versailles.