Château de Versailles
Oh Versailles! I wasn’t prepared for what I would feel on our visit, and I learned a few things that are in my back pocket for next time. I loved our day there! Yes, plan for the whole day. There is JUST SO MUCH to see. Here are seven of my takeaways and the things that stood out the most, plus some fun facts:
{1} Holy moly there are SO MANY TOURISTS there, and yes, I know I am one of them too, but it really astounded me the throngs of people from everywhere around the world. Luckily there is enough space in the palace and the gardens that you really don’t notice it except at the bottle-neck areas with entrance lines to the different ticketed areas and the most famous rooms/halls. I don’t remember noticing the tourists when I visited 20 years ago. Now, Versailles receives over 15 million tourists each year.
{2} Be ready for a lot of gold, artwork, and opulence that is completely beyond comprehension. Louise Boisen Schmidt wrote that, "To the public imagination, Versailles is the epitome of opulence…It represents an age in French history of both France's rise as a fashion and power center as well as the dramatic — and bloody — decline of the monarchy." You begin your visit with your jaw on the floor and it just keeps going and going and going, so much so that you start to feel a bit numb. Did you know it cost almost a quarter of France’s national income to maintain everything within Versailles? Just to maintain it! I kept imagining those living in poverty catching a glimpse of what their taxes were going to during times of famine, and even when things were good…how could they not be upset?
The chapel.
{3} The gardens are equally astounding. Thirty thousand acres with over 400 statues and sculptures and 1400 fountains! Fourteen hundred FOUNTAINS! When I visited 20 years ago I remember the separate ticket to see the gardens was around $14 and we were so tired from our walk through the palace and our previous days in Paris that we stood on the terrace overlooking them and decided to pass. The gardens and Petit Trianon, along with the Hameau de Marie Antionette were by far my favorite parts, and I would definitely go back with just the gardens and Trianon tickets to spend the day.
Petit Trianon was a gift from King Louis XVI to his wife, Marie Antionette when she was 19. This gift made her the first female property owner in France. When she was tired of the pomp and formality of life at Versailles, she would escape about a mile down the road to Petit Trianon for her exclusive use and enjoyment. It was small, but lavishly decorated and had all the servants to take care of everything and her. She wanted to create the gardens surrounding Petit Trianon to be more natural and in the style of an English garden. She also had a hamlet created with a set of rustic buildings so that she could “play peasant with her ladies.” While the French people literally did not have enough to eat, she wanted to play that she led a more simple life. There was a working farm and dairy meant to teach her children what the French lived like. One story says that when she wanted to milk the goats, they first were bathed and tied with beautiful ribbons. Often she would just wander through the hamlet with her friends for enjoyment. It was beautiful and sad to see at the same time. Since the French Revolution and Napoleon it had fallen into disrepair with the working dairy being completely torn down. In the 1930s John D. Rockefeller paid for substantial restorations with further work being done in the 1990s.
{4} Versailles was originally just a hunting lodge, but Louis XIV felt inspired by the house of his superintendent of finances, Nicolas Fouquet, called Vaux le Vicomte (you can see it in the movie “the Man in the Iron Mask” with Leonardo Di Caprio), and set about to make the Château de Versailles the most grand and luxurious in the world (even the chamber pots were made of silver). Everything in the château was made in France. Mirrors were only made in Venice at the time so Louis XIV brought the mirror-making Venetians to Versailles to make the 357 mirrors for the Hall of Mirrors and mirrors for the rest of the palace. After their mirror-making secrets had been revealed, the Venetians ordered for the assassination of the mirror-makers.
After the French Revolution the palace was closed and most of the furnishings an artwork were sold. Napoleon moved into Versailles but soon realized it was beyond the cost needed for renovations, so he used Le Grand Trianon just down the road as his residence. It has taken years and great expense from the French government to track down and repurchase everything that they can.
Hall of Mirrors. I’ve been in similar halls in different places, but this one is just so, so big.
{5} We should have brought a picnic! There is a strict “no picnicking” rule but that just means they don’t want you sitting on the grass in the gardens. There is 1 restaurant in the Palace that you can sit down and eat or pick up sandwiches, pastries and drinks to take outside. We did the latter and sat outside overlooking the gardens. My kids love Le Parisien sandwiches now, which you cannot really replicate because the baguette bread from is simply amazing. It is just ham, butter, and mustard and it’s so good. We were also starving by 2pm so probably anything would have tasted amazing, but it was a really French moment with really great food.
{6} I’m so glad we got the tickets that included everything — the palace, the gardens, the Trianon estate, AND the train ride between them all. Our legs were so tired that taking the train was a relief, an exciting for the kids.
{7} We walked back from Petit Trianon through the gardens at the end of the day. Emme had wanted to see the Mirror pond so we made sure see it on the way back. In French gardens, fountains are even more important that the plant designs and groves. The Mirror pond was dug in 1672 to complement the Royal Isle Fountain just opposite (this opposite fountain is no longer there — it is now the King’s garden). We arrived at the very best time. The sun was setting and we were able to catch the fountain display set to classical music for about 15 minutes. The maps of the garden list the times each fountain will display with different classical music selections at each one. You can read more about all the fountains and the gardens on the château website, here.
This was golden hour for us and absolutely magical for me. I think the kids will always remember it too.
*We won't talk about the hour we had to wait in the parking lot to leave, and how they made us pay for that extra hour of waiting. Honestly the kids didn’t complain one bit so I call it a huge win.
