Oh My Word!: Versailles

Ok! I promise, I am really back now! The past week has been crazy with picture editing, John being sick, me being sick, and our computer going on the fritz -again-. I had every intention of blogging all through the week as I had the pictures edited and it was just too much. 975 pictures makes for a lot of work and I am of the personality that it HAS to be done NOW. Otherwise they are staring me in the face and I can't finish anything else. So, after staring much too long at a computer screen, a knot forming beside my right shoulder blade, and my right hand transforming itself into "the claw" from the mouse- they are all finished. Yeh!!

First stop on our trip to Paris- the Palace of Versailles. A little history to start us off! The palace was the seat of the French government from 1682 until the Royals were forced out during the revolution. Louis the 14th wanted to get out of Paris and he wanted to better control his courtiers, advisers, and provincial rulers. In moving everything (and everyone) to Versailles, he,sort of, achieved this.

The palace is huge. There are rooms for games, rooms for billiards, smoking rooms, big ballrooms, small ballrooms, bedrooms, long hallways, and chapels. Louis never had to leave. For John and I, the best part of the palace was the garden. This massive garden was divided into several different sections. Each is completely closed off from the next and you feel like you are in your own little world. There are fountains everywhere, some huge and elaborate, others small and simple. At the end of the formal gardens, a grand canal starts. There, you can rent a boat and row your way around for a bit.

It is so strange walk through this palace and the garden and think that people lived here. I can just see Marie Antoinette getting up in the morning and saying to her ladies, "Yes, I think we will go for a walk to the Canal today. Please prepare my very best, largest hat."