On Day 4 of our Parisian trip, we ventured out of Paris again, this time to the Palace of Versailles, a place that had always fascinated me. This was my first trip to Chateau de Versailles and I was expecting grandeur and opulence – but nowhere near the level that it is in reality.

getting to versailles

We caught the train to St Lazare and then to Versailles-Chateau-Rive –Gauche on the RER Trainline C where I realised that we were going to have to take a short walk to the palace. It was in fact very easy to find, largely due to the crowds of people who were all headed in the same direction once leaving the train station.

Just outside the station in Versailles are lots of little shops and stalls which sell wonderful and yet quite cheap gloves as well as lots of other items and souvenirs. With Switzerland on the agenda, we bought several pairs of lovely gloves before heading up the hill to the palace.

We had bought tickets in advance and we were foolish enough to think that skipping the line would be a quick process. It was with more than a little shock that we discovered our ‘Skip the line’ queue wrapped several times up and down the huge courtyard in front of the palace!

I’d be lying if I said it moved really quickly – it didn’t but in reality it could have taken much longer with the hundreds of people in the queue. One thing to note is that you have to get your ticket validated in the office before you are allowed inside. The staff are obviously aware that many people wait for an hour or more in the queue and then get to the door and haven’t validated their ticket. Fortunately for them, they are then sent to the office but are allowed to head back to the beginning of the queue again to be let in.

We would have waited around an hour in the queue but it did continually move bit by bit so there was no point getting agitated. Instead we admired the incredible gold plated gates in absolute awe as we inched our way closer to the palace.

Once inside, we were suddenly hit by the crowds as they funneled their way into the incredibly ornate rooms on their way down to the Hall of Mirrors. The crowds are ENORMOUS and for a 5ft person like me, it felt quite oppressive as I had no choice but to be carried along by the masses. Fortunately, my boys looked out for me and rescued me a few times as I was in danger of being knocked over.

The palace started its life as a hunting lodge in the 17^th century before Louis XIII decided to rebuild it in 1631. It became the main residence of the French court from 1682.

Of course, the palace’s most famous residents are Louis XIV who laid the foundations for what the palace is today as well as Louis XVI and his wife, Marie-Antoinette who went on to lose not only the palace but their lives in the French Revolution. It is a fascinating story of extravagance and ignorance, with a King and Queen completely oblivious to the state of their people.

Fortunately, the palace was not pillaged during the Revolution but was instead left relatively intact. Many of the furnishings are copies however, as the originals were sold off but the palace itself was saved for the public as a museum.

Today, you can’t fail to be both shocked and in awe of the obscene amount of money that was spent on the palace by its doomed aristocracy. The estate itself is HUGE! We attempted to walk across the gardens towards the Estate of Trianon and in particular, the Petit Trianon which was the home of Marie-Anoinette. While the walk was through wonderful formal gardens, the exquisite orangerie and delightful groves , it was extremely long and I became a little frustrated that we were wasting our day and not seeing enough of the palace itself.

Eventually we emerged from the groves and found our way along the river to a point where we could catch a little train up to the Estate of Trianon. It was a welcome relief by this stage and we eventually caught one back to the palace too.

We spent most of the day at Versailles and were exhausted by the end but you can spread the visit over two days if you have time. We bought Passport admissions which I thought would have enabled us to visit all areas of the palace and grounds but it didn’t. Beware of the fineprint! We didn’t get to see the musical fountains or musical gardens but in the end, we saw plenty. And it was all amazing – in fact, a place I will always remember, largely due to the lessons in life that it teaches. How people with every privilege in life can fall so dramatically to end up being taken by the people and executed at such a young age, is a powerful story.

As we left the palace, we passed a very touristy crepes restaurant and couldn’t resist. I can’t vouch for the service at Creperie Dolmen as we certainly felt like we were despised tourists but the crepes were amazing! We stayed a little too long drinking wine and beer with our sweet treats before heading back to Paris.

I had hoped to just make it in time to visit Le Conciergerie which was high on my list of historical attractions being the last prison of Marie-Antoinette before her execution but as we literally ran from the metro towards Le Conciergerie, we realised we had no idea where the entrance was. We circled the building several times in total panic as we realised we would have at most ten minutes to get through the door. As it was, we were obviously too late and the ticketing office had already closed. That was a major disappointment to me although not necessarily to the boys. And yet another paid-for ticket wasted…

saint-severin – a wonderful find!

As it was to be our last night in Paris, Karl and I took a visit to the old church across the road from our hotel before heading out to dinner that night. The church of Saint-Severin was a gothic delight! With its soaring arches and magnificent stain glass windows, we were really taken with this beautiful building and enjoyed its peace and serenity after such as hectic day.

That night, we took the chance to see Notre Dame bathed in the setting sun once more before having dinner in what was quite a basic restaurant in the Latin Quarter. Dinner was okay but the restaurant isn’t really worth a mention and the service was quite slow. We ended up leaving late and racing across Paris toward the Arc de Triomphe with the hope of being able to climb to the top and take in the wonderful view of Paris at night.

lessons learned at arc de triomphe

Alas, it was not to be as yet again, I misjudged the timings. Closing time is usually 11pm but on Tuesdays, it is 10.30pm and arriving by 10pm was not sufficient to get in. My suggestion would be to arrive at least an hour before closing time, if not more as by the time we arrived, the guards were adamant they were not going to let us in (I tried, I begged and I bargained but they were not at all interested!).

I also found myself in trouble with the Paris police at the Arc de Triomphe. As we were in such a hurry, we ran through the metro, and out onto the road opposite the island where the Arc de Triomphe is located – the Etoile. My very sensible family then decided that the best way to get to the Arc de Triomphe in a hurry was to actually cross the multiple, multiple lanes of traffic – very fast!

Before I knew it, they were half way across and yelling at me to follow them. Unfortunately, the little gap they had found had disappeared by this point and I found myself stranded in the middle of the road where twelve boulevards merge. A motorbike first screeched to a halt to avoid hitting me followed by several other cars – I brought the Etoile to a stand still!

I luckily made it to the other side only to be confronted by a male and female police officer (armed with guns) who alerted me to the fact that I had broken the law by crossing the road and that it was a chargeable offence. By this time, I had found out that we had missed the Arc de Triomphe (another wasted ticket!) and I was in no mood to be told off by a police officer.

I advised them quite angrily that if they wanted people not to cross the road, they should have traffic lights! I was told there was an underground tunnel that we should have walked through but I then explained that it was absolutely impossible to know what to do in Paris around the metro because the signage was so bad!

I don’t actually recommend you take this tone of voice with the Paris police as I think I was in danger of being arrested but I think they gave up on me. They warned me and then walked away, watching me from a distance, no doubt wondering if all Australian women were as crazy as me.