Chateau at Versailles

We visited the Chateau at Versailles on a Sunday. It was amazingly busy as in more busy than the Louvre. We later found out that Sunday is one of the busiest days at Versailles. The first myth that I would like to dispell is that the Chateau is a long ways from Paris. By subway it took no more than 30 minutes.

Getting into Versailles took over an hour. We toured the Chateau first. We then toured the gardens which I will discuss in a later posting. We did not visit any of the other castles as they cost more money and there were too many to do in the amount of time we had.

The Chateau was a little disappointing. All of the furnishings were added back after the revolution once it became a museum. The issue is that the Chateau was invaded by angry Frenchmen during the revolution and was ransacked which basically meant people took what they could carry away from the castle. The cool part about the chateau was the art work on the wall and ceiling. Luckily most of this is original pre-revolution. Again, words cannot describe the detail and beauty poured into these works of art. I recommend the Chateau on this basis. I was not that impressed by the Hall of Mirrors which is something I have heard about since I was little. The ceiling was beautiful but it did not really stand out. One turn off for me was that people had scraped names into some of the mirrors which gave it a cheap feel.

Again, we would recommend visiting the Chateau. I will post some more about the garden which I felt was the high point of the trip.

	Versailles' "Understated" Gate
	Chateau at Versailles side view
	Jesse in front of Versailles
	Chapel inside Versailles. Is that really marble???
	View of Chapel from second floor.
	Beautiful Ceiling
	Wall Mounted Painting
	Carving of Louis trampling his enemies.
	Hall of Mirrors
	Audio tour guide
	Cat on marble staircase