Saint-Louis

Up early, we headed to Gare d’Austerlitz again to take the RER C train line out to Versailles. The ride was easy, and I was really excited because I’d been looking forward to seeing the Versailles palace gardens for a long time. It was cloudy morning, and rain clouds were a little ominous, so I was worried the day would be a washout, but we ended up quite lucky with only a few light showers and a sunny afternoon.

Upon arrival, during one of the rain showers, I thanked the TikTok girlies for sharing a hack whereby you can reserve a table at the restaurant at opening time, enjoy a coffee/petit-déjeuner while people are lining up, then buy your tickets with a shortcut and skip any lines (or standing in rain). This day the lines weren’t great too, so it really felt VIP and clever to have done the research. And not everyone can say they ‘dined’ at Château de Versailles, right! Not to mention the restaurant has a menu by Michelin star chef Alain Ducasse, so the coffee was delicious and the basket of mini viennoiserie was really nice quality, and good value - it was not all that expensive in Paris terms! I also really liked what they named the rest of the breakfast menus; one translated to “The Queen’s Rising”. So we enjoyed our coffee, and I ate most of the pastries before sneaking past the line into the palace.

Regardless of skipping lines, the palace is always busiest in the morning, so it was pretty solidly packed in many of the rooms and passages. Despite needing to shuffle past people, the grandness of the palace was overwhelming. We had an audio tour, but there was so much to look through. Listening to it all would’ve taken hours. Another day, I might’ve taken the time to listen to all of it, but the gardens were the priority while we didn’t know what the weather was going to do, plus Vikum’s patience for all the palaces was starting to wane. We walked through with a little more pace, and I focused on small highlights in each room. I loved the embroidery and wall coverings, as well as The Gallery of Great Battles - so interesting to see all the different styles of painters do very similar paintings. Little things like how they used perspective, varying levels of detail in the emotion of faces. Not to mention they’re impressively large! I also really liked to see the difference between the public dining rooms and the King’s personal dining rooms.

After this, we headed out of the palace, and Vikum decided he’d had enough of the pomp and knowing I would spend hours roaming the gardens - he was going to head back to the Paris apartment to do some fitness, chill, and prep dinner. We first headed out of the palace to get lunch in the nearby Versailles town center and check out the local Notre-Dame markets. A really cool place with fresh produce and artisan foods.

I headed back into Versailles to buy my ticket into the gardens and realized quickly we had picked a day for the “Musical Gardens” whereby baroque music played through hidden surround-sound speakers from around the ‘jardin et bosquets’ that led down to the Grand Canal. Now alone, immersed in exploring the nooks of the maze-like ‘bosquets’ and the ambient soundtrack playing around me…I started to feel a little naked without several petticoats and a bonnet. The hedges of the gardens were so tall and maze-like I might’ve gotten lost without a map, and there were plenty of times I found myself alone even though hundreds of other tourists were at Versailles this day.

From here, I walked towards Apollo’s Fountain and watched the little garden train pick up groups of tourists from the “Little Venice” area and avoided the packed train to hire a bike, with a little basket. So cute. For a few hours, I zipped around the gardens, heading down to the Queen’s Hamlet, Marie Antoinette’s hidden retreat from the Royal Court; despite living in ridiculous riches, Marie Antoinette wanted to cosplay living a quiet farm life and used to take her closest friends for leisurely walks through the hamlet. What was interesting was just how small a percentage of the crowds bothered to go to the Queen’s Hamlet area. It was so quiet, and I found myself alone many times here. For a major tourist attraction, it was crazy how little the crowds toured out past the gardens in front of the palace. After riding around the Grand Canal, I dropped the bike back and walked to the train home. On the train home, I headed to the second floor of the carriage to find an ornately designed roof, in the theme of Versailles stickered onto the carriage ceiling - so fun!

When arriving home, Vikum looked very relaxed. We ate a chill dinner, then packed up our bags ready for our 8:30 a.m. train the next morning out of Paris.Read more