The Wacky World of a Lazy Pig (AKA Simon)

Eurotrip Day 8 - The Legend of Zelda and the Chateau de Versailles and my first experience on a Tower.

Today is Sunday Many 7thm 2006. We woke up a little late because of the beer from the previous night. I didn't even go to breakfast in the morning.

I think God is with us today. The weather forcast was to be rainy all day, yet when I stepped outside of the Hostel, the clouds were parting and I knew that it was going to get better. To take advantage of this day, we changed our plans to go to the Chateau de Versailles. This is the palace or castle which French Kings like Louis lived at. There is also a really nice garden behind the Palace. I have heard good things about this attraction from Theresa and was definitely looking forward to it.

To get there, we had to take the RER train to outside of Paris. The trip took around 30 minutes. The time was not wasted as we used the free time to sleep or read. At first glance, the palace looks really big, around the same size as the tower of london I would say. Unlike the tower of london, this was wider and had more art in it. A huge line could be seen as we entered the Palace's property. The wait was long and boring. While we were waiting, several announcements were made warning visitors that there were pickpocketers inside and outside the Palace. From that point on, I got kind of cautious, but not in a way to ruin anything.

The Palace from the inside is also very very beautiful. The first room was a really tall chapel. I can't really explain it right now, I can't relaly remember too much. But the ceiling was well decorated with paintings and a fair amount of gold was used at the altar area for tabernacles and crosses. Luckily, we got audio guides which were really really good. Each room had a long description that gave details on all the art in the room as well as furniture and their significance in the old days. Most of the rooms were used by the kings for meetings or strategizing. Some other rooms also included the chambers of the king and the queens.

Everything was really good about the state apartments at the Chateau was that it was short. There were only a total of 18 rooms and with each room taking about 5 minutes to take in, it was only a maximum of 1 hour of seeing. We paid $12.50 for entrance and the audio guide, so I was expecting more. The information was of course very good. I especially liked the room of mirrors.

The Chateau de Versailles did not just stop there. After seeing the state apartments, we went outside to the gardens right behind the large building. The only way to describe this garden is "Legend of Zelda". The garden was HUGE!!!! It would take around 30 minutes to walk to one end and then back. There were more than 12 individual gardens on the premises. Each garden had distinct designs and shape and one could defeinitely tell that they maintain the gardens in superb shape. We got a map, and they second we saw it, we couldn't help but be amazed at the amount of effort at time needed to make any garden look like this. We visited a lot of the gardens, though not all of them (Roger's feet wouldn't take all that punishment).

An extra highlight we didn't expect was the fountain shows. The entire garden many fountains spread out in different locations. Each once again are very different and are not made from a cookie cutter. When the show started, water would spray out of them. During the show, people are encouraged to walk around to every fountain to see how they look like when in use. Since the day was nice, the fountain made it more refreshing and beautiful. I wouldn't think that the gardens or fountains would look good if it were cloudy or raining.

There was also a really nice man made lake or pond of some sort that allowed visitors to rent some boats to row on. I really wanted to do it, but maybe i will save it for something special next time. There were definitely a lot of people at the gardens and also a lot of poeple on the boats. I think one of the greatest views from the Chateau is right down the center of the gardens. From the center, you see a very large fountain right in front of you followed by a very very very long lawn that ends with yet a larger fountain and then the man made lake/pond. On either side if the Chateau or two gardens that you can see from up a birds eye view. Sometimes it seems like we are looking at crop circles or patterns from that.

With such a nice day, we couldn't pass it off so we decided that we would take the opportunit to climb the EIFFEL TOWER!!!! I was so excited about this because i have never really been on the top of any tower. I always thought that I would have gone up the CN tower first. Oh well. But now that I am in Paris, I realize that I would definitely choose Eiffel tower over CN tower, mainly because of the view you get of Paris from the top. For Toronto, no offense intended, there really isn't much I would find interesting looking at the tall buildings in downtown.

There are 4 towers from which you are allowed to go up the tower on. They are labeled the North, East, South and West Towers. We took the East tower because it had the best view for the way up. However, once I actually started going up, I realized that it didn't make too much of a difference because the view was obstructed by the tower's legs. We went to the 2nd level right away an that was alreay quite high. We took a few pictures and then realized that the elevator to take poeple up to the top of the tower had a huge line. When I say huge, I mean around a 45 minute wait. CRAP!!!! We waited for that long, doing nothing other than really enjoy the view from the 2nd level.

I crammed myself into the elevator to go up to the top and becuae of that, Roger didn't have enough room to squeeze in, he had to wait until the next elevator to go to the top. The top of the Tower is hard to describe. You can see so much. One can see all the mjor attractions from the top. Anything from within 5 KM of the tower all the way to even Sacre Couer Basillica. I took so many pictures that it was ridiculous. We stayed at the top for around 45mins to 1 hour before we left.

I didn't actually leave because I was able to convence steve to stick around to wait until the it got dark. No, it wasn't a date. I wanted to take pictures of the Eiffel Tower during the night when it had its lights on. We were able to take afew pictures at sunset and then at pitch dark. Once again, I think I took around 40 pictures alone for night shots. By the time 9:55pm at passed, we were tired and wanted to go home. As we were walking away from the Tower, I guess 10pm hit and the Tower started sparking. It wasn't sparking, they actually started blinking all the lights all over the tower. I had no idea this was going to happen, and I was relaly happy that I had stayed some time to actually witness this. Just watching the Tower sparkle was enough to make my jaw drop. I took a very short video.

Seeing the Tower have such nice night lights and sparkle, I expected to see the same at the Arc de Triomphe. Sadly, that wasn't true. We took the Metro there only find a very boring night light display for the Arc. It also started raining. I guess God had given us enough time to relaly enjoy the night lights in Paris. With great disappointment, we left and went home.

Labels: eurotrip

posted by lazypig @ 1:14 AM