Aug 17
… until they cut off your head.
The plan for today was great: a bicycle tour of Versailles, complete with tours of the gardens and a picnic lunch. Up early – it was still dark out – and easily made our way to the train station to meet the guide. The train tracks were being repaired, but no problem, the train company supplied buses to make sure we got there. Weather network said cool and cloudy but <1 mm of rain. It started to sprinkle as we got our bikes…no problem, we rode along on cobbled roads under the trees, and got damp. Then we got to Versailles.
It’s about 2,000 acres…it used to be 200,000 until the rest of the population decided that was too much. Bicycles are definitely the way to go, there are lovely roads and paths throughout…unless it’s pouring with rain, which it was. The bicycle company thoughtfully provided us with ponchos, which were roomy enough for anyone, and their backpack. We then looked like a group of cycling tents. The good part was we were mostly dry. The bad part was we were sweaty, and out legs were out in the rain.
We visited the Petit Trianon and another building, that was built to accommodate a mistress or two. Lunch was rescheduled into a restaurant. The grounds are lovely, and the buildings were nice. Marie Antoinette didn’t actually say “let them eat cake”—that phrase was written about when she was about 9 and had never been to France. She hired an English gardener to design English gardens for her. French gardens are very regulated with straight lines and beds that are mirror images of each other. English gardens are meant to look for natural, although improving on nature to make them more attractive. She had a river dug, and ruins built to achieve that lived in look. Little open buildings here and there allowed her to drink tea or eat in comfort.
When the enlightenment came, the grounds were improved even further by building a hamlet so that people could get back to nature and enjoy the simple life. Unfortunately, today, it really seemed rural as we squelched through the mud and slipped around. We also missed most of the stories of the tour: the choice was to keep your hood up and not hear anything, or to put it down and have cold water running down your neck.
By about 4:30 we had enough, so when it came time to actually tour the palace, we cut out and headed back to Paris. Eunsol’s shoes were so wet that she made strange squelching noises when she walked, and my pants were stuck to my legs. The moment we got on the bus, she was asleep. I woke her up to get on the train, where she promptly went back to sleep. Woke her up, got her on the Metro, and then back to sleep. Back to our hotel to dry out a little, and then out for dinner.
We went to a restaurant and ordered a complete French dinner: three courses for one price. Eunsol had escargots, followed by boeuf bourguignon, rounded off with crème brulee. She also had a coke, which cost about $1.50 more than my glass of wine. Back to the hotel to shower before bed. I don’t know what kind of mud they have at Versailles, but our pants are soaking in the sink to try to get it out.
It’s not hard to see why there was a revolution. The people were starving, and they thought that the Austrian (Marie A) was wasting flour to powder her hair. When the women came and told the King and Queen what was going on, they were invited into the palace to eat. Afterwards, some stayed outside to party, alcohol was involved, and then when things got out of hand, there was a riot. Or so the story goes. A Dr.Guillotine was concerned that the old method of capital punishment – being drawn and quartered – was too painful and someone should invent a more humane way of killing people, so someone did. Heads came off quickly and neatly. Apparently he was distressed for the rest of his life because his name got attached to it. Marie Antoinette’s last relative ended up in the US being arrested and jailed with her husband for running a cock fighting ring, so being rich didn’t really get them very far.
Anyway, perhaps we’ll come back another year, and try again, or go down in history as the only people to visit Versailles and not see the palace.