In the last post I shared about our tour of the palace itself. Here are some pics of the central court, which is the oldest part of the building and has the most crazy gold window sills.
Moster Hanne reading the map in the courtyard.
G.O.L.D.
There is a second part to Versailles: the amazing amazing, ginormous gardens. Louis XIV made the first steps to expanding these gardens in 1661, considering them just as important as the Château.
Me and Moster Hanne standing in front of the Apollo Fountain and the Grand Canal in the background. This spot is a 1 km walk from the palace but feels relatively close given the scale of the gardens overall.
Fountain show starting.
On summer weekends the extensive fountain network in the gardens is put on for several hours each day. The fountains were all designed to work with music in the late 1600s. This was an incredible technical feat at the time (Versailles had no running water and electricity wasn't invented, two things I definitely associate with fancy fountain displays).
It was very difficult to gather enough water to work all the fountains so when the King was out in the gardens the staff would turn on only the fountain that he was near to, turning them off again as soon as he turned his back!
All afternoon we wandered around the garden enjoying the many many different areas and the beautiful music that went with each different fountain.
The fountain above was choreographed very well with the music. After the show finished an American tourist behind us said to his wife "Vegas is showy, this was classy".
The next fountain is my favourite, the different levels are made with some kind of lava rock and lots of huge shells. Plus giant gold urns, of course.
We ended the day relaxing by the Orangerie (first pic below) and admiring the newly restored rear facade of the Château.
Versailles success!
I LOVE the Versailles gardens. So glad you had such a great day (and, I am a little jealous that you got to see the fountains working!). Great pictures, too!
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