Day 12- Palatial Paris

The ticket system on the Paris transport system came through for us today. Their day rover ticket is called a Mobilis ticket, and you buy as many zones as you need for unlimited travel on train, metro and bus.

We caught the metro to La Defense, just across the Seine river to the west. Here the frnach have constructed a building called the Arche de Defense that looks like a giant arch that has a direct line of sight to the Arch de Triomphe. Very impressive and HUGE.

From La Defense we caught the train along the Rive Droit route to Versailles. This train line travels along the ridge, giving great views of Paris – unfortunately a bit foggy this morning.

The town of Versailles is large. It grew up around the palace. The walk from this railway station gets your heart pumping, and then there it is – the Versailles Palace. Grand, gilt, cobble stones and lots of tourist buses!

There was the usual selection of hawkers selling miniature Eiffel Towers, who scattered quickly when the police pulled up. We had a Museum Visit pass, so didn’t have to queue to buy tickets, but then joined the entry queue snaking back and forwards on the forecourt cobblestones to get through security. Then the palace was ours, at least to look at.

It was all very impressive, with paintings and statuary and period furniture, but standing in the hall of mirrors was hair raising. What we did not expect was the overpowering sensation in the Hall of Battles, with larger than life-size paintings of French victories from Charlemagne to Napoleon.

We finished our visit to the Chateau with a stroll around the gardens. Considering that the Palace was built on swamp land away from Paris so that the royalty could get away from the smog and smells, it certainly has changed.

We returned to Paris via the Rive Gauche line, which is not as interesting as the trip out. We stopped at Invalides and took in the Musee d’Armee – very impressive collection of armour, canons and weaponry. The museum occupies some of the wards of the former military hospital. The chapel is in two parts – one for the common soldiers, and then a dome at the south end that was for royalty to attend Mass at the same time. They share a crucifix, but are
separated by a glass wall. This dome has now become the resting place of Napoleon and other great French soldiers. The chapel still retains a sense of the religious, but the dome has become secular and noisy. But still goose bumps standing near Napoleon.

The day was marching on, but we still had more to do. Another metro trip took us to the Isle de Cite, for our visit to Saint Chapel. This is in the grounds of the Ministry of Justice, which is what became of the oldest palace in Paris. So security checkpoint to get into the grounds – will Liz’s mini Swiss army knife get confiscated? No! The world is not safe.

The chapel is as beautiful as we were led to believe ( thanks for the heads up Mrs Mcguig) – two levels, downstairs the entrance which was the servants’ chapel, then upstairs to the Royal Chapel of St Louis. Each window tells a story from the bible – tall, colourful and magnificent.

Before terminal exhaustion set in our final stop was Notre Dame… however both of us were somewhat disoriented and nearly headed off in the wrong direction. But the bonus of losing our way was stumbling on a little flower market on the Isle. Very quaint. Then the towers of Notre Dame appeared. Wow!! The carving over the doorways is amazing and of course, another queue! But so worth the visit. We arrived at evening vespers and joined in the prayer time which was prayerful in spite of 100’s of tourists wandering the perimeter of the church. It is a very special place and we will return tomorrow. But that was enough for today, back on the metro to Chatelet and a visit to the Pizza Hut in des Halles before a rest and all this blogging. Good night everyone as you begin your Friday we are heading off to bed Thursday night :)