Trip to England Part 1: Versailles

I really do mean to finish our trip to Italy because Rome and Pompeii were such interesting places, but I wanted to post about our trip to England first.  In the US Hayley belonged to really good choir and they do tours every summer.  Every other summer they go abroad and the other summers they stay in the states.  They compete at music festivals all over the world.  Hayley's first tour was to Oregon.  The second tour was to England and Wales but then we moved to Germany and she couldn't do it.  So I sort of promised her that we would go to England when her choir was there so she could see them.  So that was the impetus for our trip.  It was going to be just Hayley, Camilla and I, but then Eric didn't want to miss out so he came along.  Jason was in charge at home with Rand's help and under the very loose supervision of an adult friend of the family that was our houseguest during that time.  Jason and Rand did their job excellently and the house was spotless when we got home and the little kids had no complaints.

We decided to take the night train to Paris and spend the day there and then take another train the next morning through the chunnel (Channel tunnel) to London.  So we spent that first day at Versailles.  The palace at Versailles is very grand, very huge and is the inspiration for many copycat palaces in Europe. 

Versailles is the palace that Louis the 14th built in order to get away from the gritty, government life in Paris.  But the court just followed him to Versailles and it became the center of French government.  Louis the 14th is known as the Sun King and reigned for 72 years, the longest reign in Europe ever.  (He lived longer than his son and his grandson.  His great-grandson became Louis the 15th and reigned after him.) He was a very able King and it's said that he kept his nobles entertained and out of his hair at Versailles while he ran the country.  He was one of those deified kings who reigns by divine right and is only a little lower than God himself.  There were statues and paintings of him everywhere including this painting with Mary and Jesus and others all pointing to his painting, to show how important he was.

This is him dressed as a Roman

This is him showing off his fabulous hair.  (I think I remember reading that when he started to lose his hair he started wearing wigs and that's where the fancy wigs with long hair fashion came from.)

This is the famous Hall of Mirrors (another room copied by other monarchs) where the Treaty of Versailles ending World War I was signed.  On one side are arched windows looking out over the ginormous grounds and on the other side are arches with mirrors, which was unique at the time. 

Window side: you can see Eric in an orange shirt leaning out and trying to accommodate me and be in the picture.

The mirror side: you can see a reflection of me taking the picture with Eric and Camilla standing next to me.

The grounds are almost as spectacular as the palace.  They are 2,000 acres and include a manmade canal like the canals in Venice.

The girls insisted on rowing for us.

Louis the 15th came after Louis the 14th and then came Louis the 16th who was married to Marie Antoinette.  They're the ones who were beheaded during the French Revolution.  After Louis the 14th died neither of the two kings that followed him were as good at ruling.  They would rather use Versailles as an escape from their responsibilities.  In fact they built other palaces way back in the grounds to escape from Versailles.  Marie Antoinette had a whole complex where she could go to pretend she was a simple dairy maid (without doing any real work).  One of those two kings built this palace, called the Grand Trianon, as his personal escape from the court at Versailles.

It's not small!  In fact by the time we had toured the main palace, wandered the huge grounds, toured Marie Antoinette's domain and finally found this palace hidden in the way back, we were so tired we didn't even go inside!