Versailles and Paris

On Monday we had gone to the Eiffel Tower and the Musee de Armee, but got to the Louvre too late to go. So on Tuesday, after discovering the Louvre was closed for the day, we decided to take a train out of Paris to go to Versailles. Versailles exceeded my already high expectations from what I had learned about it in high school. It was a magnificent place. We ended up being able to bypass waiting in line for an hour to buy tickets by a mere matter of chance. Two European college students happened to ask us out of every one in line if we would like to buy their tickets off of them since they discovered after buying tickets that they were eligible to enter for free (one of the many perks to being a student in Europe= free admission to most places). 

Versailles in its scope and ornamentation is quite a sight to behold. I was constantly impressed by the fact that each room was unique and customized; each room seemed to outdo the rooms that preceded it. The Hall of Mirrors was certainly a highlight of the palace. The palace was impressive, but the Versailles grounds were far more impressive. They made the palace seem like a cabin in a middle of a forest. I was amazed at how vast the Versailles grounds were and still more amazed that so much of it was still intact. It was truly remarkable. My only disappointment was that the fountains were not operational and some were even covered up to protect them from the cold. We ended up spending all of Tuesday in Versailles, getting back into Paris in the early evening.

The following day, Wednesday, we decided would be the day that we'd finally get to the Louvre and planned on doing it first that day. But after doing some research on Pere Lachaise (the Paris Cemetery), we decided that it would be best to go there first. While googling Pere Lachaise and how to find Jim Morrison's grave, I came across a warning from someone's blog who said that the cemetery is so vast and convoluted, that it could take hours to find a particular grave. This person was dead right (pun intended- ;-)). I've been to my fair share of cemeteries- some to visit the graves of family and some to visit just to visit- Pere Lachaise outstrips ALL of them. The cemetery was incredibly old and the tombs AND family crypts were absolutely amazing. It was like something out of an old Dark Shadows episode or any other super spooky graveyard in an old black and white horror film. To complete the eery vibe of the place was the fact that it was a dark, overcast day in the middle of winter where not a single leaf could be found on a single tree. Still even more spooky was the fact that you could hear crows cawing. I've never heard or seen so many crows in a graveyard- simply classic! 

We looked up where Jim Morrison's grave was on the map by the entrance of the cemetery and thought it should be easy enough to find. Yes, in theory maps are extremely handy but only if you read them correctly....On the map there was a number 30 AND a number 6 by Jim Morrison's name on the directory. We assumed that the 30 was the zone of the cemetery we needed to find and blatantly ignored the 6. We wondered up and down the narrow cobble-stoned pathways of the cemetery, up and down hills, and up and down stairs for 2 hours before realizing that something wasn't right. We found zones 28, 29. 31, and 32, but no zone 30. Finally we decided to go back to the very beginning and look at the map again (there were only two maps from what we could tell). And there was the number 6. After we figured out that we needed to go to zone 6 and not zone 30, it only took us about 20 minutes to track down the Poet. It was amazing how many people had come to pay their respects. The grave was covered in flowers, candles, empty wine bottles, and a feather boa. 

After we left the cemetery we headed to the Louvre. The Louvre, which looked impressive in daylight, looks absolutely beautiful at night. We spent a good couple hours walking through the Louvre. We tracked down all the famous pieces- Mona Lisa, the Aphrodite, Wedding Feast, The Dying Slave by Michelangelo, etc. By the time we got out there was not enough time to go to Notre Dame so that's when we went to the train station to get our tickets back to Milan.

While we had originally had planned to stay three days in Paris and then return to Italy to go to Venice for a couple days before returning to Rome to fly home, we ended up staying two additional days. We extended our stay by one day originally because the Louvre was closed on Tuesday, causing us to plan to stay until Thursday so we could devote all of Wednesday to going to the Louvre and to Pere Lachaise to track down Jim Morrison's resting site. However, as fortune or misfortune would have it, when we went to the Gare de Lyon (the only train station in Paris that has trains that go to Italy) on Wednesday we were informed that EVERY single eurail reservation seat on EVERY train from Wednesday thru Sunday were completely booked. So we heavy hearts and now even lighter pockets we had to pay for two regularly priced train tickets instead of only paying the cost of reserving a seat since we could not use our Eurail tickets. Oy!

So today we ended up getting to see Notre Dame after all. It certainly was worth seeing and I was amazed by the fact that from the outside you could not tell that there were stained-glass windows but from the inside the windows were in brilliant colors. It was a beautiful place to see. The only thing that marred the beauty of the place was how the old cathedral had found ways to capitalize on the tourism appeal of the place. Every 10 feet or so was a little stand where you could donate money to light a candle or donate to the church, and of course there was a gift shop.... But the ambiance in all was still largely intact and we even got to hear the beginning of a service being conducted. The acoustics in the cathedral are miraculous- architects truly are masters.

That about sums up our last three days in France. We'll be taking a 6-hour train to Milan tomorrow morning and will stay the day there, then we'll be getting up Saturday morning to return to Rome where we'll stay until Sunday when we fly out.

Can't wait to see everyone again!