Day Three in France

After seeing Bre yesterday, she and I made plans to go to the Palace of Versailles together. Together in Paris! Since she was traveling alone, she was able to get there on time. Some of the girls in my group wanted to come with me so it took longer than expected to get to Versailles. I'm so glad Bre got there early because she saved us a spot in line bright and early in the morning; we didn't have to wait for hours in get inside!

Versailles started as a hunting lodge for old French kings but it evolved into a palace for King Louis 14th (XIV)--AKA the Sun King. He turned this into a spectacle. The people in the courts of France could cause problems, so he moved them all to the remote palace and controlled what they saw. If they were around him all the time, they couldn't cause problems for him with the people of France. 

This spectacle had furniture made from real gold and silver. It drained the economy of France big time. This is one of the reasons the French Revolution happened. Marie Antoinette lived here and she was a little bit insensitive to some of the issues the people of France were dealing with. She had a little cottage made in the woods where she would pretend to be a peasant woman. She had her servants hide eggs so she might collect eggs from the chickens. What a mess.

Here's one of the halls of the palace.

This is what some of the furniture looked like.

Napoleon hung out at Versailles for a minute and some reproductions of famous works of art hang here. The original Coronation of Napoleon Bonaparte is under restoration at the Louvre museum. I was still really excited to see this one though. This was painted by Jacques-Louis David. It was mostly made as propaganda. Napoleon crowned himself emperor because if a Pope crowned him, that would mean that the Pope had power over him and he couldn't have that. After crowning himself, he crowned his first wife, Josephine, empress. She is kneeling on the symbols of the Old Regime. 

Fun Fact: Napoleon was late to his coronation, by a lot.

This is the Distribution of the Eagle Standards. Again, it's all about propaganda. 

I was basically on a Napoleon scavenger hunt the rest of the day.

This is the famed hall of mirrors. Mirrors way back in the day (1700's) were VERY expensive to make. So if you just imagine how many people had to starve in order to make this spectacle, it is very sad to look at. 

This is a bust of King Louis XIV by Bernini. Bernini was initially asked to build the East Facade of the Louvre but his design was too Italian, so it did not pan out. Instead, this bust remains a souvenir of his travels to France.

Because of time, we didn't have the chance to really discover the gardens. What we did see was just beautiful.

Bre and I headed over to the Invalides to see the Tomb of Napoleon. It's hard to tell because it's kind of far away, but the tomb is just massive. All for a dude who was only 5 foot 7 inches tall. 

In order to get to the Tomb of Napoleon, we had to pass through the Musee de L'Armee. It is a massive military museum and we got to sit in their chapel while some intense organ music played.

Bre and I split ways while Laura and I headed over to see the Musee d'Orsay, which holds one of the greatest collections of modern and contemporary art. 

These two paintings are by Monet. He did an incredible series of the Rouen Cathedral; his style was all about capturing the light at that specific moment in time. It was Impressionism. The series had SO MANY painted cathedrals which were intended to stay together. Unfortunately, they were individually sold off; the d'Orsay has many of them, though.

This is one of the Gates of Hell made by Rodin.

This work of art was on the cover of my 19th Century Art & Architecture text book this year! Bal du Moulin de la Galette was painted by Renoir. I really loved how he captured the light streaming through the trees.

This is a self-portrait by Vincent van Gogh. I love his brush strokes.

This painting is super beautiful! I don't know anything about it but I know it is just lovely.

After the museum closed at 6 PM, Laura and I headed to a restaurant recommended to us by one of my favorite professors. She actually gave me an entire list of things to see, do, and eat. So far, all of her recommendations were popular with my group of travelers so I had zero doubts that Les Antiquaires would be any different. 

Laura and I got there right on time; with the rain, the restaurant filled up fast. The prices were a little more than expected but after a month of really bad vegetarian food, I couldn't do a cheap meal that might not be good. I ordered the vegetarian lasagna which came with a side salad that was decent. The bread that came with the meal was delicious as well. Over all, it was close-your-eyes good. 

Laura and I made a pit-stop by the Eiffel Tower since she didn't see it the first night. While we were out and about, Krosbi was traveling around on her own, trying to see the things she wanted to see. It's sometimes easier to travel on your own when you don't have to worry about accommodating other people. When she was trying to get off the subway, some dude knocked her down and stole her new iPhone X. It created a huge fiasco for her! Luckily, she had insurance and had been backing up her photos non-stop throughout the trip. Krosbi was also able to contact Apple and her phone provider who were very helpful. She got a new phone but within a few days of arriving back home in Utah, she was notified by Apple that her phone was recovered. How scary and stressful for Krosbi!

So far, Paris has felt the like the least safe city I've visited so far. When Laura had her wallet stolen in Italy, they didn't try to hurt her in the process. Even the riots weren't too scary. But Paris had lots of people, gross guys, yelling stuff at us and Krosbi got hurt when the guy knocked her down. It's been way cool so far for the things we've seen, but I don't think I would live in Paris; maybe the countryside would be better.