The Gardens of Versailles
Paris Solo Diaries — XIX (B)
As soon as I climbed down the steps, a path from in between tall trees appeared. Opening a map I had picked up from on the way in, I found myself at the beginning of the queen’s grove. Opening the map also made me realize how large the garden of Versailles was. The Gardens of Versailles were divided into mini gardens, with the size of each mini garden being as large or sometimes even larger than the gardens at Ahmedabad.
Sitting on marble benches amongst the large green trimmed trees and huge white sculptures, I felt like I was in an open-air museum. While I did want to sit and enjoy each mini garden, I realized that I didn’t have enough time to cover all of them and spend 30 minutes in each one. So after the Queen’s grove, which was queen’s own personal garden to throw her parties or where she was not disturbed by anyone and Latona’s Fountain & Parterre, I decided that I had sat enough in Jardin Tuileries. I took up a challenge to visit all portions of this 77 hectares of the formal French garden, to see all musical fountain shows and to see all sculptures displayed in the open-air galleries that were in these gardens. And I did all this in the old-time style, with a physical map!
Right from the Orangery Parterre garden at the beginning to the King’s garden at the end, each one had uniquely trimmed trees, flowers, amazing fountains and lots and lots of sculptures. Sometimes the sculptures stood in the middle of the garden and sometimes they surrounded the garden from the edges in between the trees. A lot of times they also stood in the middle of a lake or a fountain.
I especially loved the fountain show at the Mirror Pool, where the water danced to the tunes of French music, creating melodies and shapes that soothed the eyes. Apollo Fountain, as well as Apollo’s bath grove, were quite pretty too. As I struggled to cover all portions of this garden with already 25k steps logged in, I saw some people go around in golf carts. Inquiring where I could find one of them, I realized that my walk to the renting place was longer than the walk left for me to finish the remaining part of the garden. So I decided against it. Even though the palaces were completely crowded, the gardens, despite the crazy numbers of the crowd, provided silent places to be at, only due to its sheer size.
Let me describe for you one of the mini-gardens I can’t remember the name of. As French music played in the background, I walked around in a pathway covered with green leaves. Light pink roses and other beautiful flowers hung from the ceilings of the arches I passed by, while some of them lay withered at my feet. Searching for the source of the music, I skipped the small benches and sitting areas that lay hidden from my way between two arches. As I finally came to an opening, I saw a large man emerging from stones by disintegrating a mountain stone by stone. And this wonderful statue in copper stood in the middle of the pool that was surrounded by the flower-covered archways that I passed earlier. All arches opened to this beautiful sculpture displayed in the centre of this garden. As I stood there studying the sculpture and revelling in its beauty, winds blew and the petals of the flowers fell around me. And this was a summer afternoon in Paris! Thinking of what it must be like to stand there on a fall evening, I for the first time became jealous of the Royals.
No matter how beautifully trimmed these gardens were, the trimming itself made them seem fake when compared to the wilderness I saw in the gardens at Giverny. Rectangle, oval and circular shapes of the trimmed trees, while beautiful, only spoke of sophistication. But I feel that most of the times, the beauty is in the wildness and the waves of nature.
When I came across trees taller than the large walls of the palace which too were trimmed, I wondered how were trees as tall as these trimmed. My question was soon answered as I saw a person in a mechanical lift, seemed to have been built for the sole purpose of trimming these trees, go up the wall and trim those trees.
I finished my visit with the visit to the fountain show at the Dragon’s fountain that reminded me of Game of Thrones and the Neptune Fountains.
Having survived the day till 5 pm on only a croissant, coffee and 2 cookies, I was hungrier than ever before. Skipping the dinner the previous night only worsened the situation by the end of my visit. I had stopped by the cafes in the garden and around the palace, only to find long lines. Since, I was running against time in order to finish my quest before 5 pm, against my better judgement, I had passed them by. As soon as I was out of the palace, before moving towards my bus, I went on another quest, one for food. Hogging down two ice creams, I made it to the meeting point just in time. While waiting for the bus, this time I was mistaken for a Mexican as a vendor greeted me ‘Hola’.
Reaching Paris by 7 pm, I rushed for dinner and had a full-sized portion of chipotle and two portions of guacamole and chips. I ended the night with a wine and cheese session with my Airbnb host, where she introduced me to different types of cheese and gave me a few handy tips on pairing them correctly.
Read first part of this article — The Palace of Versailles [Paris Solo Diaries — XIX(A)]
