The Western European Blitz: Day 11. A Paris Anniversary. The Versailles Special.

10.01.19

A Paris Anniversary 

The rain is coming down hard. Bag strapped to her back under the Paris street lights, Ingrid tries desperately to hail a cab trapped on the Ave des Champs-Elysees west of the Louvre. The sun has set and it’s cold and wet. In a city full of bars and cafés, we are in no mans land. Things are looking bleak. Happy anniversary. 

Ten hours prior: 

We nail the metro first try.  No mistakes. Scoop a couple tickets. Wait patiently for the correct train and we are off to Versailles. 

The gilded palace obviously can not be missed. It’s The display of European Royalty. This massive encampment is at its heart, a house. Louis XIV built it for him and the royal family. He used a tenth of the French economy to do it and it’s fabulous, in the true definition of the word.

The skip the line line is hours long so we find a different solution. We snag a guided tour that will start in 30 minutes. Perfect.

The tour brings us through the King’s personal apartment. Through out the tour the facts and history start to blend and roll over our head. It’s hard to take in 3 king’s and 5 generations worth of information. Our tour guide is good though and enough of it sticks. The gilded rooms on the second floor are strictly for the king and queen and the successor. The gold interior in Versais is 22k gold leafs painted it on the trim work. They let people touch it. Bold.

Fact attack!: 

*Louis XV, big cat guy.

*Also, the young King was issued a warning by the doctors to be less “enthusiastic” in the bedroom.  The queen had given birth to ten children in twelve years.

We are pushed along to what once was the grand staircase, and then to the chapel. The chapel is still used to this day once a month and for special events. The history of it all almost out shines the ornate glamour until you reach the Hall of Mirrors.

What a regal display. It’s packed with tourists who have like us, just past through all the estate rooms, which provide their own level of awe. The portrait ceilings in the rooms down to the furniture are all works of the finest artists France has to offer. 

We work through the other parts of the estate that we are allowed to, including the Madams apartments. The rules of proper behavior are interesting. Two waiting rooms, the socializing room, the sleeping quarters, private quarters. Each with a decreasing amount amount of qualified visitors. The hidden doors on the back wall provide stairwells and corridors for servants to move through. We also saw the very hidden door Queen Mary Antoinette escaped through when Versailles was over taken during the Revolution. Run Mary run. They pissed.

If the history was stifled by the glamour, the glamour may be stifled by the beauty and scale that is the Gardens of Versailles. 

There is classical music and loud trumpets being played through speakers in the gardens giving a feeling of historic relevance. 1st stop is the Kings garden. We grab a sandwich and a beer to go at the garden café . It’s a very well maintained labyrinth where we catch the back end of The fountain show. It’s announced by the trumpets we heard and then corresponds with the classical music. Let’s get lost in the labyrinth a bit to embrace the scene. We break out at the Eclipse.

The Eclipse features Apollo riding his chariot out from the bottom of the pool. Versailles stands behind us atop the hill. Beyond Apollo is the Grand canal. It is a man made canal in the shape of a cross and stretches for leagues. You can see couples in row boats. How romantic.

Just Beyond the boarder of the gardens you’ll find the Grand Trianon. It is made of pink marble. Louis XIV had it built to avoid court and to pursue his affairs.

Françoise d'Aubigné, Marquise de Maintenon. It was a sanctuary for Louis the XV’s “Daughters of France and eventually was home to Napoleon and his mother. The grand canal stretched from the right arm of the cross to the property. Louis XIV would travel to the palace via the water way and climb the grand staircase at the water’s edge. The gardens are more flowery than the Versailles garden which consists of large trees, hedges and such. 

Fact attack:!

*There were so many flowers in the garden that the woman who inhabited the palace would sometimes have to leave due to the overwhelming aroma giving them head aches. 

There is one more stop. The Petite Palace. It’s the place Marie Antoinette made home to avoid much of the court life and revolutionary chaos. It is quite petit comparatively speaking.  

The rain starts to fall again so we grab the trolly back and race to catch the 6:05 train back to Paris. Versailles met and exceeded expectations.

If you’re standing on the bridge on Winston Churchill Blvd. to your left is the Eiffel tower. The rain is gone in Paris. The clouds are dramatic and it’s going on sunset. It’s a wonderful place to take in Paris’ most famous attraction.

We want to check off another box and get on a boat to take in the city from the view point of The Siene so we hit the ticket window of Brateu Moche at 6:54. Next boat leaves at 7pm. Timing has been golden today, so far. We will be back in plenty of time to find our brick oven pizza anniversary dinner.

Boarding the boat we look to grab good seats on the top deck. Mission accomplished. Pull out the green towel! I knew bringing the towel everywhere every day would come in handy. We wipe down the recently rained on seats and park it. Not a minute later an Asian tour bus of photo snapping Koreans flood the seats all around us... I spot a couple seats further back. 

The Brateau Moche has been in service since 1867. It takes us east up the Siene. The Orsay, Louvre, Notre Dame, all the hits are on display against the sunsetting sky. However the crown jewel really shines brightest. On our way back down the river The Eiffel tower gives a show bouncing through three different light patterns. It literally pulls everyone out of their seat. 

It’s getting dark now. We are a ways away from any pizza possibilities. Time to down shift into our default mode and start walking. A slight detour to get a glimpse of the grand and petit palais’ brings us to the begging of the story. Its raining and we are stuck.

A blind corner with a faint neon sign in the distance is the only move we have. It works. We spill into a quiet Brasserie. Aprol sprtiz and House Roughe se vue ple. The life lines need to juice up over a couple happy hour rounds, but it’s getting late. We’ve put pizza in jeopardy. 

Our waitress comes to the rescue and gives us the address of the “best pizza in Paris.” “There are many famous people who dine there.” She says

Pizzaria di Rebellato has no special qualities about it from the outside. We find out later it’s the owner who greeted us and shows us in. We plant ourselves at a table in the corner next to admittedly, important looking people. We don’t pry.

Our waiter is a proper Italian. We explain brick oven pizza is a tradition for our anniversary because we served it at our wedding. He kind of gets it, thinks we’re crazy, but likes us I think. He tells going to take care of us and pulls the bottle of red from the shelf next to us and puts in on our table. Contado 2014. It’s Italian.

For an appetizer burrata. He explains they have it. Ingrid explains we need it.  Also we will take 2 pizzas. Why not. 

The food is excellent. The wine is excellent. The conversation is fun and reminiscent, the crowd is entertaining. We shut another establishment down. 

This where they earn the extra tip. We are the only ones in the restaurant the staff is clearly wiped and they bring us a Tiramisu on the house for our anniversary. Guess what? It’s excellent. 

The ride home Ingrid google translates with the Uber driver all his deepest ambitions and we get to see the Eiffel Tower lit up purple before Mr. Uber driver takes a good long look in the mirror after dropping us off.

Celebrating an anniversary on an epic trip in as beautiful and romantic a city as Paris is special. We don’t take it for granted and wont ever forget getting caught in the rain after a day of glamour and history only to find the “best pizza in Paris”. All because we talked to a strangers.

Tomorrow we say goodbye to Paris, hello Brussels! Where are the tickets?