St Germain en Laye

Back in Paris, I am trying desperately to see and do absolutely everything and anything while I still have daylight and decent weather and time to spend here.

Sigh.

Probably the easiest Chateau to get to outside of Paris is St Germain en Laye. It sits upon the RER A station and you just have to cross the street to get to it.

The main appeal here being the remnants of a grand André Le Nôtre garden, views of Paris, and the archeological museum that resides in the chateau. Which, wasn't much really.

It was pretty basic, and the fact the the security guards seemed genuinely surprised to see me was telling. The place was empty.

They did have some kind of cool pieces of art on display, especially in the gardens.

It was quite warm the day I ventured out, and it seems like there are a lot of schools nearby, as there were crowds of teenagers hanging out on the lawns. Picnics were had, along with cigarettes over open books, and the occasional entanglement of limbs.

There's just something so charming about a vineyard with a view of the eiffel tower.

The gardens are well-maintained, but at one point the town took a huge chunk of them away to expand and build a road, so they used to be much grander.

All and all, not the most exciting place to check out, but if you have the time and inclination to wander a garden in the 'burbs, you can't go wrong.

Sceaux

Well, hello again! I have returned to Paris after a long break. This means I can sit down and organize my thoughts somewhat coherently after adventures abroad and many late nights imbibing and thriving.

I must admit, although I was not in Paris for all of August, the weather this entire summer has been gorgeous. It's totally made up for the swampy wet misery endured last year, and it's reformed my opinions about the place. Yes, you can wear flirty summer frocks here without wool tights, really! Picnics and long evenings and lazing about in the park has been the norm, and my umbrella was forgivingly useless for once.

It's been a good summer for exploring, and I've taken quite a few daytrips (and continue to do so as September is also being kind to me).

One rather sweltering afternoon, I took a trip out to Domaine du Sceaux.

It's a small Chateaux with expansive gardens right on the RER B line, just outside of Paris. It's a stop I've passed going out to Orly without much of a thought for it. Alas, this is the year of André Le Nôtre, and the tourism board is pushing all of his landscaping efforts for your wandering pleasure. Gladly.

I mean, they really are something. Huge, sweeping grounds with lawns, orderly rows of trees, ambitious canals and water elements, with plenty of hidden nooks and winding paths to explore along the way. It's very regal.

While the midday sun is hard to shoot in, I sometimes can't help the time I'm in a place.

I usually try to wait out the more attractive late afternoon light, but oftimes I just have to shoot away as I go.

The chateau, while lovely, was small and devoid of visitors.

It wasn't Versailles, but it would have been a very comfortable place to settle regardless. Nothing to be ashamed of.

There wasn't anyone visiting it either, so it was nice to meander around. Truthfully, they didn't have much except some old furniture and paintings of long-dead aristocrats, but, eh. It was a nice break from the sun.

Outside was where the action was, as the whole town uses this park as their backyard. All but a few brave souls were clustered in the shade of the orderly box trees or the tall plane trees along the Grand Canal.

Is it worth the trip out? Sure, if you have the time for it. I always tell people visiting on a limited time frame that if they see one grand Chateau, go right for the jugular and spend a day at Versailles. Once that's been seen, it's nice to visit some of the smaller places with no or little crowds to have to battle with. Plus, some of the chateaus get snippy about picnics on their lawns, but this one didn't. Pack a nice lunch and watch the swans glide down the canal.

Chateau de Versailles

Oh! How behing I've fallen. These pictures were taken way back in October, but I'm just now getting around to sorting and posting.

Here, just press play on this while you are browsing this post:

While I've been out to Versailles before, it's one of those places that you can just keep going back to.

I have yet to tire of it anyway. It's overwhelming on so many levels. The crowds, the scale, the decor, the gardens, the lesser chateaus within the estate. Oh, and the prices. Holy Moses, they do charge you a king's ransom to enter. Lucky me, I'm local enough to make use of the fact that it's free the first Sunday of every month. Go!

Also...check out this site, where you can take a virtual tour of the Chateau.

The palace is usually so packed with people- tour groups pushing their way past and blocking all the good sites, bottlenecks that take eons to push through...it's enough to make for a tough day. The gardens, however...

The gardens are just fantastic to get lost in. Ah, André Le Nôtre, what a fantastic artist you were.

They only run the fountains on special occasions...summer nights with fireworks and such...but when we were there, they had some ballin classical music blasting from speakers all over the gardens. Made the situation somehow more regal.

This was, by far, my favorite micro-garden. It's Jupiter, breaking through the earth.

I stopped counting at 20, but let's just say that there is a very large colony of stray cats living in one section of the garden.

If one thing Paris has made me appreciate more than anyplace else, it's how beautiful things look in late afternoon light when the sun is actually free of the burden of clouds.