Paris - Day 1

Just came back from my ash dusted holiday to Europe.... My longest holiday to date... 16 dates trotting from Paris to Brussels then Brugge then Amsterdam then London and back to Paris....

I am considered damn lucky because I flew in a day before the Iceland Volcano decided to erupt and after that all planes were grounded for almost a week... :) *thank god!!*

So let me try going day by day.... *Warning! pictures might get less along the way and postings might get far and apart as I get lazier* hehe!!

So on my first day in Paris I took the RER out of paris and headed to Palace of Versailles to check out the Chateau of King Louis (a few of them, god knows why they like to name themselves with the same name and have prefixes) ..... First stop, Porte De Clichy my nearest station.... Oooh... fast train... hehe!!

It was a cold day... colder than expected.... brrrr.....

The chapel in all its restored glory....

The glorious but back aching to look at paintings on the ceiling... It was everywhere!!! and I mean everywhere....

The hall of mirrors..... One side of the walls were lined with mirrors and the other side were windows overseeing the garden.... one word comes to mind... opulent.... and gaudy... haha!!

My first statue of a naked man in Paris... haha!! Just had to....

This is another hall which are lined left right and centre with paintings depicting many a glorious moments in history from war to coronations etc....

This guy according to my sis is the best looking head we have seen so far in the chateau and there were plenty....

Out to the gardens next.... the grounds of Versailles is enormous.... Apparently it used to be the entire Paris and now this is all that is left...and it is still huge... This is the view of the chateau from the outside...

and this is the view overlooking the gardens and grounds.... at the end of it is a pond/pool....

Aiyo... my sweep panoramic pictures are turning out tiny!!! Why??? but this is a sweeping view of the gardens... it was beautiful....

Because it was too far to walk we took a tram down to Marie Antoinette's house and grounds.... which is supposed to be the most feminine part of Versailles... Oooh...before that....freshly baked potatos.... a moving oven...how quaint.... :D

More pictures of the grounds surrounding Marie Antoinette's house....

After spending a good 4 hours at Versailles we really needed to go... if not how to see everything in 3 days? So off to Montmartre to see the Basilica of Sacre Couer but not before taking the fornicular up the hill and viewing this view... :) I heard that the sunset was suppose to be stunning from up there and the nite view fantastic but when the sky only grew dark around 9pm it was a bit difficult to stay up there and freeze ourselves so we came down after a walk around....

The Basilica from the outside... pictures from the inside are not allowed but it was really grand... huge.... A church should always look like this... always....

Then at nite... mum was tired... her legs were not what they used to be after the surgery so we dropped her off at the hotel and we headed to the Eiffel Tower to get a lit up view.... It was quite breathtaking considering it is a huge chunk of metal.... and we also went up and kinda regretted... Very cold!!!!!! hahaha!!

So that was the end of Day 1.... tune in (or in MW's case dont tune in so often) for Day 2... :)