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High Society Paris / Versailles Return to home page. |
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| An early morning walk through the area of Paris around the Seine River
started this day. The entire city is just as scenic as it can be.
Then we took a bus ride over to the Château de Versailles.
When we arrived the first thing we did was went over to the stables of
Versailles, which is now a horse riding / exhibition school. We watched
several of the students practice, and heard about the school and what it's
all about. It's a very exclusive school, they only have 12 students.
You spend and entire week interviewing and proving yourself to get admission
into the school. There was a women who was "auditioning" (for lack
of a better term) to try and get into the school while we were there.
In adition to learning the riding and performing skills the students also
study art, to learn form, as well as horseback archery, although I'm unclear
as to why. Maybe they're planning an invasion.
After the stables we took a guided tour through Château de Versailles. Which is a huge mansion that one of the kings built so that he could be away from Paris in case there was yet another revolt. But after seeing the Château, I see why the peasents were revolting. It was excessively lavish, and serves no other purpose than the ego of the king. The Louvre was lavish as well, but at least it was a fortification that protected the city and served a purpose. We then walked through the gardens over to the La Flotille restaurant in the Versailles Gardens. After lunch we got rented bicycles and rode through the gardens and around the lake (or is it a pond, or a pool, hard to say, definately man made.) After proving that we were completely out of shape, we went back to the hotel. The evening ended with a farewell dinner at La Duree. Where our guides Roni & Alex showed a video presentation they had made of many of the pohotos that they had taken during the trip. |