The Palace of Versailles

The palace of Versailles - every king's dream. It was the residence of the French king and the heart of Europe for about 100 years in 1789. Louis XIV spent half a year's income of Europe's richest country to build this beautiful palace. The palace itself and grounds are stunning. This is where Melanie and I started our trip. About 6 hours from Amsterdam and 30 minutes outside of Palace, we drove here to start our vacation. Melanie was the navigator and we successfully made it from Amsterdam without incident. Versailles was a great start to our trip. It was hard to photograph it, everything was so large. I can't imagine seeing anything so elaborate and beautiful in the states. How did they build this? How did they decorate it? What were they thinking? We couldn't stop asking these questions, but we enjoyed ourselves touring the gardens and palace and town. Had a great dinner at a seafood place recommended by the hotel (even though they wouldn't tell us the specials because they were "French"). We stayed overnight here and easily (where is that train station?) caught the train to Paris leaving our car at the hotel. Paris, here we come!! (Sorry the pictures are a little out of order - it is going to take forever to decide what Paris ones to post. Melanie said that there are over 550 pictures!!!).