I'll Be Ready In Five Minutes: The Most Perfect Parisian Day

Our first full day in Paris!! I woke up SO excited and all but flew out of bed because....

We're going to Versailles today!!

Can you see the spring in my step?!

Ian's eyes were basically popping out of his head, he was so excited!

Here you can see the epic picnic loot we scooped up before getting on the train...

(This is so not our first rodeo)

Toot toot! Here comes the train...!

Getting off the train, you are faced with the ULTIMATE view...

Walking through the majestic gilded gates, it's hard not to picture what it would have been like in it's heyday with all its balls and decadence (before heads were rolling around)

Honey, we're hooooome!!

We were really going for the full experience here, so we popped into the little gift shop and grabbed ourselves some La Duree macarons...

Such beautiful little treats!

Attempting my best "Marie-Antoinette" with my mouth full of rose macarons...!

In we went! You are faced first with the chapel... I think some coronations may have taken place here, but for the most part it was used for daily mass and weddings! Ooo la la!

I was particularly obsessed with this green velvet wallpaper and considered just how outrageous would it really be for my bedroom?

Nearly every ceiling had huge roundels full of classical artwork...

One of the Louis by Bernini! Very Baroque with that billowing shawl...

Fleur-de-lis!

I didn't come across a single chandelier in this palace that I didn't absolutely LOVE...

The Hall of Mirrors is BY FAR my favorite room...

On the right side are large scale windows that look out on to the gardens, and on the left side are huge mirrors that perfectly mirror all the windows! So the light is spectacular...

This is also where all the balls where held!

The final part of the interior is several long halls filled with large scale paintings of various battles...

Outside we go! You can see the Hall of Mirrors here on the second floor...

The gardens are INCREDIBLY expansive... They just seem to go on forever!

On our way down, we spotted a little kitten!

And some statues, of course...

This lucky little thing gets to wander the grounds all day long!

We settled down into a spot by the water and prepared ourselves a picnic...

Pretty epic spread, am I right?!

We had a good chuckle watching this guy making his girlfriend do all the work...

After our picnic, we grabbed some bikes and rode down this beautifully lined path towards the Le Gran Trianon...

The Gran Trianon was a little palace that King Louis XIV had built so he could have a place to retreat to with his mistress to get away from all the strict etiquette rules of the court.

Ian getting the perfect pic...

I died over this pink bedroom...

As well as this beyond gorg peristyle...

Then we got led down a dungeon-like hallway...

And had a little snoop around of the cook's domain...! Quite the contrast from the glittering, gilded palaces, but I actually really loved it! Its so French provence and that brass cookware! Love.

Back up the stairs where everything is gilded!

We then left and headed out to the Queen's Hamlet...

Marie Antoinette had it built for very much the same reasons the Gran Trianon was built. It was a place of leisure and retreat where only her closest friends were allowed, and by invitation only. Very exclusive.

It's comprised of many little Flemish-styled houses (with the most idyllic thatched roofs!) as well as little lakes and ponds...

There was also a Petit Trianon, which the Queen could use at her leisure. Part of why Marie Antoinette built the Hamlet was so that her Petit Trianon would seem like it was deep in the countryside, rather that in the confines of Versailles. It also provided much more intimacy.

Here you can see the Petit Trianon in front of Ian...

Back on the bikes!

Weeeee!

We stopped to check out some fleecy little sheep...

And for one last rest at our most perfect little picnic spot...

I was pretty tuckered out after all the walking and touring we did...

And so was Ian, ha!!

We made it back into the city for dinner time and we headed right back to St. Germain to check out Brasserie Lipp. We knew instantly we were in for a good meal when we read "No Salad As A Meal". Clearly, they mean BUSINESS...

Vino to start, obviously...

The feeling of total French decadence lingered from our day at Versailles and so we had foi gras for our appetizer...

Another sign I totally loved... No Shorts!! Honestly, when will American boys learn... Shorts are for the beach, and the beach only - let's all get a little more civilized, shall we??