Paris, Dernier Jour–November 8, 2023

This was our final day in Paris, so of course we felt compelled to see yet one more iconic Parisian landmark, the Palace of Versailles. Versailles is about 12 miles west of Paris, so we took a bus tour. I was not ready to sign on for another insane cab ride, so the bus was a pretty tame option. Whenever you go in one of these tours, you get a lot of history in a couple of hours. It’s hard to absorb everything, so I’m usually left with general impressions, as in today: Louis XIII (had trouble with the nobles), Louis XIV (wore wigs and red high heels), Louis XV (was the Sun King) and Louis XVI (French Revolution, and was beheaded). Mary Antoinette, also beheaded.

I think you may learn more on tours guided by locals, like expressions, views of history and such, so there’s a definite value there. On the other hand, I find myself wanting to spend more time on some things and less time on other things, and a tour moves at a certain pace. I can look up the history later. Today our guide, Sylvie, used many expressions, but one she used multiple times was, “voila.” I looked it up and in French voila=there, as in “so there you have it.” I am pretty much going to use voila going forward at every opportunity.

So, tonight at dinner we were seated by two other couples, Patrick and Collette and Donald and Rachel. Made me really miss Laurel and her husband, who was either named Kyle or Kevin. Patrick and Colette were super gripey. Donald seemed okayish, but Rachel was an over-talkative racist. I will not go into detail about why I thought this about her, but they moved to Florida from New York and were bashing everything about Florida 24-7. I tried to say that all states have either good or bad things, so we just have to be happy with the mix of those things. Can you even believe I said something like that? So, it obviously went over like a lead balloon. In time, I whispered to Doug that I was pretending to go to the bathroom, but would not return. He followed soon after.

One more thing from today. The small Statue of Liberty in Paris.