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Versailles - 4th June 1999

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Mark and Ben lurk suspiciously under
Louis XIV's bedroom window...

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Ben poses, quite effectively, in the Room of Peace at one end of the Hall of Mirrors

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Mark poses a bit less successfully by the window of Louis XVI's private study

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Ben wishes it to be known that wearing shorts, sandals and a t-shirt was a mistake - it was freezing

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A miniscule french woman sheltered by the Incarnation of Air makes a good set piece

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The chariot of the Sun God rises from the Basin of Apollo at the end of the Great Lawn - the guide books are often rather rude about Versailles, but I think it has Gloire in great quantities...

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The Seine guards the Water Parterre underneath the Chateau's garden front.

 

 

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Ben feels like a pawn in the Cour de Marbre

 

Ben comments: The thing which most struck me about Versailles was the scale and sheer theatricality of it all. It is a testament to the skills of
Le Notre and Hardouin-Mansard that the spirit of the Sun King and his magnificent, absurd court lives on today.

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The belvedere, somewhere in the grounds of the Trianon, one of the king's private palaces (and itself the size of a decent royal residence anywhere else in Europe) - it was raining every other minute...

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Diana hunts as the storm gathers...

| | | | | ©2009 Mark Ynys-Mon