Beautiful Versailles

Instead of spending another day wandering the streets of Paris, we decided to go to Versailles for the day and have a look around the palace and the gardens. It was definitely worth the trip, except for the queues. It seemed that most of Paris was visiting Versailles with us!

After queueing for so long our first priority was brunch/lunch for hungry kids, so we made a bee-line for the cafe. The French definitely know how to rock a sandwich. We have had some amazing baguettes, off the shelf but full of gorgeous fresh ingredients. It almost makes up for the really bad coffee (but not quite).

Palace of Versailles from outside the gates

After lunch we followed the crowd and viewed a couple of pretty impressive rooms, but then found ourselves at the exit, which confused us and left us asking "Really, was that it?".

It turns out the in our haste to get to the cafe we had skipped must of the palace! We backtracked and found the entrance to the royal apartments and weren't disappointed. But it was really hard to get decent photos between the crowds and the glare...

Looking at room after room of intense and ornate furniture and decor, I became increasingly aware of sensory overload. If I had to live in surroundings such as those, I think I would need a plain room with simple furnishings to go to as a sanctuary every now and then.

After the crowds inside the palace it was very refreshing to step out into the gardens. We spent an hour or two roaming. There are three or four lakes, several manicured gardens, some less manicured park areas, and some lovely fountains.

This fountain was dancing to classical music. Very lovely. 

A spare bedroom or two!

And that was our day in Versailles. The next morning we hopped on a train from Paris to Montpellier in the south of France.

Paris - Day 2

On our second day in Paris we did more wandering. The rain had cleared leaving everything fresh and clean. We started the day at Luxembourg Gardens (with more bad coffee). We thought that you could tour Luxembourg Palace so we wandered on in past the armed guards, only to be told once we were in the lobby that it was a parliament building and we needed an invitation from a Senator to get in... Unfortunately I had left all my senatorial invites at home, so we had to leave. But the gardens were beautiful.

Luxembourg Palace and Gardens

Luxembourg Palace and Gardens

After that we headed just up the street to the Paris Pantheon, an amazing building despite the picture hanging out the front. The crypts underneath are not amazing as far as crypts go, but they host some fairly famous people. I didn't take many photos because I took a lot last time.

Paris Pantheon 

Paris Pantheon 

Paris Pantheon

On our way out we came across a creperie, so that was lunch. We went back to Luxembourg Gardens so the kids could run of their lunch, and then headed across the river to check out Atelier des Lumieres, an exhibition made completely from sound and projected light. It went for 25 minutes and was amazing! The photos don't do it justice, and imagine all the scenes moving and merging to the accompaniment of hauntingly beautiful music.

Atelier des Lumières

By then it was time to wander towards home, but Miss L still hadn't had a sleep (she appears to have gone from 3 sleeps per day to one while we have been away!). So we decided to start walking in the general direction and then grab an Uber after she woke up. An hour and 45 minutes later she had napped for 25 minutes and we had made it all the way back to our apartment.

The next day we were headed for Versailles.

Hello Paris - Day 1

I have been to Paris before and had no great desire to go again, but S-i-L and the kids hadn't been. So we made it a destination for four nights. Our apartment was a little out of the city centre, but with a bit of walking and a little help from Uber we managed to see all that we wanted to see.

On our first outing we walked to Notre Dame Cathedral and wandered around the outside. We had no interest in queueing to go inside with 2 kids in tow. After Notre Dame we went to the nearby Saint Chapelle church which I didn't go to last time, but everyone told me how spectacular it is after I got home... So I was glad to get the opportunity to do that. And it was amazing!

Notre Dame

Notre Dame 

Notre Dame

Saint Chapelle - downstairs

Saint Chapelle - upstairs. Spectacular!

I used the Paris Underground a bit last time I was here, but it is ridiculously hard to navigate with a pushchair, so after one attempt (and carrying the pushchair and Miss L up and down several flights of stairs) we decided that we were never going to try that again! Instead we took an Uber across the Seine to Monsieur Bleu, a restaurant that had great reviews and boasted of excellent views over the river to the Eiffel Tower. Unfortunately the restaurant was hugely over-rated, very expensive, and the views were blocked by trees (although there was no view from our table, trees or not). But we ate and refreshed, and then wandered over to check out the Eiffel Tower.

By the time we had seen enough there, rain was threatening. We headed to the Louvre to check out the pyramids but again, weren't prepared to queue with the kids to go in. I have been in before and S-i-L hopes to come back when the kids are older and she can leave them behind!

Pyramids at the Louvre

Just as we finished our circumnavigation of the pyramids the rain came pelting down! Along with several hundred other people we headed for shelter in the nearby streets and ended up in a cafe enjoying Aperol Spritzers while we waited for the rain to pass. Then we took a quick walk up the street to sample the local macaroons before heading back to our apartment for the evening.

Amsterdam - Day 2

As promised by the forecast, it was raining on our second day in Amsterdam. It was quite fabulous to sit in our waterside apartment and watch the reeds sway in the wind and rain. It was a whole other thing to consider going out in it.

Thankfully we got a bit of a break in the rain when we headed to our tram stop, but it started coming down again while we were walking from Centraal Station to the NEMO Science Museum. It is quite awkward to run with strollers, bags, and cups of Starbucks coffee (and it wasn't even a good coffee!). We got there in the end, only slightly wet. The museum is in the shape of a boat and is reached by crossing bridge while being buffeted by gale-force winds.

NEMO Science Museum

The place was great for kids, really interactive, and included a 15 minute 'show' where the concepts of potential and kinetic energy were demonstrated for them with large falling domino blocks, a ball on a roller-coaster style track, and things involving gravity and wind force. (I'd tell you more but I really wasn't paying much attention.)

It was very busy and very noisy, to the point of being overwhelming at times for us quiet types. But the kids really enjoyed it (especially 10-year-old Master J) so it was worth it to keep him entertained for a couple of hours. We even got to put on lab coats and do experiments with vinegar and baking powder mixed under pressure, another highlight for Master J.

There is a rooftop restaurant with great views out over Amsterdam city, but again, super windy!

View from the rooftop of NEMO Science Museum

After lunch the weather looked to have cleared slightly, so we went on a 1-hour canal cruise. But Miss L (1-year-old) was very tired and grizzly and it felt more like 4 hours! It was lovely to see the city from a different viewpoint, which is what a lot of the publicity about the city says... "The real city is best viewed from the canals".

After that it was time to get the kids home and fed. While they showered and went to bed I headed back into the city on my own to go to the Body Worlds Museum. This exhibition definitely wouldn't appeal to everyone, but it was incredibly interesting for me. It is an exhibition of the human body, made up predominantly of plastinated (preserved) cadavers that have been specifically donated to the museum, or science in general, by people who wished that their bodies could be used for "the training of physicians and the instruction of laypersons" after they have passed away. It was incredibly interesting, but not something that we could have taken the kids to. Don't scroll down if you don't want to see the pictures... they could be seen as graphic if you don't have an interest in that sort of thing personally or professionally.

The muscles

The nerves

The urinary system

Internal organs

After that I headed home and we all packed up and headed for Paris the next day. We didn't get a chance to sample any of the goods that Amsterdam is renowned for. It wasn't really that sort of trip this time. I'll come back without kids and see what happens!

Amsterdam - Day 1

We had a lovely canal-side apartment in Amsterdam. It was a little out of the city, but really close to a tram that went straight to Central Station, and a supermarket, a bakery, a pharmacy, and a bottle store... all those things you need when you travel with children!

We had two full days to see what we could, and the second day's forecast was for rain. So we took advantage of the sunshine on the first day and took the kids to Artis (The Amsterdam Zoo). It is a small zoo (being in the middle of an urban/suburban area in the city) but has a varied collection of animals, and we were surprised that quite a few of them roam free, especially some of the birds.

Here's just a few of the pics:

Macaques

Pink pelicans

Very quiet, disinterested thing

Garden

It looks prehistoric

Owls (Hedwig?)

Elephants 

Peacock

Giraffes and zebras

Wolves (they were gorgeous!)

Very cute, and roaming free (but not for touching, much to Miss L's disappointment)

Camels

After leaving the zoo, Master J and I did the tour of the Amsterdam Dungeons while S-i-L took Miss L for a walk in the pushchair to try and get her to sleep. The dungeons were very well done! It was a tour of about 20 people (with Master J being the only child) and it took us through many rooms, each complete with actors playing the parts of judge, torturer, jailer, and executioner etc. Unfortunately photos were not allowed, except for this blurry one I took in the foyer.

The Amsterdam Dungeon

There were many scares, screams, heeby-jeebies, and bumps in the night, and the woman beside me got such a fright in one room that she screamed and landed in my lap with her arms around my neck! It took us both a second to regain our composure! We went through a witch trial and burning, being sold into slavery on a ship, a mortuary and hanging 'garden' of corpses, a room of mirrors, and we crawled through a pitch black tunnel with things grabbing at our ankles. Although I enjoyed it and thought it was fabulously done, I was glad when it ended so that the adrenaline could cool down a bit! And a few of the guys in our group had obviously been sampling some of Amsterdam's finest before they came in. They found everything to be extra-scary and extra-funny. By the end I think they were getting on everyone's nerves, not just mine!

There were street performers in Dam Square who were very entertaining.

And that was the end of Day 1 in Amsterdam. We enjoyed looking around the city and catching the trams from here to there. We got some groceries and headed home for another early night (we seem to be doing that a lot!).