A month in Paris... The Palace of Versailles

We are house sitting in La Celle St Cloud, just a short trip from Versailles. Our kind home owner got us started off with some bus-metro tickets to use so we could explore the area. They sat on the table silently daring me to use them, so after much wondering 'what if we can't find our way home again', found ourselves on a bus to Versailles.

We decided our plan would be if we got lost to find a taxi to bring us home again. Like a couple of kids we wrote our address down on paper. Not that we didn't know the address, it's just that no one seems to understand our great French language skills, and we've found it easier to 'show'.

So off we set to the bus stop and hoped on the bus. After using the vaporettos - the ferry system in Venice, I was trying to swipe my ticket, which gave the good-naturred bus driver a great giggle, and he was telling me to 'push push the ticket', 'push push the ticket' - well that took a few moments to find where to push push the ticket, but finally I found the push push spot and off it went into the validator.

Now I never, ever use a bus, or a train, so it would be confusing for me in my own home town, let alone in a foreign one, so I was rather delighted to be finally on the bus and on my way to Versailles. How exciting, like a kid again on a bus trip.

We arrived at a stop that looked like Versailles and I asked just to make sure and the driver nodded, so off we hoped at Versailles Gare - the train station.

At the station we found a sign that in detail, showed how to get to The Palace. Thinking we had our location right, we headed off to The Palace... but in the opposite direction, luckily we saw a street sign that said Chateau and made a sharp U-turn.

We kept following the street signs and ended up in this lovely tree lined street...

and finally saw a peek of The Palace at the end inviting us in...

First we spotted the tourist buses

And then we spotted the crowds

Not to be deterred we hoped in the queue and made our way into this magical Palace

Once inside there we noticed armed guards patrolling with machine guns at one of the entrance doors. Poor France is on high alert, and it does give you a bit of a shock to see the guards everywhere we go.

However the tour through the Palace was truly amazing and as we have another 3 weeks here will be back regularly to visit. I discovered that an annual pass would be the way to go for us, it not only gives access to everything, but we also don't have to wait in queues to get in.

New to selfies, you can hear us muttering, "can you see me, no I can't see you, no now you're frowning, no now I can't see me, now the background isn't visible, OK SMILE... did we get it? I don't know" and so on. I think prefer my old camera where we used to balance it in precarious places, set the timer and run around to jump in front.

I'm delighted to say we found our way to the bus and back home again without a hitch, in time to take Hudson for his evening walk