The Palace of Versailles is one of the most famous royal palaces in the world.
If you’re going to Paris, this is the #1 sight I recommend you visit. Trust me, it’s totally worth the day trip from Paris.
Sure, the Eiffel Tower is beautiful (especially at night). And the Arc de Triomphe is a sight to behold. However, The Palace of Versailles is in a league of its now.
This is easily the most beautiful palace I have ever been in. Every single room is ornately designed. And the gardens are incredible. It is mind blowing that something like this even exists!
If you’re interested in visiting this beautiful palace, here is my guide. Here are my tips for visiting the Palace of Versailles!
Getting to the Palace of Versailles
Getting to the palace isn’t too difficult. You’ll need to take the train from Gare Montparnasse station. The station you want to get off at is Versailles-Château – Rive Gauche.
I think I paid about 7 Euros for my ticket. The whole ride is about 30 minutes.
Once you get to the station in Versailles, it is about a 15 minute walk to get to the palace. The town of Versailles is nice. If you have extra time at night, it’s worth a few hours to walk around and check out the restaurants.
There’s even a Michelin Star restaurant right in front of the palace!
Be warned: there is usually a LARGE line to get into the place!
I got there right when the palace opened and I still ended up waiting 2.5 hours to get in! Luckily it wasn’t too hot that day in the summer, otherwise it would have been a lot worse!
However, the wait was well worth it. The palace is really out of this world and something you need to see for yourself. I can’t describe it with justice.
Pro Tip: If you pay up for a tour, you can skip the line to get in the palace! Trust me, it’s worth it to just skip the line!
The Palace of Versailles
The Palace of Versailles is broken up into three major parts:
- There’s the actual palace,
- The Gardens of Versailles,
- And Trianon Estates
I would recommend buying the ticket that gives you access to all three sights.
So, if you didn’t already know, The Palace of Versailles was the primary royal residence of the French aristocracy from 1682 to 1789.
When the Court and government were installed here, many of the country’s nobles were required to spend a minimum number of days at the palace.
It’s a good thing the palace contains an astounding 2,300 rooms!!
Here’s the main courtyard after you go through the entrance gates.
When you walk into the palace, it’s like being transported back in time. You’ll see many of the rooms the royal family used and also the guest apartments.
Everything looks incredibly fancy, especially if you’re a peasant like me 🙂
The palace is beyond beautiful. You’ll see incredible oil paintings, beautiful painted ceilings, and grand staircases.
One of the thing’s you’ll immediately notice is a common theme of a lot of gold around the palace.
Now, there are two must see exhibits within the castle: the Gallery of Battles and the Hall of Mirrors.
The Gallery of Battles
WOW! That’s pretty much all you can say when you walk into this grand hall.
This hall takes up the entire first floor of the south wing of the palace. There are over 30 incredible oil paintings depicting 15 centuries of French military conquest from Clovis to Napoleon.
Pretty much every French dynasty is represented in the paintings, including the houses of Merovingian, Carolingian, Capetian, Valois, and Bourbon.
The Hall of Mirrors
The Hall of Mirrors is as you guessed…a giant hall with some giant mirrors! It is by far the most famous room in the entire palace.
The hall consists of 17 mirror-clad arches. Each arch contains twenty-one mirrors with a total complement of 357 used in the hall!
There are also more than a dozen fancy chandeliers in the room. When they light up during the night, it is an incredible sight to behold.
Unfortunately, not all of the mirrors are super clean as people touch them throughout the day. So you’ll see a lot of fingerprint smudges on them.
But, I did manage to get some decent selfies with the clean ones!
The Gardens of Versailles
The palace building itself is just one small part of Versailles that you need to explore.
Once you get outside, you absolutely need to explore the gardens. I really don’t even know how to explain the gardens.
I have never seen anything so grand and so beautiful at the same time. It’s truly incredible.
The gardens are actually my favorite part of the whole experience. It’s so beautiful and fancy. I just can’t believe something like it exists.
There are probably over 30 – 40 small gardens throughout the Gardens of Versailles. Many of them have fountains and some of them even have water shows!
The gardens are very big so be sure to bring comfortable sneakers!
My favorite garden here is hands the Orangery. It’s a large garden that houses many orange and citrus trees, including lemon and pomegranate. Some of these trees are over 200 years old!
When you walk out of the Palace, and head straight you’ll get a bird’s eye view of the Orangery. You’ll see a large pound in the middle.
The garden is flanked by a pair of grand staircases. The staircases are incredible. They look like they were made for giants!
Stand in front of the platform on top and you’ll get an amazing view of the gardens from above. But you’ll want to walk down and experience it in person too!
Trianon Estates
Once you are finished with the gardens, head straight to the Grand Canal. You’ll see plenty of tourists renting canoes here.
There are also a few restaurants and awesome gelato carts here. Be sure to bring cash as some of the street vendors don’t accept credit cards.
If you haven’t already eaten, I would get some food here. I actually ate from an overpriced cafe in the Palace and wouldn’t recommend doing that.
The food here near the canals is much better.
From the Grand Canal, you’ll want to walk to Trianon Estates. It’s about a 10 minute walk from the canal.
As you can imagine, participating in the French court can be tiresome after a while. That’s why the Kings of Versailles built themselves a place to “cool off” from all that.
They build the Trianon Estates for this reason. The estates consist of (1) Grand Trianon, (2) Petit Trianon, and (3) Queen’s Hamlet.
Grand Trianon
Grand Trianon is a small marble palace built by Louis XXIV in 1670. It was a place he used to meet his lover, Madame de Montespan.
The majority of the apartments in Grand Trianon have kept their original appearance over the years. The most incredible thing about this building is the beautiful marble flooring.
Petit Trianon
Petit Trianon is set in English-style landscaped gardens. It was used by Louis XV as a place to spend more intimate time with his mistress, Comtesse Du Barry.
The King also used Petit Trianon to explore his love of the botanical sciences. The gardens aren’t as big as Versailles, but are still a sight to see.
The estate was also used by Queen Marie-Antoinette who used it as a refuge from French court. She received the estate as a gift from King Louis XVI in 1774.
The Queen’s Hamlet
The Queen’s hamlet is a set of buildings around a lake. It was built to create a rural and somewhat rustic looking village.
The hamlet consists of a windmill, dining room, salon, billiard room, and boudoir. I can definitely see why the Kings and Queens of France took refuge in this Hamlet.
It looks so peaceful. The little village is nice and quaint and sits on top of a beautiful lake.
