An age old French dilemma. Which palace to visit? Versailles is the standard bearer for the word
palace. Fontainebleau is somewhat
smaller and more manageable. We debated visiting both (and still may) but
opted to head to Fontainebleau for our last day before heading to Paris.
This was not of course a major dilemma for Napoleon who
clearly preferred Fontainebleau and seems to have invested heavily in its
development. The palace at Fontainebleau offered a ton of
beautiful rooms to explore with amazing sculptures, tapestries and paintings. The convenient audio tour offered a great
overview of what we were enjoying and provided a nice historical backdrop to
the visit.
Napoleon's Throne Room (and Throne)
As we started the walk through the palace, it appeared our
little girl was more likely to be interested in playing games on an IPhone. This lasted for a little while and then
something special happened, she realized the IPhone had a camera. She saw something that intrigued her and
wanted to take a picture of it (I believe it was the King’s bed). She took a picture and then was off and
running. She spent the rest of the tour
running ahead of us and taking pictures of the things that intrigued here. This will obviously require its own blog post
and pictures, but she did a good job and enjoyed Napoleon’s throne room most of
all.
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| New Career - Photographer |
After the palace tour we visited the Napoleon museum in the
palace. As you can see from the picture
of his uniform (with Siena standing in front of it and easily a foot lower),
little tiny man, great big army. The museum had many unique pieces including his
medals and armor. The visit to the
palace consumed our day and we headed home for dinner and our last night in the
Chateau. Now the only question that
remains is to Versailles or not to Versailles.
