Versailles

Opens at 9:00

Get there early!!

Take RER C Rive Gauche from Musee D’Orsay runs every 15 minutes starting at 7:53 AM

Spend morning and lunch {we will have to go to a café Maureen and I found last trip at Versailles!!}

Take RER C to Paris, exit Invalides metro

Get on line 13 to St Denis Basilique {need a new ticket to get to St Denis}

Check out St. Denis, I think there are some markets in the area so we will see!

Last metro train is 5:30!! {just this stop}

Be warned. Rue St. Denis is filled, absolutely filled with prostitutes, as well as wholesale amazing clothing much less expensive than at retail. (If they like you, they'll sell it to you)

Just don't make the mistake I did of standing in the doorway while somebody else buys their clothes...

Dear pj,

Are you asking for advice?

You've picked two locations on opposite ends of Paris. I checked the www.ratp.fr route planner.

45 minutes from Musée d'Orsay to Versailles.
1:20 from Versailles to Basilique St Denis.
40 minutes from St Denis back to Musée d'Orsay

That's 2:45 travel time. I haven't included the time it takes to walk to a Metro stop and wait for the next train.

Is there some reason you want to spend over 3 hours riding the subway in Paris? Most people work out a way to see things in one direction per day to cut down on travel time.

I think pj is giving advice and making suggestions. But I'm not sure, maybe asking for advice? Maybe accidentally posting a private note.

That is a little funny about the St Denis tip and the prostituees, but rue St Denis near Les Halles is not going to be on a agenda for a visit to the suburb St Denis where the famous basilica is. I did like that visit very much, they have a couple excellent museums in St-Denis, also. I don't know about any special markets there. They do have a good performing arts festival in St Denis in June. In fact, one might check to see if dates coincide with that, as that can affect how many people are there, and they use some public venues for the concerts.

I don't think the metro stops at 5:30 pm. You are probably reading when it starts, around 5:30 am (premier), if you are looking at the RATP hours schedule. According to their schedule, it stops around midnight to 1 am going back into Paris, and starts around 5:30 am. This is for the Basilique stop on line 13.

/thanks for the replys, for some reason when I looked at the time frame for St. Basique metro stop on line 13 it looked like it stopped earlier than the rest of the stops.
I guess I have always wanted to see the Basilque, and this is my 4th trip to versailles. So since the line 13 is right at musee d'orsy, I thought I would spent the 1/2 hour extra on the metro to see it!

So thanks again for the replys

It is definately worth the trip! But I personally wouldnt do the two on the same day. Thats alot of time in transport. Not sure what else there is to see in St Denis. I found it to be a somewhat rough area.

"Take RER C to Paris, exit Invalides metro

Get on line 13 to St Denis Basilique {need a new ticket to get to St Denis}"

You don't need a new ticket as long as you stay inside the Metro system and connect to Line 13.

It's the same way your RER ticket from the airport will let you transfer to the Metro and finish out your journey.

I'm looking forward to the trip report especially Burgundy.

The main reason for going to St-Denis is to see the basilica, noted for being the first instance of Gothic architecture in France. But aside from that there's not much else, and you certainly wouldn't want to wander from the basilica, especially at night.

These itineraries remind me of why I prefer to travel solo -LOL!

Truly since this is all planned out, I'm curious is there is a question being asked? And wondering do all four people on this trip together enjoy so much running around every single day?

But then I could spend a good part of the day sitting in a sidewalk cafe drinking wine and watching the people go by and the other part sitting in jardin du Luxembourg or Tuileries sunning myself.

St Denis has a good museum, I liked it as well as many of those in Paris -- the Museum of Art and of History (Musee d'Art et d'Histoire). It is unusual because it is inside an old Carmelite convent and you can see rooms and artifacts from the history of the convent (where the daughter of Louis XV lived), as well as a small art collection (Impressionist and some modern works). One unique thing that I have seen nowhere else in France is a large part of the second floor (maybe half or almost) is a special section on the history of the Paris Commune.

I really liked that museum. There is also the Christofle silver workshop/museum (musee d'orfevrerie), which I did not have time to attend.

I have wandered from the basilica and things looked pretty harmless to me in-between there and that museum. There is a very nice large park on the way, also, which I think is where they have some of the concerts during the festival.

The Green Michelin has a section on these things, but they also have a good website www.ville-saint-denis.fr

Thank you Indy and Christina for some more information, I know St Denis metro stop is out of the bounds for the normal ticket, so it is good to know I can use my ticket anyway if I do not leave the musee d'orsay stop from Versailles.
I will post a report when I am back! PJ

We are off to Versailles today. I have been to versailles a few times now.So for something different I took the audio tour. Which was wonderful! I would recommeded it highly. The hall of mirrors are all covered up, they have one little section you can see. But since I have seen the hall of mirrors a few times it was not that big of a deal.
We spent a few hours at Versailles then had lunch at hotel sofitel in Versailles. It was lovely, we all had salad niocoise[spelling?]
We took the rer to Invalides and meandered around the 7th arrondisment. We went to Musee Rodin and Napoleans tomb. By the way it is always snowing too!!
I love churches so I always try to stop when I see an interesting church. We found one, the Basilique Sainte-Clotilde. I do not know the history but it was beautiful.
We ate at a bistro that was good but not worth repeating. We then found another church by St Germain blvd. It was St. Thomas of Aquinas. Another fantastic church. If anyone has information on the history of these two churches let me know! We strolled through Louvre for 1 1/2.
We then had a crepe and called it a night.

This what we really did!!! Intersting how the best laid plans change!

It is our third day in Paris, March 4 we wake up to sunshine!!

We walk to Louvre and have breakfast at Cafe Marley. Very good omelettes, I also had my first kir peche royal [yummy]
We then walk to Jardin Du Palais Royal. Our goal is to find some passages and keep walkin toward Opera Garnier.
WE find some of the passages, great window shopping but most of them were not open. I loved the whole area, my first time meandering through these streets.
We meander to Willys wine bar. Ilove this place. The atmosphere the WINE,it is great!
We are walking down rue des petits champs and we get to avenue de l'opera. What a magnificent sight when you make that turn and see the Opera Garnier in all her glory.
First time I have taken the time to see this, and it did not dissapoint!
We spent some here, did not take the tour though.
We then start to walk toward the Madeleinne church. Our goal now is to mustard tasting at Maille. We find the mustard stor, what a treat that was! We sampled a cassis mustard, tarragon mustard, caper mustard, chablis mustard, vin blanc mustard, and I am forgetting alot of them!! Very intersting, of course I came home with mustard!
We are now off to Musee Nissom De Camondo, right by Parc Monceau. Wow, this will be a musee I will be back to. It really is a timepiece. Too much to go into detail. The musee itself was a residence at one time of jewish banking family. They ended up perishing at Auschwitz. But the house is intact how they left it. It was built as a replica of Petite Trianon at Versailles.Beautiful artwork, furnishings, china, just a very stunning gem of a musee, and definitely haunting because of the story.
We then start walking back to Hotel Danube. We ate at Bistro overlooking Madeleinne church. yummy onion soup!
We did walk into the chuch and mass was going on. Another beautiful church.
We have reservations for dinner at 8:30, I will post the name of the restaurant at the end of the report. It was fantastic!! We always did the prix fixe meals, which really was a treat. To have all the freshest produce and dishes of day was heaven.


so another day, of what we really did!!


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