Don't say last, ita, please.

Maybe I'll move this to my LJ later.

connie, I loved that post. Gave me the sense of all sorts of images and familiar-emotions (which are the only things I know how to read "through", if I'm making any sense).

I'm so glad I've subscribed to this thread for lurking - I love reading it.

One more for places.

You come out of the palais, along an endless hall lined with enormous mirrors, through a gallery where great painters commemorated French victories, never defeats. The steps at the back are broad, a gracious sweep of white marble. Odd to think that Marie Antoinette once came this way, tittupping on diamond-studded heels.

Across the gardens, you settle on a bench. Before you is a pool. Suddenly the surface breaks into gaping black holes: the mouths of fish, knowing it's tourist season, greedy for madeleines.

You throw them crumbs. Behind you, the sun drops low, touching avenues of chestnut and lime.

mmm, Versailles.

I got into minor trouble in the Salle du Guerre - the historian in me was outraged at the chronological line of victories, because the there wasn't a single defeat in there. Where the hell was Waterloo? Agincourt? I asked that question rather spontaneously and horrified the multilingual tour guide.

It's a stange place, Versailles. The palace put me off; so damned white, tiny little beds, everything much too heavy. But the gardens, and the avenues lined with chestnut trees, and all those extremely friendly sheep, and the pampered fish, those amazed me. I have pictures somewhere, of all those holes in the water, the fish-mouths gaping up for butter pastry.

I want to see the Orangery. The terraces fascinate me.

Actually, the Trianon is bizarre. I'm trying to remember if that's the one, actually - it looks to constructed mostly out of very stale salami. I recall we were wandering the grounds and came across it unexpectedly, and thought, gah, she made a house out of lunchmeat.

edit: Actually the Grand Trianon, and it was the columns that did it. We turned the corner and there they were: pillars of coppa salami.

I thought Napoleon had the Grand Trianon redone.

Wanna go there.

I'm toying with the idea of a long trip overseas in the fall. Is September/October a good time to be in Europe, or is the weather crap?

Ireland is a possibility, and Scotland; on the other hand, I've never been to Italy or Greece or Spain. The UK is tempting because my probable traveling companion lives in Yorkshire and is kind of unemployed, so less cost for her is a bit of a consideration.

But I don't want to spend three weeks in the rain, either.

I went to Italy in late October/early November and I remember the weather being fine--I know it rained a little the day we did Pompeii, but we also ate outside several days.