I took a bit of a break from my European travel posts when I decided to change it up a bit and post about the cruise vacation that we took earlier this year. I still have a lot of trip photos left from Europe though, so now I'm going to go back in time a little and finish posting about our European adventures.
This post goes back to when my wifes parents came to visit us in France in 2022. After our one week trip in Austria they came back to our home in France and stayed with us for another week. We ended up touring around the area that we lived and basically saw all of the same sites that I had seen just a short time before when my sister came to stay with us. So anyway, these are just a few of the photos I took on our first day or so back in France.
The first stop was to the Chantilly castle. It was so close to our home that we couldn't not show it to them. As far as castles go, this one was very impressive when you saw it for the first time, so it really was a perfect destination to take visitors to.
I tried to take different photos this time around so that I wasn't just posting the same thing as times previous.
I noticed some interesting artwork, like this rather famous painting of King Louis the 14th.
While walking through the castle my wife happened to be in the room with a tour group talking about the painting and the guide was explaining that King Louis had the painting commissioned by an artist but that he was rather rude about the whole situation. The painter got offended and ended up subtly getting back at the King by painting his septer upside down, implying that the King was a bit of a buffoon. The king didn't end up noticing the slight towards him and was so enamored by the painting that he actually ordered multiple copies of it be produced. I couldn't find what the information that the guide was saying on the web but it's an interesting story and does sound very plausible to me since his septer was intentionally painted upside down.
I always take a photo of this next painting whenever I visit the castle. There is a beautiful absurdity to it with the womans shirt off and the live snake around her neck. It's like met gala attire back in the day. So avant-garde.
Here's another funny one that comes from my wife. She took this photo and posted it to her social media with the caption "I'm soooooo over this day." I got a chuckle out of it.
I can't tell if this is a dog or a lion or a cross between the two. I think it's supposed to be a derpy looking dog with a mane...
This last art piece cracked me up when I saw it. I've been hanging on to it for a long time trying to think of a story to write up as a play, like I did a few times in the past with funny paintings that I came across. I've sat on it thinking about it this entire time but it never amounted to anything. Nothing ever came to me. Oh well.
The demon essentially saying "Fuck you priest!" and the priest face looking like hes soooo over it just really cracks me up.
Horse heads at the horse stable museum which is also part of the Chantilly castle tour.
These are the stables (above).
We walked the grounds a little but I only took the one photo there.
The one above and below are from the Pierrefonds Castle, which was also a short distance away from where we lived at the time. One of the rooms had wooden carvings of mythical creatures all around it's perimeter. I got a kick out of them.
The last one is of my wife in the chapel, and that is where I will end this post I think. The next travel stop will be Mont St. Michelle, so until then, thanks for stopping by.
