Friday was Versailles day, and I got a real kick out of P’s reaction as we rounded the corner from the train station to the boulevard that approaches the Palace. It’s big. And you can know it’s big, and still be shocked by how big it is when you actually see it.
We had lunch at the Angelina on site, which is pricey, but fun. We ended up talking to the two girls behind us in line, who were in from Canada. It was funny, because the hostess ended up assuming we were all together, and that was when it really occurred to me that probably no self-respecting French person would have engaged complete strangers in a line like that. We were chatting like old friends. I can see why we have the reputation for being almost overly friendly.
After lunch is where the Paris Museum Pass fell apart a bit. I was not paying attention, and that day was one of the special musical fountain days in the garden. You’re not allowed to do that without paying extra above the Pass price. And you can’t get to the Trianons without going through the garden, unless you want to take a really long walk around the outskirts of the palace site. And once you look at a map, you really don’t want to take that walk. So we missed out on the Trianons. We’d been doing enough walking at that point, we cut our losses, and headed back to the hotel.
This is where the two room suite we ended up with was glorious. We had a nice afternoon relaxing, and finished off with dinner at the Cafe de les Deux Gares, which was just up the road from the hotel. It was my favorite meal of the trip. I’d seen this place recommended in a couple different English language sites I follow, but I’d ruled it out because they only did phone reservations, and my French is just not up to that. About a month before we left, they got online reservations, so I booked us in. It’s a neighborhood place – the menu was entirely in French, in cursive no less. The host was able to help us translate (we heard him helping the other English speaking table), but we did our best to puzzle it out ourselves – point of pride, really.
I started with a white asparagus dish that had a creamy sauce involving hazelnuts. It was amazing – I od’ed a bit on asparagus during the lockdown (it was easy to get and roast), so I’ve been avoiding it since 2020, but this was delicious. We also had some duck rillettes as a starter that were amazing. We both got the cuttlefish main fish – it was cooked in squid ink, with root vegetables. Dessert was a strawberry rhubarb concoction with sorbet and meringue crumbs that was just perfect. I really enjoyed my desserts in Paris – they use so much less sugar than we do here – the desserts were all so flavorful, as opposed to just being a sweet ending. I’m so glad this restaurant got online reservations before our trip.