Versailles

Of all the things I have seen around the world I think the two things that have impressed me most that were built by men and women were the Taj Mahal and Versailles. Versailles is if you have never seen in unimaginable at first. I could easily see Walt Disney going there during World War I and being inspired by what he saw there to build the first Disneyland. Whether this actually happened or not I cannot say. However, I believe he was in World War I in France.

Versailles is sort of like a 2000 plus acre Disneyland for 17th and 18th Century France. In fact Marie Antoinette's artificial "cave grotto" built especially for her retreats into the ground with friends that reminds me of the caves on "Tom Sawyer's Island" at Disneyland was where she was found when taken to the Bastille and executed one year later. Versailles is about one hour by bus from the center of Paris and I believe started by Louis the Fourteenth and then completed by Louis the Fifteenth and Sixteenth. But during these three reigns the aristocracy became more and more separated from and less aware of the sufferings of the common people whose sufferings financed all this outlandish behavior. This eventually led directly to the French revolution in the 1790s. There are all kinds of places where the aristocracy of France dallied with their consorts in semi private all over the 2000 acres of Versailles. Versailles as a garden paradise impressed me the most with many many outlandish fountains and fountain sculptures and whole planted forested areas maintained now for 400 to 500 years by fleets of gardeners ever since to this day. Versailles might have been originally the biggest man made park anywhere and likely was an inspiration in some ways to maintain the beauty of our National Parks here in America as well as the inspiration for the planting and making of parks and fountain areas throughout the world.