Les Nympheas

Now for today.  Kierstin and I were awoken from our sound sleep by my alarm at 8:30 am this morning.  By nine o’clock, I was on my way to the Gare St. Lazare to pick up my tickets for the 10:36 train to Vernon.  Kierstin, Linda, Chau, her friend, Drew, and I had plans to visit Giverny, and the house and garden where Monet spent his final years.  It’s the one with the famous lily pond and Japanese bridge.  It’s about 45 minutes by train from Paris to Vernon, and then three miles to Giverny.  I had ordered my tickets on Saturday and thus had no way to print them out before the trip, so I needed to get them from the office at the train station.

Well, complications occurred.  After realizing that I’d neglected to write down my order confirmation code, a frantic phone call to a very helpful Margaret was in order.  Then it turned out that my estimation of the likely line-length on a Sunday morning at a small-ish station was drastically incorrect.  I had given up on making the train with the others, and was planning on switching to the next train (about an hour later), when suddenly several more ticket booths opened, and the line began moving much more quickly.  I retrieved my tickets with five minutes to spare and hurried over to my train, luckily running into Kierstin and Drew on the platform.  So we all made it aboard and had an uneventful ride to Vernon.

Once there, we planned and discussed and decided to walk to Giverny, taking a footpath along the Seine.  Although it began raining partway through our walk, I thoroughly enjoyed myself.  The countryside was green, the Seine was sparkling, the hills were rolling gently off into the distance…and I generally enjoy walking in the rain, so I had no regrets.  As we approached the village, the walk through the meadows became a walk through streets that could equally well function as flower gardens.  It was lovely.

After buying and eating a buttery croissant and very good goat-cheese quiche from a nearby café, I waited in a long line with the others outside Monet’s gardens.  But it was worth the wait – the gardens are bursting with blossoms.  We strolled and smelled flowers and eventually made it to the celebrated water garden, which does indeed have a very impressive lily pond.

A quick tour of Monet’s restored house, a quick browse through the gift shop, and we were ready to head back.  Drew, Kierstin, and I opted to walk back as well instead of waiting for the bus, and we had another refreshing stroll.  Since our train back wasn’t until a bit before 6:00 pm, we had time to stop by Monet’s tomb at his family plot at a nearby church, as well as time to properly greet the Seine for the first time.  I waded a bit, and fished a 5-euro-cent piece from the bottom near the shore.  After walking back across the bridge into Vernon, we poked around a very nice old church and saw the city hall.  By then, we were quite glad to have the chance to sit for a while on the train and metro rides back to the dorms.

It’s been another wonderful, memorable weekend.  From stained glass to fireworks to water lilies…France has been showing me its best.