Versailles, what a place. The moment you first see it as you drive down the Avennue de Paris you can appreciate the whole intent of the layout and the majesty of the Palace.

My interest has always been the Hall of Mirrors and the signing of the Treaty of Versailles to mark the end of the First World War and the gardens, so I can say another bucket list item has been ticked off.

The big issue with Versailles is the amount of tourists. All of our group thought it was a busy day, until our tour guide said it was a quiet one. As you can see from the photos of the Hall of Mirrors it was packed, there must have been at least 30 buses in the parking lot, although the Africans flogging trinkets weren't doing much of a trade.

The gardens out the back were just as good, especially because they absorbed the tourists more easily than the various rooms we went through inside.