Top 5 Castles to Visit near Paris (incl. Versailles)

when you come to Paris chances are you want to see a palace like Versailles but there's no shortage of palaces around Paris even the Louvre was a palace long before it became an art museum and there are plenty of other Royal residences just in the vicinity of Paris so in this video you're going to discover five castles right around the area of Paris we'll see the Pierre Falls with the medieval structures we'll see Fontainebleau which is the elegance and opulence of many kings of France The Chateau Chantilly which has the biggest collection of art outside of the Louvre in the area we'll see the Chateau Bola Vicon which was the inspiration for Versailles and of course we'll visit Versailles and see what each one of those castles has to offer so you can decide which one's right for you and whether or not it's worth it to see one or the other are you ready to go let's go let's go today we're here at the Chateau de Shanti which is one of the most beautiful castles just outside of Paris and it's closed today but we're getting a special private VIP tour to see rooms that nobody gets to see and I can't wait so are you ready I am all right oniva let's go let's go today we're touring the castle with Bertrand from my private Paris and with his knowledge and passion this place comes to life in a whole new way and his company specializes in custom Private Tours so if you're interested in something like that there's a link in the description below the last owner of the Chateau Chon tea Andre De Leon this was dishes and you can see the H and the O initials on display [Music] foreign so in this Castle we have the largest collection of classical paintings next to the Louvre it's stunning so let's go see some more [Music] and this ladies and gentlemen is Mario Antoinette [Music] this is Henry dolion this is the gentleman that has his initials on the dishes he's right there he was the last owner of this Castle okay [Music] so this guy is which was the man that was supposed to be the next king until we the 14th was born [Music] technical [Music] when Henry of Orlean lived here in the castle in the 1800s this is the part of the castle where they lived so these are private bedrooms and the private office of himself The Duchess and where the family lived [Music] so this is a private room we got special access to but you can see in here just like in Beauty and the Beast this demonstrates Henri de Orleans love of literature and arts because these are all books from his collection in addition to the ones we saw in the library that's open to the public so this is an amazing amazing spot [Music] to get to Chantilly from gardenor is actually very easy in Gardner you want to go into gonlin which is where all the long distance strains are which is the main central place in Gardena buy yourself a round-trip ticket at a machine and the cost is 18 Euros for round trip that train ride is going to take you 25 minutes to get to Shanti just look for trains headed in the directions of Amia or cray and there's usually one on every 30 minutes or so in any case right at the head of the train it will tell you that it goes to Chantilly so if it says so that's the right one now once you enchantee it's a 10 to 15 minute walk to the castle through the woods and it's very Charming now if you don't want to take the train and do the 10 to 15 minute walk in Shanti you can hire a private driver in Paris it will take you from your hotel directly to the castle and we'll put some links in the description with some options today we're going to the Chateau Fountain Blue which is one of the largest Royal homes in France and a UNESCO protected site and I'm excited to come here today and I especially want to see Marie Antoinette's Boudoir and there's a lot of super cool stuff in here so come on let's go years [Music] this room is the inspiration for the Hall of Mirrors at Versailles and you can see why it's stunning [Music] foreign [Music] most of the time when people come to Paris they want to go see Versailles so they can experience a castle but this one is not nearly as busy every bit is opulent and it is absolutely gorgeous [Music] by the way if you're coming to Paris check out our travel guide it's full of tips and information and it lists restaurants and hotels and places that we featured in our videos so if you think you might like to buy one of those there's a link in the description below it's a valuable asset so today I'm taking you to Pierson piafo is a beautiful medieval castle it's about an hour away from Paris so this is why we're taking the car so if you're in Paris visiting you may need to hire a driver or rent a car to go to that castle but before that Vincent got us a reservation in a one macaron Michelin restaurant you know it's kind of like going to Pierre phone have an amazing meal see a beautiful castle it's an amazing day trip from Paris let's go foreign [Music] it's so delicate and so subtle to the good life [Music] [Music] the next course calls for white [Music] thank you [Music] [Music] [Music] wasn't expecting that when I bit into it it like popped in my mouth [Music] [Music] let's go inside come on [Music] those are gutters formed after Notre Dame and notice on top of the other little columns you have little castles [Music] so during the second world war this became a field hospital because of course they had a lot of wounded soldiers and this was kind of close to where the battles were taking place and we can tell that the Americans were here because they left little marks like you can see here there's you s a [Music] so this is obviously the chapel and where the altar is they have the statue of San Michelle who is slaying the dragon which is one of the symbols here [Music] so there's a little door over here with a railing like a little balcony an interior balcony and I can imagine who's watching over uh what's going on this is a reception room I don't know if you had dances here they played cards here I don't know what they did here really nobody knows because the records aren't that clear and there's no furniture it's just amazing let's go see what else they've got this is the Emperor study it also has from 1863 a running toilet with water flush and everything in a private chamber it's a pretty remarkable study this is one heck of a man cave foreign [Music] foreign [Music] Castle which is about an hour away from Paris and there are a couple of ways for you to get there the economy way is catching a train in gal de Leon that'll take you to Mulan and in Mulan you have to take a bus and that'll take you to the castle and then back and forth obviously it's economy but you know it's going to take you at least an hour and a half between two hours to get here the second way which is probably the way that many of you are going to do which is to hire a driver or a tour out of Paris to pick you up in your hotel drive you all the way there and then bring you back home it's about an hour a good solid hour to get here but it's super worth it so today we're taking our car and we're going to Bobby Kong so let's go [Music] foreign this Castle they have free headsets that give you the story of the relationship between Phuket and Louis XIV and how he brought Fontaine from all the fables and mogier and like all of these famous people here to work in the Arts and the paintings the tapestries the I mean just the absolute attention to detail in every single aspect of this place it's no wonder that King Louis XIV felt upstaged and and thought that Phuket was trying to outshine him you know and when Phuket saw that it was an error he offered to give the king the castle but of course the king says you know like you know what will people think of me if my subjects are gifting me something like this so it didn't end well for folkhead but you know obviously he was a Visionary and this place was the inspiration for Versailles foreign [Music] they have a reenactment kind of a scenario of what it was like in the kitchens and building the Gastronomy that you know kind of started right here in this Castle when Phuket was getting ready to receive the King as a guest you know he had to he had to make art of the presentation of the food and everything so it's really cool to go through in the caves and see you know how they prepared that how they laid it out and what the table looked like when Phuket welcomed Louis XIV here as a guest it's really cool and earlier we were all the way at the top there where we got the Magnificent views this is the Dome it's an extra three Euros to get to see it but then you get beautiful views of the garden and it's just really worth it one of the things that I love about volvicond is how quiet it is how few tourists you have here I know for a fact that Lulu and Versailles are sold out and there's hardly anybody here we visited the castle pretty much on our own a few people here and there it's not easy to get to but if you want to cancel the experience without having enormous amounts of people around you Vol viconte is delightful [Music] foreign [Music] Versailles it's fairly easy you obviously have the first option which is to hire a private driver or a guy to take you from your hotel directly to the Chateau Versailles and bring you back or you could take the rer line C from Sami shell and I will take you all the way to Versailles and it's a quick 10 minute walk to go to the castle which is right behind me so let's go [Music] we're here today at the Chateau de Versailles the Palace of the king of France most notably Louis coutures or Louis XIV and this place is stunning now the thing you got to know about visiting Versailles is it is busy it is packed and everyone puts it on their list for good reason because it's beautiful it's opulent it's the Palace of palaces and it's kind of a must and when you visit Versailles you're going to go through the king's bedroom the Queen's bedroom where they receive their Royal guests all of the places where they hung out and if you've watched the Netflix series you can imagine all of the shenanigans that went on there and it also takes you through some of the history of the creation because this place was originally a hunting lodge this is where Louis xiv's father would bring him as a child and you know run around and play so originally just a small place that Louis XIV built as the as the Palace of the Sun King so there's a lot of history a lot of culture when you walk through here you can't just look around you at what's in the room you have to look up at the ceilings down at the floors just every single detail is magnificent and you can walk through the Hall of Mirrors and see where the king of France greeted the Royals from around the world then there's the gardens I mean sculpture and you know the Landscaping is just beyond with little hidden paths through the woods and statues everywhere this is a luxurious Royal opulent place now the collective wisdom when it comes to buying ticket for Versailles is to get the earliest one in the day like the 9 or 10 a.m but the problem with this is that that's what everybody is doing too so if you come here at nine or ten you've got a long line of people that are all thinking the same thing so two things first of all you want to buy your ticket online before you come here because otherwise you're going to have to wait 30 to 40 minutes just to buy your ticket maybe an hour and then wait another 30 to 40 minutes just to get inside the castle so you want to buy it online in advance but the one o'clock ticket is the secret to get into Versailles because you'll have a lot less people waiting in line with you thank you

Channel: Les Frenchies

Views: 107,630

Keywords: best castles near paris, best chateau near paris, chantilly chateau, vaux le vicomte chateau, les frenchies travel, versailles palace, les frenchies, fontainebleau chateau, paris travel tips, paris travel guide, paris travel vlog, things to do in paris, paris vlog, Pierrefonds castle

Id: MAbI8Q-WRXg

Length: 18min 21sec (1101 seconds)

Published: Sat Jul 02 2022