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dyhgarden

Monet's Gardens -- Oh my!

DYH
14 years ago

We've just returned from Paris, France where I got to fulfill a longtime dream of visiting Monet's Gardens at Giverny. I must say that I was just blown away by the garden -- exceeded my expectations!

I will post photos when I sort through -- probably 200 of Giverny and over 750 of the entire trip. I have enough garden and trip blog material to last for months!

We were up for 24 hours yesterday before we got home, so it may take me a day or two to get my head on straight! LOL

Here's a tiny preview of why cottage gardeners love Giverny:

{{gwi:670549}}

Later,

Cameron

PS My poppies are blooming! I didn't know they'd be 3 feet tall! Of course, there was rain almost daily while we were gone and the stick verbena is over 4 feet tall! One larkspur is blooming and many others are budding up, so I didn't miss that in my own garden.

Comments (31)

  • gottagarden
    14 years ago

    Lucky you! I want to go there one day as well. So happy for you that you made it. Looking forward to the photos.

  • natalie4b
    14 years ago

    Wow! Lucky you! And lucky us to be able to see all the pictures you will post soon!! Look forward to it.
    My sister went last year, and she said the whole time she was thinking of me and how much I would have enjoyed the gardens, since I am a gardener (she is not).
    One day...

    ~Natalie

  • ginny12
    14 years ago

    When you can, would you post directions on how you got there? This is something I am hoping to do in the next couple of years. Can you get there from Paris without a car?

  • janen
    14 years ago

    I've been longing to go there for quite some time. I'm terrified of flying, but I would do it just to see Giverny! Can't wait to see your pictures. Thanks for sharing.

  • DYH
    Original Author
    14 years ago

    I do feel lucky. The upside of this down economy is that airfares were the cheapest we had seen in years ($500 round trip from Raleigh to Paris via JFK and my husband had enough frequent flier miles for a free ticket). We rented a studio apartment with a small kitchen so we had coffee and breakfast there most days to economize. Staying in the center of Paris, we didn't have to rent a car and either took a Batobus (boat on the Siene - hop off and on) or walked. Took the Metro just a few times.

    A 5-day unlimited trip pass is only about $25 per person (19 Euro) for the Batobus. The boat is a bit slower than the Metro, but stops all along the river - Louvre, Musee d'Orsay, Saint Germain des Pres, Hotel de Ville, Notre Dame, Jardins des Plantes and Eiffel Tower.

    Ginny -- yes, you can get to Giverny without a car.

    Go to the Saint Lazare train station in Paris.
    Try for 8:00am, but Giverny is closed on Mondays. Our train left around 8:15am and we went on a Wednesday to avoid the weekend crowds.

    Take the Rouen-bound train and get off at Vernon. It's about a 45 minute trip. (I think the ticket was 22 Euro per person).

    Just outside the front of the Vernon train station is a bus (4 euro r/t) that goes round-trip to Giverny -- it meets each train and goes back for each departing train.

    There is an impressionist museum a block away from Monet's gardens where we had a very good lunch in their cafe. During our visit, they had many of Monet's paintings on loan from from the Musee d'Orsay.

    More details to come.

  • aftermidnight Zone7b B.C. Canada
    14 years ago

    Cameron, you're such a tease, I'm sooo looking forward to more pix. I'll have to live the 'experience' through your photos but that's O.K. :o).

    Annette

  • jennypat Zone 3b NW MN
    14 years ago

    Oh man! I am sooo Jealous! Is language a barrier when visiting? I would love to go someday, but don't speak French.

    Jenny P

  • spazzycat_1
    14 years ago

    Glad you had a "bonne vacances" I anxiously await your photos.

  • ginny12
    14 years ago

    Thank you for those very clear directions, wonbyherwits. I am printing them out for my file. I refuse to die without seeing Giverny!!!

  • BecR
    14 years ago

    Welcome back, Cameron! Can't wait to see ALL the pix and hear all about your trip!!! Maybe one day I should be so lucky....

  • DYH
    Original Author
    14 years ago

    I'm getting my act together -- just posted first set of photos of Monet's House and Gardens on my blog.

    On Monday, I'll post his walled gardens; on Tuesday, Monet's pond.

    Enjoy!
    Cameron

    Here is a link that might be useful: Monet's House and Gardens

  • DYH
    Original Author
    14 years ago

    A few different color combos and views:
    {{gwi:670550}}From Defining Your Home Garden

    {{gwi:670552}}

    {{gwi:215579}}

  • ianna
    14 years ago

    It's beautiful. Monet's garden is known for it's iris walkway.

    On that first photo, I can recognize the allium (probably a Globemaster) but I cannot id the other tall plumy flowers.

  • todancewithwolves
    14 years ago

    OH MY GOSH! It looks just like his paintings. I'm going to Paris in October!!!! I can hardly wait. I hope we have time to make it to Giverny. If not I shall surely die with sorrow.

    More . . . I mean MANY more pictures please.

    Edna

  • BecR
    14 years ago

    FANTASTIC!!! More please...

    Edna, it would be a crime not to make it to Giverny.

    Becky

  • DYH
    Original Author
    14 years ago

    I have three sections on my blog -- Monet's home, Monet's Clos Normand (walled garden) and Monet's water gardens. If you don't mind going over there (you see iVillage would be able to use my photos if I post them all here).

    Thanks,
    Cameron

    Here is a link that might be useful: my gardening blog

  • todancewithwolves
    14 years ago

    I saw them all and still want more *lol* How fortunate to have visited one of the most beautiful places on earth.

    I'm trying to contact my travel agent to see if I have enough time to go to Giverny. Our tour consists of stopping in Paris for two days - then we take the bullet train to Lourdes - then a bus to Milan and Assisi and final destination beautiful Roma.

    I paint copies of Monet's paintings. My dream is to capture a small bit of his garden in plein air.

  • DYH
    Original Author
    14 years ago

    Edna -- don't miss Giverny if you can possibly get there. I've never gone on a tour (except to get into Russia when it was the USSR in 1974), but I know they have everything planned out. Sometimes they have free afternoons. If you hustled and knew the trains well enough, you could take the 8:15 am Rouen-bound train get to Vernon/Giverny by 9:30-9:45 am. You could probably see Monet's gardens in 2 hours if you didn't take 200 photos like I did.

    I do hope you'll be able to see Villa Borghese in Rome. It is full of Bernini sculptures. The garden is okay, but the sculptures are amazing! I'm a huge Bernini fan.

  • PRO
    Nell Jean
    14 years ago

    Thank you, Cameron, for all the time you spent taking photos and then uploading them so that we all could enjoy a bit of your vacation.

    I'm not fond of travel. I love the idea of travel, the planning, the anticipation; I just don't want to actually go.

    Nell

  • todancewithwolves
    14 years ago

    200 hundred pictures! When are you going to post them.

    So much to see and so little time! I love Bernini as well. A few moths back there was a special on PBS about his life. I've seen Bernini's statue of the Ecstasy of St Theresa ... B_E_A_U_T_I_F_L! He was considered risquè in his depiction with some of his characters.

    I will be seeing the Sistine Chapel for the second time. How I love Michael Angelo. He and I share the same birthday. Last time I visted the chapel I sat along the wall and imagined hearing Michelangelo and Pope Julius II arguing over the fresco on the ceiling. I always wondered why he painted a depiction of God with a belly button.

    Did you go to the Moulin Rouge? Another dream is to see where Toulouse-Lautrec hung out.

  • DYH
    Original Author
    14 years ago

    Nell -- I hate the flying, but I love the destinations! No fear of flying, but I just find trying to sleep in coach class overnight as inhumane! LOL

    Edna -- Didn't go to the Moulin Rouge, but we walked through the neighborhood of Monteparnasse on our way up to the Sacre Coeur.

    Here's one of the gargoyles on top of Notre Dame Cathedral, which was just down the street from us. I had fun playing with my zoom lens on my camera.

    {{gwi:670555}}

  • midnightsmum (Z4, ON)
    14 years ago

    Edna - dial your expectations back a touch.....October, while still a growing time, is when the fountains are turned off, at least at Versailles. It was still awesome!!! You will get to see the knot gardens, or parreterres. You will see some really awesome patterns!!!

    Moulin Rouge is very cool. Hope you decide to go!!!

    Nancy. - hey, where else are you going!!!

  • ginny12
    12 years ago

    I've saved this post because someday...someday I hope I'll get to Giverny.

    Am posting now because there's an interesting article in today's Globe travel section about Giverny, along with some nice photos. And I'm sure I'm not the only one out there dreaming of Giverny. But...we'll always have Monet's waterlilies at the MFA!

  • ginny12
    11 years ago

    I'm not sure if this thread is still "live" tho it comes up where I have bookmarked it. Just wanted to say that my dream is coming true in September when I will visit Paris and Giverny. Am so excited!

  • nulty
    11 years ago

    Beautiful pictures,..and a very interesting and entertaining Blog,..lovely to see you visited Paris,..and to see all those members heading there in the near future,..enjoy folks,..its an eye opener,..with so much history.

    Looking forward to seeing all your pictures.

    Philip.

  • schoolhouse_gw
    11 years ago

    ginny12 - trip report please! Have a great time. Cameron, how did I miss this post in 2009? It must have been before I made my way back to GW.

  • cyn427 (z. 7, N. VA)
    11 years ago

    Cameron, hope you also got to the Orangerie to see the Nympheas there. Unbelievable. I was just there, but we went down to la Dordogne. Hope to get back next summer to do Monet's garden before heading south again. Love your pics!

  • Thyme2dig NH Zone 5
    11 years ago

    Ginny, I am so happy for you!! How long will you be there for? I hope you post pictures of Monet's garden in September. I had gone when it was late-April when all the iris were in bloom. I could "see" how much more there was to come. Looked like a great garden to visit throughout the seasons.

    There are some great gardens w/in Paris. The Paris Botanical garden was really quite nice and interesting. There are gardens at the Rodin Museum that were beautiful (and of course the sculptures were well worth the visit.) We also walked along the elevated garden where they transformed a viaduct. It's call the Promenade plantee in the Marais and Bastille quarter and it was beautiful!

    Ahhhhh....so much to see and do! And even better that the Euro has dropped in value.

  • ginny12
    10 years ago

    A very late trip report for this dream come true at last. I was at Giverny last September 30 on an absolutely perfect day--clear blue skies, beautiful sunny day, just-right temperature. We arrived as the gardens opened so it was not crowded til later altho it was never really Louvre-crowded.

    I had worried that this was too late in the season and the gardens would be dry and tired but they were perfection. This was actually a great time of year to visit as the annuals and tender bulbs were in full, glorious display. The flower garden was packed with bloom and the nasturtium allee was beyond description. It was everything I could have hoped for.

    The waterlily/bridge garden was lovely and we enjoyed the walk to it along the small river with beautiful views across the early-autumn fields. The short walk increases your anticipation of what is to come.

    The house is a wonderful treat in itself. Only an artist could have created such a colorful series of rooms, every one filled with interesting objects and artwork.

    I'm still pinching myself that I actually was there. My pictures did not turn out so great but it's all in my mind's eye forever.

  • todancewithwolves
    10 years ago

    Ginny, do you have photos? I'd love to see them :-)

    Edna

  • organic_kitten
    10 years ago

    Absolutely gorgeous, dream inducing photos. thank you so much for sharing them.
    kay

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