What a beautiful way to spend Mother’s Day! Bri and Chris took me to Chantilly by train. I had been wanting to go and so off we went with Bri while Greg studied for exams. We took the train from Gare du Nord and were in Chantilly by 1pm.  We had printed information on what to see and the castle was priority #1. On the way we walked through a beautiful town through a tree lined path and it brought us right to the stables of the castle. We could buy our castle tickets there and we decided on tickets for the horse show later as well. So, we continued to walk to the castle (many steps on Chris’ pedometer) and then to Brianna’s Joy (not exactly) we toured the castle with a headset, filling us with all of the history on the castle from ‘it’s day’. It was interesting to hear about why Chantilly cream got it’s name from a chef at the castle who had to make cream go further than normal because his cream shipment didn’t arrive on time for the grand celebrations at the castle. (He later committed suicide over the fact that he thought his name would be ruined because his food wasn’t as expected due to the late shipment).

Domaine de Chantilly  was very interesting to tour and Brianna didn’t mind in the end because we found a Louis Vuitton shop and she bought a wallet there which made her day! She also convinced us to rent a golf cart for her to drive all around the gardens (miles of them) which was actually very relaxing for us to learn all about the castle’s domain.

 

 

We saw statues in the woods that were awe inspiring and all of the gardening that was ordered by the duke (ie., love island). Brianna was an excellent chauffeur as she navigated through the wooded pathways and toured the domaine. The horse show was also interesting as they showed the audience how they trained the horses to do specific maneuvers, and the entire explanation was in French of course, so it was very good for us to try to follow along while watching what the horses did. I couldn’t help but sing the song ‘Chantilly Lace’ all the way back to the train as we loved the wold village and it’s sleepy character.  What a historic place and the perfect Mother’s Day gift for me!