Day 18 – Giverny

We are slowing our pace to one thing a day and we both have sore legs from so much walking. Whining in France, LOL! But seriously, Dennis’ knees are bothering him and we don’t want a repeat of the Baker’s cyst, so we are taking it a bit easy.

Today it will be Giverny, Claude Monet’s home for over 40 years. It is where he painted the water lilies and many of his floral works. We get the train at Gare St. Lazare, which he also painted and this is when I realize that much of what I am seeing has filled his eyes too and I feel so privileged.

The train trip is interesting going along the Seine – at least we assume it is the Seine – without a map it is hard to tell. There are little villages and a factory town with Peugot cars on rail cars for shipment. It is only a 45-minute ride to Vernon where there is a shuttle to Giverny.

Vernon looks very interesting, parts of it medieval, but we have no time today.

Giverny is spread out along the river. Just a tiny little town that you could walk in fifteen minutes and it is charming. Now most of the houses are Art Galleries, B&Bs, or restaurants, but you can see how it would have been in the 1800’s.

It is relatively quiet here and the crowds are small. Coming in the afternoon we may have avoided the bus trippers, whatever it is pleasant. When we gain entrance to the house, it is enchanting. Built in the style of the time, rooms flow into each other, there are no real hallways: Four rooms and his studio on the bottom floor and four rooms upstairs. I love the bright yellow of the large dining room with a huge table to seat 14 – but then they were a family of 10 who loved to entertain. Dennis notes that all the windows along the dining room are French doors to the deck that runs the length of the house, so the suppers could just spill in and out to the garden. How lovely.

The kitchen was huge also, all blue and white tile with a large fireplace and a stove with many chambers like a built-in-place Aga.

I am charmed by the lifestyle that the rooms’ represent…almost nothing is formal, and everything gives way to the garden. Monet’s bedroom with sitting area on the second floor has huge windows that open fully letting in the most glorious perfumes from the thousands of flowers.

I am surprised by the art on the walls: Everywhere but his studio and bedroom are covered in Japanese prints and we are told that these were on his walls when he lived here. Clearly he was fascinated by this genre that is so far from his own. So interesting. His bedroom is a mini-museum of the works of fellow impressionists, and his studio held the paintings he had completed and not sent to the dealer.

The gardens are Monet’s creations. I had no idea he was an avid gardener but there are two-and-a-half acres planted in beds of every conceivable flower and vine along with his water gardens. It is brilliant with colour and smells amazing. At the foot of the garden we need to enter a subterranean passage to get to the other side of the road where his water garden stands. When Monet bought this property he was quite poor and having both a road and at one point a railroad run through part of it probably made it more affordable.

I can only describe the water gardens as heaven. Since I was a teenager and first fell in love with his painting at the art gallery in Ottawa, I have loved these very gardens from a distance. Now to be in them, and standing where I know he has stood, seeing what I know he has seen, it is the gift of a lifetime and I am so grateful.

His boats, or replicas of them are on the shore, but without the canvas top that is evident in some of his paintings.

The willows droop to meet the water lilies, which are every colour. There are beds of flowers around the edges of the ponds and wisteria vines cover a roof-like trellis over one of the arched bridges.

When it is time to leave, I am full to the brim. One happy puppy and Dennis has loved it too! It is also nice to have been out of the city. We are both people who love quiet and nature; today has soothed our souls amid this great adventure.