This is the Orangerie, a small side garden so-called because it is filled with relatively
exotic trees and plants that do not normally grow in the climate of Versailles, including orange
trees, palm trees, lemon trees, and so on. No big deal for those living in Florida, but very exotic
for a place like Versailles! Some of the trees are more than 200 years old. They are put outside in summer,
and taken indoors in winter.
It is terribly difficult to take decent photos of this area (and many others at Versailles) without
a very wide-angle lens, and even then, it’s hard to squish the result onto a Web page. Sorry about
the less than ideal composition of this photo; I’ll try to do better in the future. You are looking south
in this photograph, which was taken on a summer the afternoon around 4 PM.
Although it is not apparent in this photograph, there’s a road right behind the back of the garden; if
you look closely, you can see the streetlights at the far edge of the garden.
Behind the garden (and across the invisible road) is the pièce d’eau des Suisses, the “Swiss pond.”
It is a large, man-made pond, nearly 800 metres long.
Click directly on the photo to see a smaller version (half the above size). Photographed on
August 24, 1999._
