Category: France

Looking up, looking down!

By cpadmin

Looking up, looking down! La-Roche-Guyon.

Looking up, looking down!
Looking down! La-Roche-Guyon.

Looking up, looking down! contains two complimentary views. One is from the top of the Donjon (keep) looking down at the river. The second image other from the road in front of the Chateau. There are three ‘parts’ to La Roche-Guyon: the village itself, a large 14th century Chateau, and the medieval donjon (in English we would say “Keep”). 

La Roche-Guyon stands on a broad bend in the Seine River. It is 10km east of Vernon in the Ile de France (Paris) region of France. The village is officially classified as one of the ‘most beautiful villages of France’. Originally developed next to the river below the medieval Chateau, the remains of which still stand on the hill behind the village.

The two views show how high the keep is and how exhausting it was to climb to the top. The view is well worth the climb though. La Roche-Guyon is only a few miles drive from Monet’s garden and was Rommel’s Headquarters in 1944.

Looking up, looking down!
Looking up, la Roche Guyon

One of the two famous bridges in Monet’s garden

By cpadmin

A view captured in Monet’s garden at Giverny last week.

Bridge in Monet's garden
One of the two famous bridges in Monet’s garden

Are they the most famous bridges in the world?

One of the two famous bridges in Monet’s garden. Are they the most famous bridges in the world? Maybe, maybe not. But hundreds of people queue up to walk round it, over it and photograph themselves on it. Monet’s garden in Giverny northwest of Paris has two bridges like this. This image was captured as the gardens opened on a summer morning with a heat haze. The haze soon evaporated and once it had cleared I would have secured a better image. However, by this time other tourists had crowded the bridge!

Monet’s gardens are so colourful. In this image we see the reflection of the bridge amongst the water lilies. There are rows and rows of brightly coloured flowers stretching downwards and away from the house. To get to the lily pond and the bridges it is necessary to go under the roadway. The pond is surrounded by more shrubs and flowers and the lilies were just coming out last week when we were there. Truly an experience to savour.

To see the gardens at their best, buy your tickets in advance and go early in the day to the ticket holders’ entrance.

Equipment: Sony SLT-A65V, Tamron 16-300mm

Settings: F5 1/60 ISO 100

What a view! La-Roche-Guyon

By cpadmin

A view from the top of the rock?

What a view! La-Roche-Guyon. This post contains two complimentary views. One is from the road in front of the Chateau and the other from the top of the Donjon looking back at the river. There are three ‘parts’ to La Roche-Guyon: the village itself, a large 14th century Chateau, and the medieval Donjon (in English we would say “Keep”).

La Roche Guyon
La Roche Guyon – The Chateau looking up to the keep

La-Roche-Guyon stands on a broad bend in the Seine River. It is 10km east of Vernon in the Ile de France (Paris) region of France. The village is officially classified as one of the ‘most beautiful villages of France’. It originally developed below the medieval Chateau next to the river.

What a view! La-Roche-Guyon.
What a view! La-Roche-Guyon – a view from the keep

Two views are shared to show how high the keep is and how exhausting it was to climb. The view is well worth the climb though. 

From the left of the image the chalky hillside arcs round to the centre of the image almost as if it is a container for the river. The village is central to the image. On the right of the image the patterns of the formal ‘potager’ (kitchen garden) can be seen between the Chateau and the river. This is a lovely sleepy village to wander round. La-Roche-Guyon is a few minutes from Giverny where Monet’s garden is found. 

More History

The Chateau de La Roche-Guyon had an interesting military use in the Second World War when Field Marshall Rommel established his base here to direct the German response to the Allied invasion of 1944.

Historically the region managed to remain under independent control despite the powerful regions that stood either side – the lands of the Loire Valley and the Kings of France to the south and the lands of the Dukes of Normandy to the north.