Pierrefonds Town and Castle
The next location that I visited with my sister was the the small town of Pierrefonds. It was located about 40 minutes from my home and the town boasts a massive mideival castle called the Chateau de Pierrfonds.
These things together made it an ideal location to bring guests that came to visit. It's close by, it's impressive and it's something to do. What more can a guest ask for really?
By the way the town is located only about an hour and 30 minute drive from Paris so it makes for a pretty decent day trip from the big city as well.
The castle was originally built as a military fortress but definitely also gives off some serious fairytale vibes.
It must be the many conical turrets and towers.
Maybe it was the blue sky effect but the color also gave me that impression as well.
When I saw it the first time I immediately thought of Sleeping beauty and perhaps Cinderella.
The castle is situated way up on a hill as if to stand guard over the small town below.
The town itself is only slightly touristy and still has that quaint lived in feel about it. There are no shops selling touristy crap, just small cafes and restaurants and outdoor terraces. Maybe an ice cream stand or two.
Dammit to the scaffolding covering most of the castle exterior.
Its nice that they are continually maintaining the landmark but it really detracts from the overall look when you visit it. I'm sure that it will be gone eventually.
I like the rooftops poking through the trees in the photo above.
Heading through the outer gates brought us into the small but very elaborate and detailed courtyard. The stonework and statues were really spectacular in there.
Fun fact, this courtyard can be seen in the movie The Man in the Iron Mask starring Leonardo Dicacprio. It only appears on screen for a brief moment in a scene at night but I could recognize it when I re-watched the film a year or so ago.
That movie was produced long before the film industry's reliance on CGI, back in a time when real sites were required... but I'm not here to talk about that. Let's head inside!
The castle interior was fairly sparse in terms of furniture and mostly seemed to focus on the construction and renovation of the castles exterior.
Is a winged lion considered a Griffin or does it need to have the head of an eagle?
Bronze and plaster statues and other building features and designs were showcased throughout along with a brief description of each.
Above is a winged bull seen next to the commode. The bull is a small version of one of the four mythical beast statues found at the castle entrance. The bull is pondering a small snail sitting on its arm.
These knight statues were seen outside the armory in the great hall or Worthies Room.
If memory serves me correctly, this room once contained several real suits of armors that decorated its walls.
Same room viewed from the opposite direction.
As you can see it's currently just a long empty room without any real furnishings.
The dual fireplace is very impressive though.
It's decorated with nine statues of women that according to an information board, represent the Nine Worthies. They were carved in the appearance of the Emperor Napoleon III's Empress and her ladies in waiting.
I liked the rich colors of the room and the differing textures created by the woodwork and the wallpaper.
I sort of got onto a kick of taking photos of wall paper and differing textures that day.
Wallpaper, wood, fabric. It probably wouldn't be interesting if I didn't point it out to you but now that I did I'm hoping you thought, "hmm, that is sort of neat."
I believe that they are porcupines, not hedgehogs. But who can really tell?
So much detail, even on the ceiling.
Here is another room.
There is really a lot going on in this one but it all seems to work together nicely.
Do you agree?
A stained glass window followed by another.
And here is a lit up cabinet that is giving off window like vibes so that one will be next.
Perhaps now I will break to point out the low doorways. They are almost headbangers but not quite. I guess it depends on how tall you are.
The adjoining church with a statue of St Michael seen both from above,
as well as below.
The last place to see during your tour of the castle is the crypt in the basement.
I don't believe that there are actually any corpses down there, just the tombs, or maybe just replicas.
Either way, there are a lot of them and they are quite neat to see. It's cool down there on a hot day so that's also a nice reprieve.
And so concludes our day at the Chateau de Pierrfonds and of the town itself.
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Dang man. The 10th one down that captures the enormity of the thing, impressive. Good job documenting this one. I don't know how many castles we've seen but that one's no slouch.
Yeah it's location on a hill makes it seem even larger than it is. It's very cool.
Now, that's a lovely cover photo, which caught my eye right away, and then I realised it was your profile.😁
Anyway, about the post; Yes, I got that fairytale vibe and I love it.
The French are big on mixing textures, in general... I like that too:)
You are probably right!
I dig that!
This is a lovely post overall, and it filled an empty hole that I have for exploring historic places.
You have great mobile, architecture, landscape, and nature photography skills 🙌
Yeah the textures wasn't something that I noticed before but I guess since I've been so many times now I have the luxury of slowing down and looking at the finer details.
Wawoo what a amazing place
Thanks 😁
A worth visiting place indeed surrounded by tranquility and beautiful scenes 😍❤️
Yes I agree 👍 💯
Very gothic and seen from a distance gives a clue to its mahoosive size, being a little weird, the crypt is my fav bit of the wander!
Yeah the crypt is pretty neat. You don't see them all that often so they are a pretty unique feature
👍
nice place
😁 thanks
This is so amazing!
I'm glad you enjoyed it 😊
It's definitely a castle from a fairytale... I just don't understand one thing, where did they hide the piano..? 😂 Oh, as I said a few times, would live in a castle like this, hmmm not during the winter maybe 😂
That's a good question. Maybe in the worthies room. That seems like a spot worthy of a piano...
Yes I imagine these old castles to be quite drafty in the wintertime.
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Beautifully captured! And it's such an interesting place 😁
Thanks I'm glad you liked it 😁
This is such a beautiful place, enormous castle, or should I say, a historical place.. I love such a place.. There isn't like that in here.
Yeah it's a neat spot. Castles are pretty cool to see when you don't have them where you're from. There aren't very many castles in Canada where I'm from so I was impressed by the ones we saw in France.
Lovely place of this town, I looks cool for visiting there. hope you enjoyed a lot with your sister, she is looking so pretty 😍
It was an enjoyable time. I had been to the site previously but it was still a lot of fun.
Wow - what a lovely place - nice castle !
Thanks 😁 👍
This is my kind of place! I had no idea that such beautiful castle was so close to Paris.. next time in Paris, I will ask my friends to take me there.
That Great Hall is impressive. It makes me think of some castles that we visited in Germany. In some rooms, there is indeed a lot going on but again there are many castles like this. When you look at it briefly it doesn't make sense, but when you focus on detail it all suddenly goes together very well.
I usually don't recognize any places that I saw in movies. The guides can even tell me in which movies the scenes from the place were included but I probably don't pay enough attention while watching 🙂
Great photos! Thank you for inspiration!
There are quite a few castles near Paris actually. A person could do this one and the castle in Chantilly in one day if they planned it out. Pierrefonds is only about a 40 minute drive from Chantilly so it's doable if you wanted to have a castle filled day haha.
Château de Vaux-le-Vicomte is another one close to Paris.
Yeah sometimes you really have to keep your eyes glued open to catch a glimpse of a particular castle in a movie. This one was kind of like that. It only appears for a few seconds and you have to be paying attention. But I did see it so that was kind of neat.
Amazing blog @leaky20
Will visit Pierrefonds and Paris Someday
I hope that you do 👍
Waw, it's a beautiful castle, just like the one in the fairyland where Cinderela is, how nice it is to be able to visit this place
I agree that it is a fairytale castle. 👍