A Day with Claude Monet at Giverny & Vernon

A day well-spent at Giverny to take a peep at the places that have inspired the guru of Impressionism. This charming village is nothing less touristy, owing to Monet's house and garden. The village is very easy to explore by foot, with an archaeology site in the woods nearby. There is also a romantic restaurant housed in a moulin at Fourges, a town 15 mins away from Giverny. However, it is so popular that reservation at least 3 days in advance is required.

Monet's garden has a very good collection of exotic flowers, and the flora are really very well grown. Here is a short list of the pretty petals we took.

I remembered seeing a painting that looks exactly like this photo, but I just can't retrieve it from the gallery.

The water lily pond and the Japanese bridge. Monet couldn't get enough of his pond, and have a number of paintings of water lilies in different seasons and time of the day. Clearly, the painting was in a different season as our photo.

The artist's garden on paper without the girl...

Haystack summer effect versus haystack winter effect....

Pictures of paintings extracted from http://www.claudemonetgallery.org/

This is the legendary Moulin de Fourges. Prices are really very reasonable for a gastronomy fare, the place seems like they can accommodate a lot of people, but they still weren't able to accommodate the 2 of us who gate-crashed without any reservations. Dommage!

And so, we settled for a restaurant with a view of Le Vieux Moulin de Vernon. Unlike most restaurants in France, restaurant Coté Marine opens beyond 2 pm for lunch, and is pretty value for money in terms of quality and ambience.  http://www.restaurant-cote-marine.fr/

We would not come all the way to Vernon to see just this, in fact, this moulin is a private property now, and is not allowed for public visits. However, one can get a close up view from a small park and recreation centre for youths. The amazing thing about this building is that it is already warping, but still standing on it's supports till now. Perhaps it is for safety reasons that it is denied entry for the public.

This is all of château de Vernon. Just 3 towers of the keep, and the rest of the compound  is for recreation and sports.

The cathedral in Vernon is very normal, but they do conduct small group commentaries on the organ at specified timings.

This is the most amazing half-timbered house we've seen. This building is warped vertically and horizontally, yet it is still inhabited!