Day 84 I'm only good at two things- painting and gardening.

Claude Monet once said that he was only good at two things- painting and gardening. Before taking the opportunity to view some of Monet’s beautiful impressionist paintings we travelled out, on Day 84, to the little town of Giverny, which is about 75kms from Paris to visit Monet’s Garden. This was to be our last journey using our two-month Eurail passes.

Monet was quite correct about his own assessment of his ability to garden. Having bought a little place in the Normandy countryside Monet’s garden grew over the years, as he was able to buy other blocks of land from his neighbours. The garden is a
cottage garden and although it was showing the effects of Europe’s recent heat wave the garden was a delight. Like an English cottage garden Monet’s garden is a wash of colours; pink, blue, purple, mauve, white, with splashes of red, orange and yellow. It is a garden of varying plant heights and foliage and is dominated by perennials. Roses, salvias, windflowers, geraniums, lavender, and daisies form the understorey of the garden with beautiful weeping willows and other trees framing the gardens’ canvas. The centrepiece of the garden, is of course, Monet’s wonderful lily pond which he painted over 600 times. With the river running down the side of the garden Monet was able to divert the water to feed his pond. The garden paths wind around the pond and the whole garden is reflected in its still waters. The water lilies and their flowers are highlights while the beautiful bridges allow the visitor to cross the pond and enjoy just being part of the whole landscape.

A cottage garden is often filled with beautiful flowers, but sometimes the ‘dead heads’ on the plants can be as interesting as the living flowers. We were rather pleased that the garden was far from perfect and we thought that it looked more authentic than some other professional perennial borders which have had every trace of death removed. With the clever use of annual planting using geraniums, impatience, begonias and petunias the gardens just looked like an artist’s pallet.

The town of Giverny remains quite unspoiled and charming. We sat in a sunny park and ate our baguettes, which we had brought with us for lunch. During a long walk through the village we discovered the local church and Monet’s remarkably ordinary family grave. With a delay to get a return bus we filled in another hour eating pate and chips (French Fries) at a local hotel made famous by the artists who flocked to this country village during Monet’s life.

Monet’s house and garden left us with many images of country life in this lovely part of rural France and we left feeling inspired to get home and fill our own house and garden with colour and life.