Spring in St Cloud
With the winter definitively behind us, and the sun warming the city to a not-unpleasant 20 degrees, it was time for a Sunday walk in my favourite park in Paris – the Domaine National de St Cloud.
Climbing the hill behind a wide bend in the Seine southwest of Paris, St Cloud was the site of the Château de St Cloud: preferred residence of the Bonapartes, and home to Napoleon III until it was destroyed (ironically, by a stray French artillery shell), during the seige of Paris in 1870.
Today the park of the Château is owned by the nation, and its gardens, lawns and forest are a popular escape from the city. The Domain forms part of a swathe of parkland that stretches all the way to Versailles. Great triumphal avenues cut through the trees providing glimpses back towards the city – La Défense, Issy-les-Moulineaux and the Eiffel Tower.
If you carry on over the hill, you’ll eventually hit the edge of the forest at Marnes-la-Coquette, a village that proudly remains one of the smallest communes in the Paris region, with a population of just 1,700 people. Although less than 10 kilometres from the edge of Paris, Marnes has retained the atmosphere of a country village.
Rather predictably, Marnes’ discrete location has made it a coveted bolthole for the rich: this is where Johnny Halliday and the Emir of Qatar have their Parisian homes. Most mere mortals can’t afford to live here. Luckily, on the north side of the park, the SNCF “L” line is waiting to carry us back to the Gare St Lazare.
