Potsdam Palaces

So, pretty much every moment I ask myself, "Why did it take me so long to do something like this?"  But I won't worry about that now.  I'm here now and that's all that matters.

Sunday, I took a trip out to Potsdam.  It's this wonderful, old-fashioned village with a huge park that is filled with palaces.  That's right -- palaces.  Apparently Frederick the Great (I can't really tell you for sure which Frederick that was; it seems that nearly every male royal figure in Germany's past was named Frederick) used this town as a summer vacation spot back in the 1700s.  Thus, he built a number of palaces, some for himself, some for family members, and others for visitors.  Seriously, it's basically just a neighborhood of palaces.  Plus this really awesome church (called Peace Church):

Peace Church was a very peaceful place.

There were even real, live swans.

 
I took a tour in a horse-drawn wagon of the area, but the only palace I went inside this time (I will be back) was the Schloss (Palace) Sanssouci.  It was high up on a hill with loads of steps and none of the pictures I took quite did it justice.

See?  It looks so tiny up there.

It's a really cheery shade of yellow.

"Sans souci" -- French for "without care/worries."  Apparently Frederick the Great was obsessed with French culture.

It was good Frederick could be there.  I bet he was telling these nice people all about French stuff.

The place was filled with fancy gold-embellished rooms like this one.

My very favorite was the final room of the tour.  It was a very "naturalistic" style for the time period and incorporated moldings of flowers and animals.

I loved the flower-covered chandelier.

I've really been liking yellow lately.  It's just a nice, happy color.

See the monkey?

Potsdam is one of my new favorite places.  I definitely plan to visit a few more times while I am in Germany, if only just to tour this, the Neue (New) Palais: