The Great Romantic

9/19/2013 - St. Peter's Port, Guernsey (UK)

One of the best days of the trip. My three destinations were: Vale Castle, the Victor Hugo statue in Candie Gardens, and the "Hauteville House" where Victor Hugo lived during his exile in Guernsey. All three were very nice, but the Hauteville House alone was worth the trip to Guernsey.

Victor Hugo expected that he'd die in exile in Guernsey, so he created a home that was a work of art. It is full of Romantic artwork (paintings, tapestries, sculptures, etc), all arranged so that Hugo would encounter the appropriate pieces during different parts of the day. Much of the artwork had personal meaning to Hugo: some was symbolic, some explicitly written in words. It was pretty fantastic, like we were walking directly through the artist's mind. 

Pictured: The master bedroom of the Hauteville House