You will discover there a beautiful castle, "le Petit Trianon" and its gardens, and at the end of it Snow White like little houses, and even a charming little farm.
Admission is free for children under 18 throughout the Versaille's estate, and there are 4 main areas to visit; the main castle, the gardens of the castle, le Grand Trianon and The Queen's Estate. Prepare your trip: look at the different areas, decide what you want to visit and which "passports" is best for you. Check out the official site for this. It can be quite confusing to figure out when you are standing in line...
Getting to Versailles is a bit of a pain if you are not driving since it adds a lot of walking time to and from the train/RER.
You can drive to the Trianon and Queen's estate area directly if you enter by "la Porte St Antoine" (Boulevard St Antoine) - then it is not a lot of walking, and children of all ages will love it.
Actually, driving through the different gates is a really good idea; it will cost you 6 Euros, and you can drive and park in the different parkings of the estate all day long, when the main parking "Place des Armes" is an hourly based parking - so more expensive - and then you'll have to hike through the estate! If you do park inside the estate, make sure you know when the gate you went through closes!
Beware though that you can only buy tickets to the different areas at the main castle, at the Grand Trianon and the Queen's Estate entrances, so if you want to go directly to the Hameau de la Reine entrance, you need to have bought your ticket. I strongly recommand you buy your tickets online (it is a bit more expensive though, but will save you standing in line time, which is priceless...).
There are many things available in the main Castle's gardens ; "les grandes eaux musicales" when all the fountains are switched on : Saturdays and Sundays and some Tuesdays from 3 April to 31 October 2010 from 11 a.m. to 12 p.m. and 3.30 to 5 p.m - not to be mistaken with "les grandes eaux nocturnes" which is a water, sounds and light show (as far as I understood - I did not see it myself but I heard it was amazing) Saturday evenings between 19 June and 28 August 2010 from 9 to 11.20 p.m. Again, check out the official site.
And be prepared to walk... you may rent a small battery car (euros 30/h...) or take a little train throught the estate (about 7 Euros), or park wisely as I suggested, but chances are you'll be walking a lot. It took Olivier and I seven hours to do the grand tour... and we zoomed through the castles...
Look at this picture ; I am standing at the very very bottom of the map, behind the main castle, facing the Grand Canal which begins at the end of the picture. The Grand Trianon and Marie Antoinette estate are at the very right of the map... quite a hike... The map says count 25 minutes. I say it's more like 45...
About the main castle... it is huge and gets uber crowded. I would never imagine visiting the castle in the peak of touristic season... If you do, make sure you come with tickets, at opening time and maybe beat the tourists tours... Otherwise, be ready to stay in line for 2 or 3 hours. No kidding.
Now, there is a lot to see inside the castle, but most tourists are interested in "la Galerie des Glaces" and "les Appartements du Roi". The tour actually took us through many galeries that were not all that interesting to us ; paintings and statues, beautiful as they may be, were not what we were there for...
There ought to be a "faster" tour, short cuts through the castle to go directly to "La Galerie des Glaces" - next time, I'll ask one of the castle's crew... maybe it was just a question of looking at the signs and not just following the crowd... If you know about it, do share !!
