Monet's Lily Pond at Giverny is Stunning

The lily pond at Claude Monet’s Giverny in France was the subject of many of his iconic impressionistic paintings. Photos by Doug Oster Tribune Review

Rachael Robb waited 25 years to see the lily pond at Giverny, artist Claude Monet’s garden. “It’s been on my bucket list for a long time,” she said with a smile.

Rachael Robb can scratch seeing Giverny off her bucket list.

She came to Paris in 1990 as a 20 year-old, and on a visit to the Louvre, and was thrilled to see the original paintings of the famous impressionist.
She bought a print and in those days brought it back on the plane along with a cuckoo clock and wealth of other souvenirs. “It’s still in the house today,” she said proudly.
She was always interested in art, but there was something that drew her to Monet. “His art seemed to be something I could related to,” she added.
Robb learned about Giverny sometime after she returned from her first visit, “It’s always just been a thought, if I ever got back to Paris that would be something I would definitely do,” she said of seeing the garden.
Even though she’s a self described excitable person, the drive to Giverny was not stressful at all. “It’s more of a calmness and stillness sort of feeling, the closer it came, the calmer I got.
While stepping up to the arched green bridge of the lily pond she felt it was “surreal.”
“I felt like I was standing in one of his paintings,” she said. Pink and white flowers covered the water and long arching branches of weeping willows reached down to barely touch the water.
Robb couldn’t get the smile off her face as she reflected on what moved her the most from her special experience. “Probably standing there just looking at the waterlilies and just imagining all the paintings I’ve seen.”