Travel Beyond the Clichés While Looking Back In Angers
There I was in the local newspaper in a picture borrowed from the web and a paragraph hailing me as “a globetrotting American writer with a new book out entitled Travel Beyond the Clichés.”
Château de Beauregard: A Castle Road Less Taken
Tourists in the Loire Valley generally head only for the A-list castles. But for sightseers who dislike crowds and relish the possibility of running into a congenial chateau owner, quieter slices of 16th-century splendor are a few minutes away at the Chateau de Beauregard, 3 miles southeast of Blois.
Chambord, the Loire Valley’s XXL Château, Gets a Tourist Makeover
When you can't get any bigger, you just have to get better. Chambord, the massive chateau in the Loire Valley, 9 miles east of Blois, is in the midst of a major development plan (€4.5 million invested in 2014) to make the castle more user-friendly and, ultimately, self-financing.
A Little Loop in the Loire Valley: A 2-day Cycling Route from Blois
There are those big biking trips that you spend months preparing. Then there are those short trips that begin with “Hey, it’s going to be nice out this weekend—let’s go biking… in the Loire Valley!” This little Loire loop—three days, two nights, including two days of biking—is of the latter kind. Beginning and ending in Blois...
Blond Girl in Saumur: When Our Eyes Met for the Second Time
A photo/video-log from the Saumur area of the Loire Valley in which Gary Lee Kraut remembers when travel was less about fooding and more about flirting, less about getting reservations and more about losing inhibitions, less about looking for recommendations and more about following your own nose.
Chartres Lights Up as an Overnight Destination (Video)
Long considered a day trip destination, Chartres has also become an overnight destination thanks to the vibrant and animated illuminations of the cathedral and other historic sights and monuments that make for an enchanting evening walk-about.
Chaumont Playfully Imagines Gardens of the Future
Corinne LaBalme reports on the International Garden Festival at Chaumont, one of the most delightful castle ground strolls in the Loire Valley. With “Gardens from the Coming Century” as its theme for 2016, the festival presents the brave new world of flower beds, hydroponics and botanical fantasies. Castle-hoppers exploring the valley and day-trippers from Paris take note.
Elsewhere along the Loire: Val d’Aubois
You’d be the rare traveler, French or foreign, to have heard of the Val d’Aubois, the Aubois Valley, a largely bypassed portion of Loire...
Equitation in the French Tradition Joins List of Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity
UNESCO’s Intergovernmental Committee for the Safeguarding of Intangible Heritage has inscribed equitation in the French tradition, with specific reference to the Cadre Noir of Saumur (Loire Valley), on the Representative List of the Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity.