This little Loire loop—three days, two nights, including two days of biking—is of the latter kind. Beginning and ending in Blois, itself easily reached by train from Paris in 1½-2 hours, this itinerary provides an excellent introduction to the Loire Valley, its castles, its wines and its biking routes. All that with little preparation. Your most difficult decision may well be what to pack in order to keep your biking load light.

Chaumont, Cheverny and Chambord, the three chateaux on this route, are different enough that castle-fatigue won’t set in. The distances covered, about 30 miles per day for each of the two cycling days, is moderate enough to appeal to occasional cyclists while significant enough to attract frequent cyclists who might add a few zigzagging miles to make for a more challenging ride.

While the route is flat, with only a few slight slopes, the distances are great enough that they may be a bit much for children and for those unaccustomed to athletic activity given that you’ll also be doing a lot of walking while visiting the chateaux and their parks and gardens.

This loop covers just a small part of the 500 miles of cycle trails that are covered by Loire à Vélo (Cycling Loire), the Loire Valley system trails going from the outer edge of Burgundy to the east to the outer edge of Brittany to the west, by way of chateaux, vineyards and the towns and cities of Orléans, Blois, Tours, Saumur, Angers and Nantes.

Here’s a 3-day, 15-step itinerary for little Loire Valley loop that begins with a touring day on foot in Blois, reached by train from Paris.

Day 1. Blois.

1. Pack lightly—whatever you can carry on your back and/or in a saddle pack when biking. Take the morning train to Blois from Paris.

2. The castle, tourist office and center of Blois are a 15-minute walk from the station. The Blois Tourist Office is next to the castle entrance. You can pick up a town map there along with maps and information about the chateaux in the surrounding area covered by this loop.

3. Check into hotel or B&B. (Or, since you’ll have packed lightly, carry your bag with you until you’re ready to check in in the afternoon.)

I stayed at the B&B La Maison de Thomas, a friendly little place in the very center of town. The ground floor of the B&B serves as a wine bar in the evening, one of a several places in town to get familiar with Loire Valley wines, particularly the Cheverny and Cour-Cheverny vineyards you’ll be biking past. For other lodging possibilities as well as dining options see the bottom of the article Blois Castle: The Key to the Loire Valley.

4. Visit Blois Castle (read that same article for an overview of its historical and architectural significance) and, if it’s up your alley, La Maison de la Magie, The House of Magic, across the square from the castle. Don’t miss the dragons that emerge periodically from the window of the House of Magic. A bit of wandering between the castle, the river and the cathedral can complete the afternoon.

5. After tasting two or three wines at La Maison de Thomas, you might enjoy, as I did, the relaxed gastronomy at Christophe Cosme’s Le Rendez-vous des Pêcheurs. (Closed Sun. and Mon.). The Blois article mentioned above also lists other dining options.

6. See the sound-and-light show in the courtyard of the castle beginning at 10pm in April, May and September, 10:30pm in June, July and August. An overview of a day in Blois as outlined above appears in the photolog Great Encounters: Blois.

Day 2. Chaumont and Cheverny.

7. Rent bikes from the friendly folks at Traineurs de Loire, 12, rue Saint-Lubin. It opens at 9:30am. You’ll likely walk by the shop during your wanderings on Day 1 since it’s just below the cathedral. If you’d like to picnic you might pack it in Blois before setting off. Otherwise you would have lunch at Chaumont.

8. Ride to the castle at Chaumont-sur-Loire, 20k (12.4 miles) from Blois.

9. There are two entrances to Chaumont: one on the ride near the river, the other upon on the hill behind the castle property. If you want the challenge of a biking up a hill (and the thrill of wheeling down) then take the back entrance. (I took the challenge.)

Give yourself plenty of time to visit Chaumont: the castle (1465-1510), which Queen Catherine de Medicis purchased in 1550 to use in the famous Chambord-for-Chenonceau housing exchange with her husband’s mistress Diane de Poitiers after King Henri II was no longer alive to protect and spoil the latter; the view of the Loire from the castle terrace; the lush castle grounds; the 5-star stables (still displaying its original saddler by Hermès) created during the tenure of Marie Say, Chaumont’s extravagant owner from 1875 to 1938; the animal cemetery for her beloved dogs and monkeys. From late-April to mid-October, Chaumont hosts the International Garden Festival from late-April to mid-October, with two dozen gardens restored or created each year. For garden lovers the festival alone can seduce a visitor a few hours with a lunch and café pause, so you’ll have to remind yourself that you’ve got biking to do.

10a. If you leave Chaumont while the afternoon is still young you might ride to the Chateau de Beauregard. Beauregard is 18.2k (11.3 miles) from Chaumont. Cheverny is then 8.3k (5.1 miles) from Beauregard.

10b. I spent so much time at Chaumont that I rode on directly to Cheverny, a ride of about 22.9k (14.2 miles), give or take a vineyard. Cheverny is described in this article. In addition to the harmony and elegance of the château and its park, a major draw of Cheverny is its kennel for 100 Anglo-French hunting hounds. Since you’ll be arriving here in the mid to late afternoon, you can watch the hounds, tail in the air, devour mass quantities of raw meat during feeding time. The feeding takes place at 5pm daily (with exceptions) from April 1 to September 14. The remainder of the year the feeding takes place at 3pm on Mon., Wed., Thurs. and Fri. (except holidays). It isn’t that they don’t eat on other days but they’re probably out working during the hunting season.

11. Either before or after entering the chateau grounds, you might taste-test some Cheverny and Cour-Cheverny wines right by the entrance at the Maison des Vins de Cheverny, the official tasting table/wine shop of the association of winegrowers from the two appellations. These are the wines from the vineyards that you’ll be riding through on this 2-day loop.

Cheverny is a young, fruity wine largely using sauvignon and some chardonnay for the whites and pinot noir and gamay for the reds and roses. Cour-Cheverny, far less well known and with more cache because of its more limited production (one-tenth that of Cheverny), is made from grape varietal called Romorantin, a grape now specific to this area, cousin to chardonnay, introduced by king Francoise I, and so proprietary that it’s typically written with a capital R.

The tasting table/wine shop It isn’t a cozy setting but it’s the opportunity to learn something about these wines if you haven’t yet had the time or inclination to visit a vineyard between chateaux. The Maison des Vins de Cheverny is open daily from Easter to the beginning of November, 11am-1:15pm and 2:15-6pm. Since the tasting room may be closing before you finish visiting the chateau grounds at that time, so I suggest stopping here before going in—furthermore, that’ll give you time to digest the alcohol before getting back into the saddle. The chateau itself is open until 6:30pm April-October, until 5pm the rest of the year, though the grounds stay open later.

12. There are two good options for a fine meal and a good night’s sleep: the 3-star Auberge du Centre in Chitenay, 7.4k (4.6 miles) from Cheverny, where I enjoyed a most pleasant evening during this loop, and the 4-star Château du Breuil, on the edge of Cheverny, 4.4k (2.7 miles) from the chateau. Both have restaurants. Breuil also has a swimming pool.

Day 3. Chambord and return to Blois.

13. The ride from either of the hotels noted above to the Chateau de Chambord is just over 21k or 13 miles, making for a leisurely morning ride. Here’s an article about Chambord, the Loire Valley’s XXL castle.

14. There’s plenty to keep you busy at Chambord and extra cycling trails to be taken in the area, so in visiting the area you’ll have to make sure that you leave yourself plenty of time to get your bike back to the rental place in Blois, which closes at 6pm.

The most direct route to Blois through the countryside is 16.4k (10.2 miles), but for the more scenic route you’d head directly to the Loire at Saint-Dyé-sur-Loire then ride downstream to Blois, staying on the left (southern) bank of the river until you cross over the old bridge at Blois. That route adds a few miles, plus there are some great riverside photo ops along the way. And on my own trip I encountered such a strong headwind along the river that the last 7 miles felt like three times that, but it was well worth it for the beauty of the ride.

I therefore suggest allowing yourself a good two hours to make it back to Blois.

15. Once you’ve dropped off the bike give yourself 30 minutes to get to the train station—make that an hour so as to relax in a café near the rental shop before taking the train. Back to Paris? Or further down the river to, say, Saumur, for the start of another little loop in the Loire?

Text and photos © 2015, Gary Lee Kraut

The post A Little Loop in the Loire Valley: A 2-day Cycling Route from Blois appeared first on France Revisited - Life in Paris, Travel in France.

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Blois (pronounced a sharp blwa, vampire-like) holds a prominent place on the map, yet its castle is often ignored in favor of more photogenic stars of the valley. Chambord, Chenonceau, Villandry, Azay-le-Rideau, Usée and Saumur, for example, readily lend themselves to adjectives such as majestic, exquisite, idyllic, dramatic, elegant or storybook. (Match the adjectives with the chateaux and you get a free subscription to France Revisited for the rest of this year.)

Blois Castle, le château de Blois, stands on a rise on the right bank of the Loire but it offers no great photo op from the river. The Blois Tourist Office might well sue me for libel for showing this gray-weather shot from the bridge across the river.

And the main entrance to the castle is more promising though still not as imposing or impressive or fairy-tale as we’d like our castles to look, particularly when seen under an indeterminate sky.

But that doesn’t make Blois any less notable. This is in fact the most historically and architecturally significant of the chateaux of the Loire Valley. Admittedly, that isn’t a line you use to get your spouse to choose Blois as a vacation destination or to get your 12-year-old excited about a trip abroad (how about telling him/her that there’s a Magic Museum with dragons in the windows across the square?). Nevertheless, Blois is a key to understanding the valley’s castle-scape.

What it lacks in outward photogenia it makes up for in details, in revealing history and in convenience to daytripper and valley bikers. Blois does have character(s). You just need to get closer to see it/them.

Let’s take a look.

Amboise Castle, a left bank chateau 22 miles downstream, is more photogenic from across the river but it’s now far less notable inside. Amboise is where Charles VIII (born 1470-reigned 1493-died 1498) died from fracturing his skull on a door lintel (careful when visiting old castles, folks, they weren’t designed with Disney building standards in mind, and just you try suing someone for tripping on a cobblestone).

Charles VIII and Queen Anne of Brittany were childless, so with no direct heir his cousin Louis d’Orléans ascended to the throne as Louis XII (1462-1498-1515).

Louis XII

Louis may have had Orleans in his name but he was a native Blésois, as the inhabitants of Blois are called. A century earlier, in 1391, his grandfather Duke Louis I d’Orléans, brother to then king Charles VI, had purchased the fortress of the Counts of Blois whose power had waned. He took full control of the county six years later. While most of the counts’ fortress was razed to its foundations to make way for the new castle of the mounting Orleans clan, Louis I kept the fortress’s Great Hall (1214), one of the largest civil halls in France still existing today from that period.

Louis XII would in turn raze much of the castle of his father and grandfather, again conserving the Great Hall as he pursued a transformation of the family castle to make it worthy of a king. (We’ll return to the Great Hall later in our visit.)

Louis XII greets us above the entrance.

Below him, his symbol: the crowned porcupine. His motto: qui s’y frotte s’y pique, meaning rub against him and you’ll get pricked (literally) or cross swords with him at your peril or if you don’t watch out you’ll get burned.

The initials to either side of the porcupine: L for Louis and A for Anne, you guessed it, of Brittany, his cousin’s widow. Anne was no looker, but having the duchy of Brittany in her dowry made her quite the catch. Louis therefore obtained the annulment of his own childless first marriage to wed her. Anne’s symbol, the symbol of Brittany, was the ermine, a pattern of black stoat (weasel) coats against a white background.

Viewed from the outer square, Louis XII’s brick-and-stone wing, circa 1500, speaks of the end of an era (Gothic). Inside we follow the call of a new era (Renaissance), a pleasure palace with a vast hallway and a succession of royal apartments. The main Louis XII wing now houses the town’s Beaux-Art Museum (more on the museum later). A chapel, truncated by subsequent developments at Blois, also remains from this time.

Louis and Anne had two surviving children, daughters, Claude and Renée, however the succession laws of the French kings stated that the crown could only pass to a male heir. That meant the search for good (i.e. useful) marriages for the girls and likely inheritance of the crown by cousin François (Francis). There was therefore no better marriage for Claude (de France), the elder daughter, than to cousin Francois (d’Orléans).

Francois I

In 1515, less than a year into their marriage, Louis XII died and Claude’s husband became King Francois the First (Ier in French). (France has had plenty of Kings Louis and Charles and several Kings Henri but only two Kings Francois, the second being his grandson who reigned for only 17 months before dying from an inner ear problem at age 16.)

Claude, already duchess of Brittany by virtue of her mother Anne (she also inherited her mother’s looks), was therefore queen. Claude died at the age of 24, which gave her enough time to have seven children, including the future king Henri II—or perhaps it’s better said that having seven children by the age of 24 killed her, and getting syphilis from her husband didn’t help.

While Francois has gone down in history as a powerful builder king, Claude is remembered in the name of a sensual green or yellow-green plum, la reine claude, found ripe in markets in August. Francois I remarried after Claude’s death but had no children with his second wife, Eleanore of Austria, though plums continued to grow in the castle gardens. (Those gardens no longer exist; the city has grown into it.)

Francois grew up at the Chateau d’Amboise. It was there that he invited Leonardo da Vinci to be his neighbor. But Claude was naturally fond of her home castle at Blois and Francois I was intent on keeping it up-to-date. That meant tearing down portions of his predecessor’s château, already démodé, and creating something stylish and avant-garde.

This year France is commemorating the 500th anniversary of the coronation and reign of Francois (Francis) I. Chateaux great (e.g. Chambord) and small (e.g. Beauregard), however deeply or tangentially touched by the architectural and decorative spirit of the era of Francois I, are unfurling images of the broad-shouldered king with the long straight nose, sporting a thin moustache trickling into a full beard, wearing tights or armor, sitting in equestrian glory or standing in fur-lined grace. Blois itself is hosting a bookish exhibition called “Royal Treasures, the Library of François I,” running July 4-Oct. 18, 2015.

The equestrian statue of Louis XII may get the photo op at the entrance to Blois Castle, but it’s Francois I’s see-and-be-seen staircase that draws the lens once in the courtyard—though how to photograph it properly without looking like it’s been seen in a funhouse mirror is anyone’s guess.

Let me try again.

I give up. Photography may have become the lazy man’s travel writing but a skilled photographer still has his place.

Francois I (1494-1515-1547) would go on to launch enormous royal projects at Chambord, Fontainebleau and the Louvre, but he made his first mark on royal architecture at Blois. Palaces constructed or altered in his name were signed with his royal symbol the fire-breathing salamander and the motto nutrisco et extinguo referring to flames that nourish his people and extinguish his enemies.

The salamander sets the tone for decorative relief by the base of the showy outer staircase that defines the Francois I wing.

This is Blois’ architectural claim to fame. With loggia for nobility to look out onto the courtyard and to be seen from below, the theatrical staircase (1515-1519) and the wing of the castle that it serves set the stage for a new architectural style that would now developing throughout the valley. The Francois I wing gave royal momentum to the French Renaissance, thanks largely to Italian architects and decorators in its early phases.

This is no Eiffel Tower. Go to the top of the staircase and you’ll have little more than a view of tourist tripping over cobblestones down below (be sure to look up, though at the way in which the structure meets the ceiling). Nevertheless, this remains one of the architectural treasures of the Loire Valley. Again, not enough to plan a honeymoon around, but there you have it, 16th-century architectural sophistication—dramatic staircases were becoming all the rage.

If approaching from the train station, a 10-15 minute walk, your first view of the chateau is the back of the Francois I wing. Based on an Italian model, it looks more like an apartment building in Rome than a royal castle along the Loire.

It used to overlook the castle gardens but now faces a city road that wraps around a tremendous Atlas cedar. Beyond the cedar, one can also see from the balcony the orangery where citrus trees from the castle gardens were placed in winter. (The historical building now houses a gastronomic restaurant.)

Francois gets the architectural shout-out for this wing with the famous staircase, but the historical tale told inside speaks more about the era of his grandson Henri III.

Henri III

Francois I’s son Henri II (1519-1547-1559), who eventually died from being poked in the eye during a jousting tournament, preferred to place his architectural monograms elsewhere, including on the Louvre and at Fontainebleau. But Blois continues to speak of the presence of Henri II’s queen Catherine de Medicis and of their third son, Henri III (1551-1574-1589).

Henri III’s era of the French Court was as perverse and manipulative as our own in terms of power struggles, festivities, fashion, intrigue and assassination. We have our own politics in which a vocal, heavily armed group proclaims that the “true” religion should guide policy; we, too, go in for fear mongering, lies and rumors passed off for evidence that one man or one party will destroy life as we know it; we too hear the siren of the politics of nostalgia, etc. Admittedly, we prefer to assassinate character more than body these days and we pretend that telling an armed public that “someone ought to shoot that guy” is just an expression of disagreement, but we surround our politicians with a sizeable security detail just in case.

In 1576 and again in 1588, Henri III convoked at Blois an assembly of the Three Estates: the clergy, the nobility and the Third Estate, i.e. all others. The assembly took place in the Great Hall of 1214, originally built as a multi-purpose hall for the Counts of Blois. At its best the Estates (or States) General, as it was called, served as an advisory body offering wise counsel to the king. Otherwise it might be a way in which those with lesser or no power could let off steam or a quarrelsome nuisance that the king would ignore. The body met periodically at various venues from the early 14th century until 1614, then not at all until 1789, when discontent was so loud that Louis XVI could no longer postpone the reunion—but more than reunion, revolution was in the air.

The Wars of Religion between Catholics and Protestants marked the tenure of Catherine de Medicis and her three successive royal sons. It came to a head during the reign of Henri III. It was bad enough that factions of warring nobility saw no room to compromise, but the ultra-Catholics felt that disaster would befall the kingdom since Henri III was childless, making the heir to the throne his cousin Henri de Navarre, a Protestant.

The Great Hall is a magnificent space for its time and for a family photo op on the throne. Portions of the apartments of Catherine de Medicis and of Henri III are also visible. It’s less the heavily restored décor that makes them significant as the events that took place there. With the right guide (human or audio), the events that took place but gets us thinking about how similar the power struggles of the late 16th century are to the politics of our own time.

In order to calm the warrior spirit of the hawkish Catholic nobility and clergy against the Protestants (Huguenots) on the occasion of the Estates General of 1588, Henri III had the Catholic leader Duke Henri de Guise assassinated as the duke was walking through the king’s bedroom to a supposed pow-wow with the king.

“My God he’s tall,” the king is reported to have said upon seeing his slain rival. “He even looks taller dead than alive.”

The Duke de Guise’s brother, the Cardinal de Guise, also a conspirator against the king, was assassinated in Blois Castle the following day.

Twelve days later, Queen Mother Catherine de Medicis, died here of natural causes at the age of 79.

And seven months later, on August 2, 1589, Henri III was in turn assassinated, caught off guard while on the pierced chair (i.e. the can) at the royal Chateau de Saint Cloud (near Paris). His assassin was a monk named Jacques Clément who represented forces of what we would now call the religious far right.

Upon Henri III’s death the king’s chronicler Pierre de l’Estoile wrote: “This king would have been a good prince had he been born in a better century.” It’s doubtful though that such a century has ever existed.

Henri IV

Heir and party to the Wars of Religion, Henri IV was not only a distant cousin rising to the throne but was also a Protestant, two strikes against him that meant he had to conquer his kingdom. He would eventually convert to Catholicism to be in phase with the majority, but without abandoning the reformers.

Photo Henri IV. The central role that the Loire Valley had played in royal politics was coming to an end as the Bourbon kings asserted a firm hand throughout the kingdom and took up more frequent residence in Paris and then Versailles. Henri IV’s main association with the Loire is far downstream at Nantes, where he signed the edict that granted the right to Protestants to practice their religion in peace along with certain politic rights, thus closing the Wars of Religion in France.

He nevertheless showed enough interest enough in Blois to order the construction of a new building in the gardens. As a builder, his heart—before it was pierced by an assassin monk in Paris in 1612—was more focused on urban projects in the capital.

After his assassination his queen Marie de Medicis assumed the regency for underage Louis XIII. But a power struggle ensued when he son reached royal majority in his mid-teens and he exiled her to Blois to keep her from meddling in affairs of state. A painting in the Louvre, La Fuite de Blois by Rubens, shows her escaping from Blois through the construction site that had been launched by Henri IV. That building was never completed and was eventually demolished.

(To recap royal deaths from 1498-1612: Charles VIII died from banging his head on a door lintel at age 27; Louis XII died from intestinal trouble at age 52; Francois I died from septicemia related to fistula around the unmentionables and kidney failure at age 53; Henri II died from a brain infection caused by being poked in the eye at a jousting tournament at age 40; Francois II died from an ear infection at age 16; Charles IX died from pleurisy at age 23; Henri III was assassinated by a monk will sitting on the can at age 47, and Henri IV was assassinated by a monk while riding in his carriage at age 56. Not pretty, but, ah, but the castles they built!)

Gaston, Duc d’Orléans

Louis XIII saw no need to keep Blois Castle in the French crown and so gave it to his younger brother Gaston in 1626. Had the power days of Blois ended? Not if Gaston could help it. Any pretext was good for Gaston (1608-1660) to conspire against or otherwise disobey his brother because as long as Louis XIII and Queen Anne didn’t have a son he remained first in line for the throne.

By the second decade of their childless marriage, Gaston could reasonably dream of occupying the throne should his older brother predecease him. Blois would then become a royal residence again.

So Gaston hired one of the top architects of the time, Francois Mansart, to build a new wing to his castle, thus bringing Blois into the modern era of the 17th century. Gaston may well have rebuilt the entire castle, razing the previous structures like an old villa on beachfront property, but the throne eluded him. In 1738, after nearly 23 years of marriage, Anne of Austria gave birth to a son (presumably fathered by Louis XIII). The existence of a healthy boy distanced Gaston one step further from the crown, and when Louis XIII died five years later, the boy became Louis XIV.

The Gaston wing resembles a stand-alone chateau and is notable for its relatively early Classicism, but viewed from the courtyard it sticks out as ambition gone wrong; the focal point of the courtyard remains the Francois I wing with its external staircase. Architect Francois Mansart would lend his name to the mansard, a high-pitched roof pierced with windows, then coming into fashion.

The grace of the Gaston/Mansart wing comes especially from the symmetry of the central structure with pavilions on either side reaching out to embrace the courtyard. Through his work here and elsewhere, Mansart nevertheless helped usher in an architectural style that would later become associated not with Gaston Ier but with Louis XIV.

Louis XIV’s prime minister Mazarin, tired of Gaston’s conspiring against the crown during the king’s youth, eventually exiled Gaston to Blois. There he lost the ambition (and perhaps the funding) to complete his dream castle.

The decorative elements of the interior were never finished. The interior monumental staircase of the Gaston wing, crowned by a copula, looks like a grand stage between plays. But Blois was now far from center stage, and the Loire Valley itself was soon but a sideshow as, about the time of Gaston’s death in 1660, Louis XIV began drawing plans for the entire theater district move to Versailles.

The Beaux Arts Museum

The main Louis XII wing houses a small collection that lends itself as much to pleasant if disinterested meandering as it does to a more studious examination of representative 16th- and 17th-century paintings, and to a lesser extent 18th- and early 19th-century works, including glossy, theatrical historical works from the early 19th century called “troubadour” paintings.

For students of 19th-century restorations of medieval and Renaissance castles, Blois Castle is a must see. But since none of those students is reading this, we might be tempted to pretend that that the original equestrian statue at the castle entrance wasn’t actually destroyed during the Revolution and that this window with the ermine of Anne of Brittany has been safely in place for 500 years.

No, let’s not pretend. Let’s be truthful here: The history of French chateaux is rarely that of a single moment in history, and all the more so at Blois. What we see is the result of evolving tastes and ambitions, good fortune and bad, and restoration. In 1788 Louis XVI, five years short of the guillotine, abandoned any royal prerogative to Blois Castle. It then served as barracks for troops and officers with no interest in protecting its historical significance. With the Revolution soon banging at the door there was no interest in protecting its royal symbols either. What was saved was saved for practical rather than historical or emotional reasons.

Then, several decades later, historical mindfulness came calling. In 1840 Blois became one of the first royal complexes in France to be designated a historical monument. Major restoration began several years later, beginning with the rehabilitation of the Francois I wing. The Beaux-Arts Museum opened in 1869.

A room inside this chateau is dedicated to the 19th-century restorers, particularly one Félix Duban, an architect who oversaw the restoration of Blois Castle until his death in 1870. In his terrific travel book “A Little Tour in France,” Henry James, writing in the 1880s, laments the heavy-handed restoration work that he encounters on his tour of the provinces. Nevertheless, it’s thanks to that post-royal history—as barracks, as possession of the city, as object of restoration—that we get to see and to appreciate the lessons in history and architecture that Blois teaches.

To Blois or not to Blois

That remains the question. Is it more rewarding to aim for the monumental unity of Chambord, the loveliness of Chenonceau, the dramatic view of Chaumont, or to get studious with Blois? You can’t go wrong as you plan or wing your way through the castle-rich area of the Loire Valley between Blois and Saumur. Still, a traveler much choose between chateaux while leaving time to enjoy the other pleasures that the region offers—vineyards, gardens, culinary explorations, a zoo, a long stroll by the river.

The architectural developments themselves may seem insignificant 500 years on. Nevertheless, Blois, considered a (perhaps the) key to the Loire Valley, deserves attention.

© 2015 Gary Lee Kraut

Useful information

Château de Blois, Blois Castle, is open daily except Dec. 25 and Jan. 1. Fencing demonstrations are given July 13-Aug. 16, 2015. One reason to spend the night in or near Blois is to attend the wonderful sound-and-light show in the castle courtyard, April 4-Sept. 20, 2015.

Blois Tourist Office, is next to the castle at 23 Place du Château. Tel. 02 54 90 41 41. The office and its website also provide information about chateaux in the surrounding area.

Maison de la Magie, the magic museum and fun house across the square from the castle entrance. Watch for the dragons in the window. Open April 4-Sept. 20 and Oct. 17-Nov. 1, 2015.

Loire à Vélo is the name of the Loire Valley biking system covering a cycle trail of about 500 miles. Its official website is here.

Getting to Blois: From Paris, there are infrequent direct trains to Blois from the Austerlitz Station. They take 1 hour 25 minutes. More frequent indirect trains take 2 hours, arriving in Blois via Orleans (from Paris’s Austerlitz Station) or via Saint Pierre des Corps (from Paris’s Montparnasse Station). A daytrip from Paris is possible. One worthwhile approach to beginning your longer Loire Valley stay in Blois is to spend the first day and perhaps night in the town before renting bikes or a car for wider explorations in the valley. Bus service from Blois goes to the nearby chateaux of Beauregard, Cheverny and Chambord. Inquire at the Blois Tourist Office or see the bus schedule here.

Lodging in Blois and the surroundings area

B&Bs

La Maison de Thomas, 12 rue Beauvoir, 41000 Blois. Tel. 09 81 84 44 59 or 06 60 14 41 41. In the heart of the town, a friendly townhouse for those without wheels or for a night in Blois before or after a biking trip.

16 Place Saint Louis, 16 place Saint Louis, 41000 Blois. Tel. 02 54 74 13 61. At Philippe Escoffre’s B&B a 5-minute hike uphill from center, three cozy rooms look out to the cathedral and over the river. Yes, the name is the address.

Le Plessis, 195 rue Albert 1er, 41000 Blois. Tel. 02 54 43 80 08. On the downstream edge of the town with a chemical-free, salt-water swimming pool.

Le Clos Pasquier, 10-12, Impasse de l’Orée du Bois, 41000 Blois. Tel. 02 54 58 84 08. Claire and Laurent Nicot’s B&B in a 15th-century manor house is another 1.5 miles further downstream.

Hotels

Côté Loire – Auberge Ligérienne 2 place de la Grève, 41000 Blois. Tel. 02 54 78 07 86. A 2-star hotel and restaurant in Blois by the river.

L’Auberge du Centre, 34 Grande Rue, 41120 Chitenay. Tel. 02 54 70 42 11. Nine miles south of Blois. I found this 3-star village hotel with a pleasant restaurant. A choice stop during a biking trip in this portion of the valley.

La Maison d’à Côté, 26 rue de Chambord, 41350 Montlivault. Tel. 02 54 20 62 30. An 8-room inn with restaurant (1 star Michelin in 2015) 6 miles upstream from Blois toward Chambord

Le Château du Breuil, 23 route de Fougères, 41700 Cheverny. Tel. 02 54 44 20 20. Ten miles southeast of Blois, in the countryside two miles from the Chateau de Cheverny, Véronique and Bernard Gattolliat’s 39-room 4-star hotel with restaurant an swimming pool.

Domaine des Hauts de Loire, 79 rue Gilbert Navard, 41150 Onzain. Tel. 02 54 20 72 57.Ten miles downstream from Blois, across the river from Chaumont, a 4-star chateau hotel and restaurant. The 170-acre property also has a tennis court, outdoor pool, a pond where one can fish and bikes.

Restaurants in Blois

For a daytripper, one of the cafés below the chateau de Blois should suffice, or simply a sandwich and pastries from one of the bakeries in that area.

For those spending the evening: I’ve fond memories of a relaxed, gastronomic dinner at Christophe Cosme’s Le Rendez-vous des Pêcheurs, 27 rue du Foix. Tel. 02 54 74 67 48. Closed Sun. and Mon. There’s also the Auberge Ligérienne, a part of the hotel Côté Loire noted above. For a more formal meal in an airy historical setting there’s L’Orangerie du Château, 1 avenue Jean-Laigret. Tel. 02 54 78 05 36. It occupies the former citrus green house or orangery of the chateau. Also closed Sun. and Mon. For a more contemporary decor, more contemporary gastronomy, Assa, one mile downstream from center on the edge of the Loire, has 1 Michelin star (2015). 189 quai Ulysse Besnard. Tel. 02 54 78 09 01. Closed Sun. dinner, Mon. Tues.

– GLK

The post Blois Castle: The Key to the Loire Valley appeared first on France Revisited - Life in Paris, Travel in France.

The elegant Château de Cheverny is chez moi for Charles-Antoine de Vibraye and his family. His ancestors have resided on the premises for the better part of 600 years and today de Vibraye (who might also be referred to as the Marquis de Vibraye), his wife and three children occupy roughly 10% of it. Much of the rest is open to visitors. Cheverny was one of the first private French estates to open its gates to the public (1922), and de Vibraye welcomes on average 350,000 guests per year to his castle-sweet-castle.

One expects de Vibraye (seen in photo) to describe Cheverny as a museum but the word usine (factory) crops up in his conversation just as often.

”I live inside my family business,” he explains. ”Cheverny belongs to the public, and making the tourist experience serene and enjoyable requires constant attention to detail. You can’t take your eyes off it for a minute. It’s like caring for a small child.”

The result of such devotion is a well-oiled machine. For numerous crowd-pleasing reasons, Cheverny is one of the more theme-parkish of the Loire châteaux. ”But it’s also one of the most authentic,” adds de Vibraye. ”Hardly any other chateau has been continuously occupied. At Cheverny, things may have been added but nothing’s ever been taken away.”

One thing that’s been added is Cheverny’s association with the Francophone comic book hero Tintin. This is the only Loire castle that comic book fans will recognize faster than many art historians. That’s because Belgian cartoonist Hergé based Marlinspike Hall (Château de Moulinsart), the property of Tintin’s buddy Captain Haddock, on Cheverny’s symmetrical silhouette. (Hergé shortened its wings lest Captain Haddock appear to rich.) One of the outbuildings at Cheverny houses a free-standing museum dedicated to Tintin, his dog Milou and other characters, with videos and special effects.

But the main event is the chateau itself. The place-name Cheverny debuted in 1315 on a deed registered to the newly-enobled Hurault family. The seigniorial domain has belonged on and off to the Herault family—of which the de Vibraye family is a branch—ever since. A peaceable existence allowed the domain to sit out the royal and lordly turmoil and high politics of Blois. It did, however, appear on BuzzFeed in 1551 when former royal mistress Diane de Poitiers took a 10-year lease after being evicted from Chenonceau, but almost all of the day-to-day archives have gone missing.

Construction of the current chateau began in 1625 with a design that signaled a strong tilt toward what would become known as Classical architecture. Those also visiting visited Blois Castle on their Loire Valley wanderings will find that Blois’s Gaston d’Orleans wing, begun in 1635, was designed in the same movement of harmony and symmetry.

Two-thirds of the Château de Cheverny is open to the public, without any of the yawn-inducing, near-empty rooms that one often finds in public castles. Visitors can marvel at a royal bedroom that rivals Fort Knox; a luxuriant dining room; suits of armor; playrooms stuffed with vintage toys; fireplaces adorned with gilded dancing girls; a flower-bedecked chapel; and even the current Marquise’s Cinderella-style wedding dress.

Visiting the interior of the chateau gave rise to one burning question for its owner. When you live in a historic château like Cheverny, aren’t you tempted to roll back the brocade bedspreads and sleep in the Royal Bedroom after closing hours?

”Never,” de Vibraye replied firmly. ”Those rooms belong to the public and that’s final. There was a TV crew here recently, filming lots of furniture in close-up, and I must admit I heaved a huge sigh of relief when they left and I got the velvet ropes back in place.”

The chateau interior is compact enough that it can well visited in about 30 minutes, leaving plenty of time to wander through the expansive park and the flower and kitchen gardens, visit the Tintin Museum (additional fee), enjoy the pretty setting at orangerie for a beverage or a bite to eat (inside or out; open April 1 to Nov. 11), perhaps even take boat-ride on property’s waterways.

At the Café de l’Orangerie you can try some locally made beer, but having passed through the Cheverny and Cour-Cheverny vineyards along your way to Cheverny it’s likely that those appellation wines will be the fermented beverage of choice. For a tasting, the official Cheverny Wine Club is housed just outside the castle gate to Cheverny (see below article).

The Hounds
One of the major draws of Cheverny is its kennel for 100 Anglo-French hunting hounds. Cheverny has maintained its hunting heritage and the estate census also includes 11 horses, 70 stags and 200 wild boar.

This is no petting zoo. Those hounds are trained to be in prime hunting shape, and the deer are well advised to be too. The hunt takes place in the surrounding forest and other hunt-friendly woods, twice per week from October through March. About 25 deer are killed each year in keeping with local (departmental) hunting regulations.

Come feeding time you can watch the hounds, tail in the air, devour mass quantities of raw meat in a matter of minutes. The feeding takes place at 5pm daily (with exceptions) from April 1 to September 14. The remainder of the year the feeding takes place at 3pm on Mon., Wed., Thurs. and Fri. (except holidays). It isn’t that they don’t eat on other days but they’re probably out working.

If your kids love dogs, get them to the kennels about 15-30 minutes before feeding time for a ringside view of the buffet. Arrive after the crowd has formed and the kids who are too big to sit on shoulders may miss the show. It’s perfectly safe as the dogs are enclosed in a barred courtyard, although one 4-year-old near us was a bit frightened.

The chateau and grounds are open every day of the year, including holidays.

© 2015, Corinne LaBalme.

Château de Cheverny, 41700 Cheverny. Tel. 02 54 79 96 29.

Getting There: Cheverny is 10 miles southeast of Blois, passing near Château de Beauregard along the way. By car Cheverny is about a 30-minute drive from Blois and Chaumont, in separate directions.

From Paris, there are infrequent direct trains to Blois from the Austerlitz Station. They take 1:25. More frequent indirect trains take 2 hours, arriving in Blois via Orleans (from Paris’s Austerlitz Station) or via Saint Pierre des Corps (from Paris’s Montparnasse Station).

While it’s preferable to have your own wheels (car, van, motorcycle or bicycle) for leisurely explorations of chateaux and vineyards in the area, there’s bus service from April to August between the chateaux of Blois, Chambord, Cheverny and Beauregard. Bus information can be found here.
CHEVERNY and COUR-CHEVERNY WINES

Cheverny and Cour-Cheverny are appellations for wines grown between on the south side (left bank) of the Loire roughly between Blois, Chambord, Cheverny and Chaumont. Those are the vineyards you see when driving or biking in this area.

Cheverny is a young, fruity wine largely using sauvignon and some chardonnay for the whites and pinot noir and gamay for the reds and roses.

Cour-Cheverny, far less well known and with more cache because of its more limited production (one-tenth that of Cheverny), is made from grape varietal called Romorantin, a grape specific to this area, introduced by king Francoise I, and so proprietary that it has a capital R.

As with most Loire Valley wines, these all relatively inexpensive, typically 6€ to 12€ per bottle, some a bit more.

Maison des Vins de Cheverny, the official Cheverny Wines Club of the association of winegrowers from the two appellations, is located by the entrance to the chateau, making for an easy tasting stop to get familiar with these wines, at least for those not driving.

Maison des Vins de Cheverny. Open daily from Easter to the beginning of November, 11am-1:15pm and 2:15-6pm. Tel. 02 54 79 25 16

– GLK

Also see our articles about the nearby chateaux of Chambord, Beauregard and Blois.

The post The Marquis, the Hounds and Château de Cheverny appeared first on France Revisited - Life in Paris, Travel in France.

Tourists in the Loire Valley for a few days generally head only for the A-list castles. That means the three Cs in this part of the valley: Cheverny, Chambord and Chaumont, while eyeing a blockbuster fourth, Chenonceau, further downstream.

But for sightseers who dislike crowds and relish the possibility of running into a congenial châtelain (chateau owner), quieter slices of 16th-century splendor are a few minutes away. Simply make a beeline 3 miles southeast of Blois to Beauregard to visit one of the valley’s many beautiful B-listers.

Like the 426-room Chambord, Beauregard served as one of François I’s hunting retreats. But unlike the national domain of Chambord (770,000 visitors per year), Beauregard is a small, family-owned château that draws approximately 25,000 yearly visitors.

It may be comparatively small in size, but “it’s a bigger responsibility than I expected,” says Guy du Pavillon, whose great-grandmother purchased the property in 1926. “I’m very, very grateful to my mother, who ran it alone for many years. She gave me the chance to establish my family before handing over the reins.”

Like many Loire getaways, its vacation vocation insured that few events of significant historic importance occurred on its grounds.

Jean du Thier, part-time poet and protector of Joachim du Bellay and Pierre Ronsard, left the largest architectural footprint. He purchased the place in 1545, near the end of the reign of Francois I and was soon working in the government of the latter’s son and heir Henri II.

Since Jean du Thier’s time there have been countless renovations, ”some harmonious, some less so,” says du Pavillon with a sigh. However, Beauregard’s major claim-to-fame, an extraordinary portrait collection housed in a 26-meter long Renaissance gallery, has hardly changed a whisker since its 17th-century inauguration.

While the 327 portraits are not stand-alone works of art, the ensemble—which amounts to a 400-year-old equivalent of Time’s Person of the Year covers—is fascinating. Bien sûr, it’s mostly Man of the Year as only 20 women made the cut via marriage or martyrdom. Apart from the gender imbalance, the selection is remarkably international as it features Albanians, Austrians, and Ottoman Turks.

With whimsical impracticality, the 17th-century owners covered the floor with 5,600 delicate Delft tiles that quickly proved too fragile for foot traffic. (What you see today, partially covered, are the replacements that that same family was wise to order.) Chaises longues are in place so that guests can lean back and admire the decorative ceiling, richly painted in lapis-lazuli.

Du Pavillon hasn’t abandoned his day job in Paris in fire-proof textiles but still spends several days a week at Beauregard.

”What I love best is rising at dawn and jogging through the property. That’s when I make notes for the gardeners.”

Six gardeners are required to keep the 100-acre estate in bloom with fruit bushes, heritage roses, color-coordinated flower beds and a collection of trees from around the world. French/English quizzes for children are posted on the trees. Unlike its sister châteaux, Beauregard encourages guests to walk on the grass to better explore.

There’s a medieval century chapel on the grounds (with a scallop medallion to prove it served as a stop on the pilgrimage to Compostela, Spain) as well as a 17th-century ice-house. Filled with straw-covered ice blocks, it kept the castle’s white wine chilled until refrigeration took over in the early 20th century.

Better-than-average snacks and lunches are available (everyday but Tuesday) and there’s a guest-house (sleeping five) for people who can’t bear to leave. Bicycle rentals on site. The two orangeries (seating 70 or 120) can be rented for private parties.

© 2015, Corinne LaBalme.

Château de Beauregard, 12 Chemin de la Fontaine, 41120 Cellettes. Tel: 02 54 70 41 65. Beauregard is closed from mid-fall through much of the winter. See the website for exact dates and opening times.

Getting There: Beauregard is 3 miles southeast of Blois. From Paris, there are infrequent direct trains to Blois from the Austerlitz Station. They take 1:25. More frequent indirect trains take 2 hours, arriving in Blois via Orleans (from Paris’s Austerlitz Station) or via Saint Pierre des Corps (from Paris’s Montparnasse Station). While it’s preferable to have your own wheels (car, van, motorcycle or bicycle) for leisurely explorations of chateaux and vineyards in the area, there’s bus service from April to August between the chateaux of Blois, Chambord, Cheverny and Beauregard. Bus information can be found here.

Also see our articles about the nearby chateaux of Chambord, Cheverny and Blois.

The post Château de Beauregard: A Castle Road Less Taken appeared first on France Revisited - Life in Paris, Travel in France.

When you can’t get any bigger, you just have to get better. Chambord’s 20-mile wall encloses a 426-room castle plus 13,443 acres of formal gardens and untrammeled forests where deer and wild boar roam, making it the largest enclosed park in Europe (and about the same square footage as the City of Paris). Right now, Chambord is in the midst of a massive development plan (€4.5 million invested in 2014) to make the castle more user-friendly and, ultimately, self-financing.

”Chambord is a conceptual castle,” explains Jean d’Haussenville, General Manager of the Domaine National de Chambord. Conceptual is an odd adjective choice for a monster stack of stone but it fits. François (Francis) I, the king most identified with the French Renaissance, commissioned the rural getaway in 1519, but Chambord failed as a functional hunting lodge. Its giant rooms, built around the outline of a Greek Cross much like the contemporary Saint Peter’s in Rome, resisted warmth in the frigid game season. Comfort-conscious François only spent 72 nights there during his 32-year reign.

Far more many days and nights are being devoted to celebrating this year the 500th anniversary of the Francois’s ascension to the throne. Francois inherited the crown upon the death of his childless cousin Louis XII in 1515 and ruled until his own death in 1547. Eleven major chateaux in the Loire Valley and many lesser chateaux and monuments, along with cities and towns throughout the area are promoting their kinship with that period. The purity of Chambord’s architecture as a reflection of the reign of Francois I makes it a major marker of the commemorative year.

Despite its vocation as a retreat after the hunt, Chambord’s frilly, massive silhouette is as much Beauty as Beast. The lacey turrets appear to pirouette in the wind and its slinky, Escher-esque double-helix stairwell is the White Album carved into stone. The jury’s still out on whether Leonardo designed the stairwell (building records went missing centuries ago) but even if he didn’t the château is infused with the artist’s charisma. ”Chambord,” insists d’Haussenville, ”is the Mona Lisa of architecture.”

Owned by the French state since 1930 and a UNESCO World Heritage Site since 1981, Chambord is currently 86% self-supporting with €16.5 million in annual operating expenses, already quite an achievement in French parlance. Its goal of 100% self-financing demands a push for 1 million visitors/year instead of the 770,000 at present. Chambord has recently pursued partnerships with royal sites of comparable candle-power (Beijing’s Summer Palace; Udaipur in Rajasthan) to build awareness around the world.

The château is also revamping its hotel and restaurant offers; opening new parts of the castle (like the 18th century kitchens in the West Tower next September); refurbishing the French formal gardens; restructuring the reception area; re-designing the façade lighting, and going into the wine business by planting vineyards this spring.

The vineyards will be growing Francois I’s musky fetish Romorantin grape, along with pinot noir. Romorantin, a white grape, was first introduced to the area (specifically to plant near the chateau at Romorantin 10 miles southeast of Chambord) by the king at about the time he ordered the construction of Chambord. The vines came from Burgundy, but the Cours-Cheverny wine-growing zone that one passes through when approaching Chambord from the west has for some time now been the only place in the world that that fully bases a wine on the grape.

How does all the improvement work impact on your personal visit to this iconic castle in the next few months? Rest assured: Some things won’t change. You will still have a multitude of tours (including wildlife jeep safaris in the nature reserve); equestrian shows; bike, golf cart and boat rentals; art shows; theater, and live concerts.

Events: The deer begin their theatrical mating rituals in the forest in mid-September, but that’s not the only thing to look forward to.

Molière’s Le Bourgeois Gentilhomme débuted at Chambord in 1670 in front of Louis XIV and the Court, and the Comédie Française production (with Christian Lacroix costumes) returns for two outdoor performances on May 22 and 23. National Archeology Days are June 19 to 21 and World Music Day (free admission) is celebrated on June 20. The Chambord Music Festival, July 3 to 18, kicks off with the Doulce Mémoire concert that recreates a Renaissance ball in honor of the 500 anniversary of François I’s coronation. Through August 30, the Chateau presents the playful contemporary paintings of Guillaume Bruère that turn a Francis Bacon-esque focus on François I and the French royal family.

On June 22, the castle debuts the HistoPad, a digital tour guide (in 12 languages) that provides remarkable value for its 8€ sticker price. (Only one needed per family.) With a swipe of the fingertip, you can see how each room was decorated in the past. “Enhanced reality” features also grant visitors x-ray vision to see through walls and into closets and coffers. There’s a kid’s treasure hunt included in the HistoPad tour that adults may try to hog. It’s very informative and lots of fun.

Lodging: If you want low price lodgings on the grounds, book a room before September 30 when the no-frills, two star Hotel Saint Michel, located a few feet from the castle’s doors, closes for an 18-month expansion/renovation. This genteel 19th century property has been ripe for a luxury makeover for decades, and it’s finally happening. Architect Jean-Michel Wilmotte (Paris’s Mandarin Oriental, Hotel Nell) has been tapped for the country chic re-do, so kiss those 75€ rooms (with no curtains) goodbye. Michelin-starred Chef Jean-Pierre Vigato (Apicius) will supervise the future dining options.

You can still stay on the Chambord grounds at a reasonable price with a little help from your friends. On the property there are two elegant self-catering cottages, inaugurated in 2013, that sleep eight and six, equipped with washing machines, dishwashers, TV, barbecue, wifi and free bikes. The tiny village that abuts the castle has souvenir stands and sandwich shops.

Getting There: Chambord is a 2-hour drive south from Paris. The closest major town is Blois, 9 miles west. While it’s preferable to have your own wheels (car, van, motorcycle or bicycle) to combine a visit to Chambord with stops at other chateaux in the area, shuttles to Chambord from the Blois train station operate in summer and take 25 minutes. There is also bus service from April to August between the chateaux of Blois, Chambord, Cheverny and Beauregard. Bus information can be found here. From Paris, there are infrequent direct trains to Blois from the Austerlitz Station. They take 1:25. More frequent indirect trains take 2:00, arriving in Blois via Orleans (from Paris’s Austerlitz Station) or via Saint Pierre des Corps (from Paris’s Montparnasse Station).

Further information: For more information about Chambord, including opening times and entrance fees, see Chambord’s official website.

Corinne LaBalme, May 2015.

Also see our articles about the nearby chateaux of Cheverny, Beauregard and Blois.

The post Chambord, the Loire Valley’s XXL Château, Gets a Tourist Makeover appeared first on France Revisited - Life in Paris, Travel in France.

From Charleville-Mézières, capital of the Ardennes, I drove north, following the loops of the Meuse River on a misty May morning. The winding corridor sticks like a bedspring into Belgium’s southern border. Though the weather didn’t lend itself to photo-ops promised the tourist brochures, I nevertheless had a wonderful sense of meandering otherworldliness as I crossed and re-crossed the Meuse at the riverside villages of Joiny-sur-Meuse, Bogny-sur-Meuse and Monthermé, driving slowly and stopping frequently to take in the grey yet inviting view.

I was on the lookout for a café by the river that morning but at Monthermé a sign for a little bar called Le Palais de la Bière (The Beer Palace) on the opposite side of the road reminded me of my quest for beer joints, so I went in.

It was rather insular bar, the kind of place where, in the movies, a stranger walks in and everyone stops talking. But no one stopped for the simple reason that no one had started. I said “Bonjour Messieurs-Dames” to the six people inside and, turning friendly enough, they all responded “Bonjour Monsieur.” Four men and a woman stood at the bar (one beer, one juice, two coffees, a white wine) while an older man sat at a table nearby (coffee). The mistress of the Beer Palace was arranging glasses behind the counter. I stood at the counter and ordered coffee. The place was strangely quiet without being ominous, as though they/we were all waiting for something to happen.

And it did.

A roundish fellow in his comfortable 30s walked in. I’d seen him outside as I’d parked the car. A thin older man had been berating him on the sidewalk. The term “sad sack” had come to mind; I thought that he might be a slow-moving public employee being given some tough love by his employer. Here though he appeared taller, more confident. He shook hands with all of the men, including me, kissed the female client and went behind the counter to kiss our host. His presence lifted everyone’s expression. He joked politely, commented on how he’d heard that this one was having trouble installing a new door, how that one’s dog had been barking again through the night. He remarked that the one female client must have fallen in love since he hadn’t seen her in a while. He accused our host behind the counter of being too beautiful. We travel as witnesses or as strangers but are often aware that we don’t quite belong. Here, though, it was impossible not to feel a part of the scene. I’d come to the right place. Conversation flowed.

I asked the man standing next to me which road I should take to the top of the hill.

“Haven’t been up there in a while,” he said. He asked the man on the other side of me if he knew. They talked about the hill as though it were another country, speculating about distances and weather. Finally the friendly fellow whom we’d all come to count on said: “You go the intersection about 200 meters that way then wind around until you come to a little inn. Then turn left.”

On a given morning—a Thursday it was—Le Palais de la Bière in Monthermé may well be one of the best beer bars in France, even though only one in six was having a beer and I have no idea what kind they serve.

It was a grey, misty day, still a view to remember… I share here my photo, with nothing to envy of the promise shot provided by the tourist office.

The map was inviting me to continue north to Deville, Laifour and Revin so as to eventually step on the Belgian border just past Givet, but I had a beer call to make further south in the more central portion of French Ardennes.

Woinic and Ardwen

Little did I know as I drove from Bogny-sur-Meuse to the center of the department of Ardennes that I was more or less following in the trails of Woinic, the wild boar that is the symbol of the department of Ardennes.

Standing 33 feet high, 46 feet long, 16 feet wide, and therefore the world’s largest boar sculpture, Woinic was completed in late 1993 following an 11-year labor of love by artist Eric Sleziak, who created the mammoth pig in a hangar in Bogny. The department acquired Woinic in 2008 and the sculpture was moved to its current position with great fanfare (and lots of cut overhead wires) for inauguration at the entrance to the natural regional park of the Ardennes from the plains of Champagne on the emblematic date of 08-08-08.

The trademark Woinic, which belongs to the department of Ardennes, is the object of various licenses, including its designation as an 8.08-degree “triple” beer produced by the brewery Ardwen, located in Launois-sur-Vence.

Created in 2006 and producing about 2100 hectoliters last year, Ardwen is too large to be considered a microbrewery and is in fact the largest brewery in the department, still it’s quite small. Geoffrey Stevenin took over as the brewmaster here in 2012 at the age of 22 and works with one assistant. In 2014, to celebrate its eighth year of existence and its 1000th brew, Ardwen began producing its eighth type of beer, an amber-colored triple called Obscure which uses four types of hops and four types of malt, a celebration of beer making. Ardwen is available mostly in bottles and is sold though large distribution channels throughout Champagne-Ardenne region, principally in the Ardennes.

Founder Daniel Guerin, who previously worked in agriculture, said that he founded the brewery “out of love for the department of Ardennes.” He lauded the local spring water (otherwise sold in bottles under the Cristaline brand) and Launois-sur-Vence’s position in the heavily agricultural center of the department as reasons for selecting this location to produce Ardwen beer.

“The French have managed to maintain variety in their cheeses as the Belgians have in their beer,” Guerin pointed out. But while the beer-making tradition of France went dormant with the human and territorial destruction of First World War, he explained, the beer-drinking tradition continued, particularly in non-winegrowing zones such as this. So there was a ready thirst for the revival of beer-making in northern France, as the regional success of Ardwen shows.

Attached to the brewery is Ardwen’s brassserie-restaurant, the occasion to try several small glasses of their beer over lunch. (Don’t forget to appoint a designated driver, please.)

Sedan

Sedan sounds like an old car to American ears. To Kansans in particular it also sounds like the hometown of famou clown Emmett “Willie” Kelly. But to the French, and perhaps to Germans as well, Sedan calls to mind the site of the overwhelming Prussian siege that brought about the capture and fall of Napoleon III in 1870 and opened the way to France’s defeat in the Franco-Prussian War.

At the center of the former military stronghold of Sedan, now with a population of 20,000, stands a fortress (château fort), much of it a remnant of the 15th and 16th centuries, the largest of its type in Europe. One enters its thick walls through a cool damp tunnel and into a museum that reveals the development of artillery through the centuries. It’s an impressive stop on the trails of military explorations in northern France, but while a fortress can certainly hold its own as an attraction for traveling families and soldierly visitors, I had beer on my mind.

Brasserie Artisanale du Château Fort

La Sedane, a local brand of beer, is brewed across the street in the vats at the back of the Brasserie Artisanale du Château Fort (Craft Brewery of the Fortress), under the brewmastery of Jean-Christophe Viot.

Viot began making home brew in 2005 and took over producing the La Sedane beer in 2008. The microbrewery now produces about 600 hectoliters per year, with about 60% being sold in bottles.

Despite the presence of brewing vats in the back, this isn’t a bar but rather a restaurant serving homey dishes such as calf’s head, calf’s knuckle, grilled meats, moules frites, sauerkraut and meat, and the boudin blanc from Habyes (a traditional white, i.e. bloodless, pork sausage that’s very much at home in the region) served with fries that I enjoyed with a glass of triple (a malty high-fermentation pale ale). Due to the Belgian influence to its beer production, triples are more commonly consumed along France’s northern border that further south.

I have no regular affection for either boudin blanc or triple beer. They do grow on you though. The French Ardennes grow on you. Walk around the corner to the pub Le Roy de la Bière (The King of Beer) and that’ll grow on you too.

Le Roy de la Bière

Lionel Passe reigns here as the third-generation owner, along with co-owner Annette, his ex-wife. In 1943, during the German occupation, Lionel’s grandfather Robert purchased what was then called Le Grand Bar Ardennais. Lionel’s father Michel took over in 1951, at the age of 21, and renamed it Le Roy de la Bière five years later. Lionel claims with pride that his father’s bar was one of the first in France to serve Guinness in the 1960s. With a pool table already installed in the back since his own father’s time, Michel looked to the British Isles for further inspiration, adding a dart board, a wide selection of beers on tap, dark wood and a red British telephone booth. Lionel, a commanding publican, took over the taps in 1990 at the age of 35. He set my glass on the table in the back (I now had a designated driver) and stated that he operates the first true pub in France.

Adding to its wide selection of craft and other beer, in 2013 he enlisted Jean-Christophe Viot at the nearby brewery to produce the bars 70th-anniversary brew, Le King’s Beer, using a combination of three hops: American, Czech and French. The Sedan brewery also produces Passe’s signature Passe Stout. The table on which my King’s Beer sat was once a door at the prison of Sudan. Nearby, old photographs show the room as it was during his father’s tenure. And among the historical paraphernalia and signs there’s a notice from the German Commander in Chief of the Army during the Occupation asking residents to “abstain from rash actions, sabotage of any kind and passive or even active resistance against the German army.”

Passe is the kind of large, voluble, initially wary but inevitably welcoming personality that one hopes to meet in a local pub. One might also meet his ex-wife Annette, co-owner, though Annette is more ready to retire and would like to sell the pub. Passe told me that he’d like to keep working the 80-hour weeks required to run the place but they’ve nevertheless put Le Roy de la Bière up for sale. “It’s tough to find a buyer because banks won’t lend money for bars,” he says, “including to me to buy her out, and for now that suits me fine.”

There are stories to be told here but I leave them for travelers to discover on their own—that’s part of the pleasure of visiting a watering hole such as this. You might then swallow enough of those stories to end up buying the place and settling in for the long run.

© 2014, Gary Lee Kraut

Return to The French Ardennes, Part 1: Charleville-Mézières: Beer, the Run-Away Poet and the Giant Lizard
Return to The French Ardennes, Part 2: Charleville-Mézières: Place Ducale and the Bare-Ass Casserole

***

Tourist information for the Loops of the Meuse and its affluent the Semoy
Monthermé Place Jean-Baptiste Clément, 08800 Monthermé
Tel : 03 24 54 46 73
www.meuse-semoy-tourisme.com

Le Palais de la Bière
70 rue Pasteur
08800 Monthermé
Tel. 03 24 53 06 31

Ardwen (Brewery and Restaurant)
20 avenue Roger Ponsart
08430 Launois-sur-Vence
Tel. : 03 24 35 46 50
www.ardwen.fr

Office de Tourisme de Sedan et Pays Sedanais
35 Rue du Ménil
08200 Sedan
Tel. : 03 24 27 73 73
www.tourisme-sedan.fr

Brasserie Artisanale du Château Fort and restaurant
45, Promenoir des prêtres
08200 Sedan
Tel : 03 24 53 13 52
Open Tues.-Sat. noon-2pm and 7-10pm and Sun. Noon-2pm.
Bière La Sedane (Jean-Christophe Viot)
www.biere-sedan.fr

Le Roy de la Bière (Lionel Passe)
19 Place de la Halle
08200 Sedan
Open 10am-2am Tues.-Sun.

The post The French Ardennes, Part 3: The Meuse, Sedan, More Beer and the Big Boar appeared first on France Revisited - Life in Paris, Travel in France.

France Revisited joins in the celebration with a series of photo reports by Elise Prudhomme, a longtime resident of Paris, beginning with seven stunning black-and-white images of the Tuileries Garden, Paris’s most historical garden.

It was here, behind the royal palace of the Tuileries, that André Le Nôtre cut his teeth as a landscape gardener. His father and grandfather had worked here before him, he lived within the garden walls, and he is buried nearby in Saint Roch Church.

These Tuileries photographs are accompanied by a text in which the photographer provides background about Le Nôtre and explains her photographic interest in this garden.

Le tien, le mien, Le Nôtre / Yours, Mine, Le Nôtre’s

Photographs and text by Elise Prudhomme

A walk through the Tuileries Garden is a return to the origin of French gardens. Considering its long heritage of transformations by queens, kings, landscape architects and gardeners, the Tuileries cannot be fully attributed to André Le Nôtre (1613-1700). It can nevertheless be viewed as the matrix of André Le Nôtre’s career. By matrix I mean that the Tuileries was his testing grounds and the precursor of his future projects, the womb or mold from which his future work originated and developed.  Without the Tuileries there would be no Versailles.

Le Nôtre was born near these royal gardens in the Saint Roc Quarter. He was baptized and would eventually be buried in the St. Roch Church.  For many years he lived with his family in a house inside the walls of the Tuileries Garden. This garden was a family affair. His grandfather Pierre Le Nôtre was in charge of the parterres for Catherine de Medici, who had built the Tuileries Palace. His father Jean Le Nôtre replanted and maintained the Tuileries for Henri IV. (The Tuileries Palace itself, begun in 1564, burned down in 1871, leaving its garden to appear as though directly connected to the Louvre.)

The Tuileries appears to rest on the pillars of its historical central axis running through the garden and out west to what would become the Champs-Elysées and the geometrical work of the basins, but as a photographer these are not the aspects that most interest me here. My eye is drawn instead to the groundmass that constitutes the garden, actually a series of gardens within the larger garden.

Le Nôtre made innovative and subtle changes to the notion of space, opening what was once a medieval walled garden towards the exterior, creating gardens within gardens (these developed into bosquets at Versailles), changing the form of the parterres (octagonal to trapezoidal) for visual complexity, and constructing the elevated terraces (including the fer à cheval [horseshoe] ramps) which provided the viewer with different heights from which to contemplate the garden.

André Le Nôtre sought to break with the early formalism of French gardens in order to render the space appreciable to visitors. Working with mineral and plant architecture, he created multifaceted gardens that are both majestic and playful. The introduction of great vistas allowed him to play with symmetry and geometry in order to create complexity and diversity that open the garden to various functions, to areas of ornamentation (though there were fewer statues at the time), pleasure and utility (though commercial utility was far from Le Nôtre’s intent).

While crowds of pressed visitors are naturally drawn by the dramatic perspective from the Louvre up the Champs-Elysées, the Tuileries also allows strollers the opportunity to discover smaller gardens within the garden.

Photographing these individual spaces like the pieces of a puzzle, I wished to form a notion of the whole through the assimilation of individual details. Working spontaneously, I visited the garden frequently and photographed a variety of subjects. The choice to work in black and white was made to better reveal the geometry and rhythm that nature and humans have brought to these places.

Text and images © Elise Prudhomme.

A Philadelphia-born photographer living in Paris since 1990, Elise Prudhomme developed a passion for photography during university years at Smith College.  She also directs Studio Galerie B&B, an art gallery, photo studio, darkroom facility and digital imaging center in Paris, 6 bis rue des Récollets, near Canal Saint-Martin in the 10th arrondissement. More images can been seen at www.eliseprudhomme.com.

Thirty photographs from Elise Prudhomme’s Tuileries series Le tien, le mien, Le Nôtre (Yours, Mine, Le Nôtre’s) were accepted by the Louvre to grace the walls of their reception tent in the Tuileries Garden during the 2013 Jardins Jardin festival.

The post Celebrating Le Nôtre: An American Photographer Explores the Tuileries Garden appeared first on France Revisited - Life in Paris, Travel in France.

Some impressions and practical information concerning the area covered in Parts 1 and 2 of “Eat like a sixth grader, drink like a wine enthusiast,” including Nyons, Taulignan and Grignan and featuring olives, lavender, silk and Madame de Sévigné.

* * *

Nyons
After dinner I set out alone from the Hotel Colombet to haphazardly explore the cobbled streets and alleys of the oldest portion of Nyons. I eventually made my way an ancient bridge arching high over the narrow Eygues River. It was dark. The bridge was blocked at my end. In the dark it didn’t appear to go anywhere one would want venture at night. The area felt abandoned, forgotten.

It was just an impression on a cold night but the truth didn’t matter. There’s an attractive mystery that comes from wandering through an old town at night, a hesitation before turning corners and walking under archways, a mix at apprehension and relieve at seeing someone walking towards you in the opposite direction against a backdrop of stones walls and strangely cast shadows. It’s the reason I’d set out alone rather than accept an invitation from the others to visit the town with them once they’d finished the wine. I didn’t want to visit; I wanted to explore.

In daylight the following morning the mystery had evaporated. The shops were opening. The ancient bridge was now interesting for its form rather than its enigma. The shutters and the rooftops of the old town and the vegetation along the hill on the opposite side of the bridge all spoke of Provence.

Nyons is best known for the table olives and olive oil produced in the surrounding area. The olive oil is a smooth and light with a mild taste of spice and a nip of pepper. The unlikely traveler passing through the area from the end of November through December can enjoy the view and buzz of the olive harvest. Visitors in summer will more likely be seeking out lavender fields in bloom when exploring the area of Provence and Haute Provence, including the Nyons region.

The cultivation of lavender has increased substantially since the early 1980s in the provençal areas of southeast France (Drome, Alpes de Haute Provence, Haute-Alpes, Vaucluse), whose land and various altitudes lend themselves to growing three main types of lavender—aspic lavender, “true” lavender and lavandin. Lavandin, the most ordinary of the three, is what grows in the lower-lying areas around Nyons.

Nyons has a distillery for lavender and other aromatic plants, Bleu Provence, one of about 120 such distilleries in France. Visitors can learn about the production and distilling of lavender now and in the past I the distillery’s little museum open. There’s also a selling all things lavender. See Bleu Provence’s website for opening times and entrance fees. www.distillerie-bleu-provence.

For suggestions of itineraries of “Lavender Roads” throughout Provence and the Alps that can by car, motorcycle, even bike see this official tourist board website.

Taulignan
Taulignan is a small town that’s a 20-minute (12-mile) drive from Nyons. It has a population of 1600 of which only 160 within the medieval walls. A quick walk through that medieval portion gave the impression of a gated community that hasn’t yet figured out parking restrictions. I suspect that it’s deserving of a more leisurely stroll, however Taulignan’s Silk Museum was my actual destination.

The history of silk production is one of those many things that I’d hardly think myself curious about, but once inside the museum I found myself absorbed for a good 30 minutes by the history of silk production beginning in the area from the 17th century until the end of the 19th century, with a particular emphasis on 18th- and 19th-century developments in techniques and machinery. There are explanatory panels in French and English. The museum also tells the story of local silk factories that housed and employed orphans and disinherited girls.

Locally produced silk thread was transported to Lyon, formerly the center for the production of silk fabrics and products in France. France no longer produces silk though a tiny remnant of the silk fabric and garment business still exists in Lyon. The agriculture surrounding Taulignan, once marked by up to 13,200 mulberry trees and their silk worms, is now devoted to vines for Cote du Rhone wines and lavender with the occasional honey producer and truffle hunter, as throughout the region.

The Silk Museum (Musée de la Soie) is located just outside the main opening in the medieval ramparts. See the musem’s website for opening times and entrance fees. More information (in French only) about the village itself can be found here.

Grignan
The hilltop castle of Grignan, four miles from Taulignan, can be seen in the distance as you approaches from the plain. Its architecture and interior are less notable than its place in French literary history. This is where Madame de Sévigné, the celebrated figure of 17th-century epistolary literature, would come to visit her daughter Madame de Grignan, with whom she otherwise and frequently corresponded with by letter.

“My heart is at rest when it is next to you” (Mon cœur est en repos quand il est auprès de vous), she wrote upon leaving her daughter after a visit in 1673, before concluding “alas, here we are back in letters” (hélas ! nous revoilà dans les letters.) Reading that letter makes me feel nostalgic for the days not so long ago when people were more interested in voice communication rather than in texting.

Madame de Sévigné’s collected letters reveal this intense mother-daughter relationship as well as life, fashion, literature and politics at the Court of Versailles during the time of Louis XIV. Those letters are likely to be on the curriculum of those students now eating 25% organic food at lunch throughout the department.

The countryside of Grignan, Tricastin and the Popes Enclave, all in this same general area, is leading producer of the hunted black truffle “tuber melanosporum.” Grignan is just five miles north of Europe’s largest truffle market held on Saturdays from mid-November to mid-March in the town of Richerenches (see this article on France Revisited). Truffles are integrated into menus throughout the region at that time of year, in dishes such as the creamy scrambled eggs with truffles (brouillade de truffes) that I had just outside of the old town at one of the finer local restaurants La Table des Delices.

For a photo-reportage about this region in winter see here.

End note for cyclists: We are just north of Mont Ventoux, the largest mountain in the sector, known to cyclists both amateur and professional for challenging gradients up to 10%.

© 2012, Gary Lee Kraut

– Return to Part 1 of Drome Provencale: Eat Like a Sixth Grader, Drink Like a Wine Enthusiast
– Return to Part 2 of Drome Provencale Eat Like a Sixth Grader, Drink Like a Wine Enthusiast

The post Drome Provencale: Medieval Towns, Castles, Olives, Lavender and Silk (Part 3 of 3) appeared first on France Revisited - Life in Paris, Travel in France.

There was a simpler time, when a man was put out of his misery with a particular kind of long, pointed dagger that fit nicely under the slits in his armor around his neck or under his armpit or through his coat of mail. They are called misericordes and stilettos, and a number of them are on display among the collection of medieval weaponry and armor at the Fort Saint Elme which overlooks the Mediterranean on a hill between Collioure and Port-Vendres, just north of Banyuls and the Spanish border.

The site of Fort Saint Elme has been a strategic position since the 9th century, first as a watchtower keeping an eye out for invaders from the sea then as a border position between the Kingdom of France and the Kingdom of Aragon/Catalonia/Spain or the Spanish portion of the Holy Roman Empire. After centuries of shifting rule in Roussillon, the region was finally integrated within the French crown with the Treaty of the Pyrenees in 1659, after which the defenses at Fort Saint Elme were reinforced to guard against Spanish attack.

The fort has among its weaponry a collection of stilettos and misericordes that were used by the troops of Charles Quint, Holy Roman Emperor and sworn enemy of the Kings of France Francis I and Henri II, during battles on the Italian front and in the north of France.

Misericordes and stilettos were specifically created to kill adversaries protected by armor and coats of mail. Their sleek design allowed them to slip between or even perforate the metal plates of armor.

The medieval stiletto is a dagger about 6 to 8 inches long with a thin triangular blade designed to pierce a coat of mail and strike a man’s chest, preferably his heart. If the adversary didn’t die immediately the wound would likely be deep enough that it wouldn’t heal and would prove mortal.

The stiletto was also the arm of predilection for assassins and traitors because it could easily be hidden inside a sleeve or under a coat or, for the fashionable assassin in northern climes, a fur hand-warming muff.

The misericorde, with a blade about 6 to 14 inches long, about 1.5 to 3 inches at his base, resembles a wide knife. Ideal, then, for slitting an adversary’s throat by passing through openings and links in his armor, such as the gorget at the neck, around which the misericorde could be thrust to open the throat like a tin can.

The misericorde (or misericord) was both an arm for killing and a cry to keep from being killed. The word means “mercy.” “Miséricorde” was what a combatant who has been struck to the ground would cry out when he saw a blade drawing to his throat. It was supposed to save him as it meant that he was asking for mercy and giving himself up as a hostage who could then be held for ransom. Unless of course the fellow with the dagger was deaf, as was the case of one Claude de Beaumont who, on January 5, 1477, during the Battle of Nancy, coldly killed the Duke of Burgundy Charles the Bold without hearing that the latter was wounded and crying “Miséricorde.”

By extension of the cry for mercy, soldiers gave name misericorde* to the arm that was used on the battlefield to finish off a severely wounded man who might otherwise be left to die in agony. God, it was said, granted his misericorde / mercy / pardon to he who, in delivering the mercy stroke, the coup de grâce, mercy stroke, recognized his guilt by so killing another.

How that would work with the contemporary tools of character assassination in the name of righteousness is anyone’s guess.

Fort Saint Elme, between Collioure and Port-Vendres in the region of Roussillon. Tel. 06 62 64 11 76 or 06 64 61 82 42. Open April -Sept. 10:30am-7pm, Oct.-Nov. 11 2:30-7pm. 6€, 3€ for students.

* Another type of merciful misericord is the wooden (or otherwise) projection from an upturned church seat that allows congregants to remain partially seated during standing worship.

The post In Roussillon: Stilettos and Misericordes at Fort Saint Elme appeared first on France Revisited - Life in Paris, Travel in France.

I’d arrived on the early morning 90-minute train to Blois and would leave the following morning for two days of biking to nearby chateaux.

Arriving at Blois Castle, I immediately encountered King Louis XII (born 1462, reigned 1498-1515) on horseback above the entrance of a wing that he had built when he assumed the throne upon the death of his childless cousin Charles VIII and began transforming his ducal castle into a royal palace.

He showed me some of his signature porcupines.

Scott Corregan was my personable and ever-so knowledgeable guide. I soon thought of him as the Malcolm Miller (of Chartres fame) of Blois Castle. Scott re-introduced me to Louis XII and then presented me to Francois/Francis I, whose protuberant profile I recognized even before he turned to greet me.

Francois (born 1547, reigned 1515-1547) inherited the throne when his cousin Louis XII died without a son, though he did have a daughter, Claude, who had grown up at Blois and who Francois married. Not to be undone by the porcupines, Francois displayed a great many fire-breathing salamanders on the wing that he built, including this one that I encountered on the novel outdoor staircase.

I had an audience with Henri III (born 1551, reigned 1574-1589), whose reign was full of festivities, intrigue, civil war and assassination, and caught sight of his sworn enemies of the Guise clan lurking in the corner.

I had a brief chat with Gaston d’Orléans (1608-1660, brother of Louis XII) when he was young and still full of hope of one day becoming king. But his plans of making Blois once again a royal abode began to unravel with the birth of his nephew the soon-to-be King Louis XIV, and Gaston lost the motivation to rebuilt his palace after reconstructing only one wing.

I went across the long square from the castle to the Magic Museum where I was introduced to native son Jean-Eugène Robert-Houdin, a 19th-century clockmaker, conjuror and magician, a man so accomplished that Harry Houdini borrowed his name.

Magician Arnaud Dalaine, gave me a wonderful tour of this entertaining and informative kid-of-all-ages-friendly museum and treated me to some card tricks with a sleight of hand that I couldn’t in the least decipher from under two feet away.

I saw dragons in the windows of the museum, one of whom broke through the railing to roar hello. Or was it good-bye?

I took a drizzly walk in the park by the Bishop’s Palace where, to my surprise, I came upon Joan of Arc (1412-1431) riding along the edge of the hill overlooking the River Loire. She raised her sword to acknowledge my presence but scarcely turned from her mission.

I was lodging at the excellent B&B La Maison de Thomas. The Thomas in question is Guillaume Thomas, however the Thomas I met was his father Bernard, who had led him into the B&B business…

… and had kept a key to the wine cellar. Before I went out to dinner, Bernard Thomas gave me a tour of that cellar from which he selected several bottles to try. I called the restaurant to postpone my reservation, giving me time to encounter winemaker Xavier Frissant though a wine from his fié gris vineyard downstream the Loire in Mosnes, near Ambroise, and winemaker Benoit Daridan through a wine from his romarantin vineyard across the river from Blois in Cour-Cheverny territory. Fié gris and romarantin are two old Loire Valley grapes; romarantin is only grown here. (I also met an unmentionable sauvignon blanc from a third Touraine winery.)

After a prolonged aperitif I had a terrific dinner at Au Rendez-Vous des Pecheurs, a friendly little gastronomic place where fisherman once gathered for a drink and their wives once picked up groceries. Unable to decide between fish dishes, I selected the full force of the tasting menu of owner-chef Chistophe Cosme, whom I first spotted through the service window into the kitchen.

From a thick slice of salmon to an asparagus and mi-cuit fois gras combination to a lobster, ox cheek and ham combination to a pike dish to a raspberry mille-feuille, Christophe Cosme revealed his talent for serious, natural, even-handed, low-heat, product-friendly preparations. I hated to say good-bye so quickly…

… but it was nearly 10:30 and I wanted to catch the sound-and-light show on the inner facades of the castle. It was pouring and I was without an umbrella, but after a meal like that who cares.

While those with umbrellas ventured into the castle courtyard…

… I stood beneath the arcades of one of the Louis XII wings and watched as the walls on the three other wings came delightfully to life as a recording (in English on Wednesday only) reintroduced me to the characters I’d met earlier in the day, including France’s most memorable Queen Mother Catherine de Medicis.

Before leaving Blois by bike the following morning I returned to the castle for a dryer look. The rain gods had threatened to spit along my biking route for the next two days,…

but it turned out that the clouds, like those grotesques at the castle, were only decorative.

It also turned out that even without much historical bla-bla Blois is a town of fascinating, magical, entertaining, friendly and tasty encounters.

Photos and text © 2012, Gary Lee Kraut.

The post Great Encounters: Blois appeared first on France Revisited - Life in Paris, Travel in France.