Five chateaux in 5
days.
The first, Usse, is said to
have inspired the fairytale ‘Sleeping Beauty’. Mosquitoes plagued
us there worse than they had in the aire. There wasn’t lots to look at aside from a dodgy recreation of sleeping beauty in the tower,
however it was a nice afternoon’s entertainment. The exterior of
the castle has a strong resemblance to the Disney logo. Access to the
attics was interesting and unusual. To get to Usse the GPS put
us on a narrow 2 way bridge, unfortunately we had already rolled onto
the bridge when we saw the sign ‘pont difficile’. We were over
the width limit, luckily we didn’t meet anything big coming our way
as it was a loooonnng bridge. The GPS proceeded to send us back over
the river on a BIG bridge a couple of clicks down the road. “She”,
in the GPS, must have saved us half a kilometre in total, laughing up
her electronic sleeve.
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| Fellow campers, a different spin on a family holiday - Chausson in the background |
Chateau Azny Le
Rideau, was next on the list. It is famed for its setting beside a
mirror lake providing exquisite reflection photographs – uh oh, 50%
of the chateau was covered in scaffold, not such a pretty reflection.
The excellent municipal campsite located 300 metres from the chateau
gave no clue that a castle was nearby, in fact it seemed to be a
secret chateau.
Afterwards the visit
we treated ourselves to a glace with 2 flavours each, this was in
addition to the apple strudel we had in the morning.
A navigation issue,
no blame accorded, occurred on our way to Amboise so we stopped to
make coffee in a parking lot and have a re-boot. Over the fence we
could see a campsite, it was only 3.5 – 4 km from Amboise. A mere
E6.60 for the site or 6E for the aire? A no-brainer. After lunch
we took a circuitous cycle route to Chateau du Clos Luce, in Amboise,
the death place of Leonardo da Vinci. Inside were well executed
recreations in the rooms LDV used in his last days. He had been sponsored by the incumbent king to set up house in Amboise and work on inventions. The whole house
looked like a comfortable place to live, compared with some of the big castles. There were models and AVs of
his inventions. Outside in the beautiful gardens life size models of
his inventions invited people to try them out, and big
semi-transparent reproductions of his best known works swung from the
trees. He was a painter, military engineering adviser, botanist,
engineer.
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| Spinning the wheel in Leonardo's garden |
Chenonceau – we
ignored the advice of satnav to plow through the centre of Amboise,
and carried on up the road to a bigger bridge to cross the Loire and
head to the Cher river.
Chemonceau was
largely the result of powerful women overseeing the building and
additions. From the mid 1500s the castle underwent transformations
through the centuries and was used as a hospital for seriously
wounded soldiers during WWI. The most eye catching feature is the castle's pontooned
bridge that spans the Cher, Formal gardens flank two sides and inside
is bedecked with tapestries and paintings by old masters. The best
bit for me however are the innovative floral displays in each room,
oh to have a job creating those beauties.
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| Chenonceau |
We enjoyed where we
were staying and took the time to cycle a circuit that started at the
camp.
We cycled through
quiet back roads, everywhere was intensive cultivation. We passed a
mill that was clanking away as it worked and a nearby lock. There
were some very attractive houses and some used the limestone cliffs
as the rear buttress of the house and sported chimneys poking out
from the top of the cliff. The gardens were beautiful with pristine
flower and vegetable gardens. Logs for firewood seemed to be all cut
to one metre lengths and stacked in very orderly piles. There seems
to be a national standard for firewood – no mish-mash of lengths
and widths.
We set off across
country to Chambord. Started in 1519, it didn’t have many permanent
inhabitants during its time and presented itself as a shell of a
building. The exterior was very extravagant – a showpiece for the
French aristocracy. The bit that had me in wonderment was the double
helix staircase – two concentric spirals flights of stairs wound
independently around a central column. If two people each take one
flight they can see each other through openings but don’t actually
meet on the stairs! The other amazing thing about this chateau is the
sheer size of the grounds, surrounded by 32km of walls and cover 5540
hectares.
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| Chambord |
By now supplies
started getting low so we set off to find a Lidl, we found one in
Briare where I got carried away and ended up with too much cheese –
cheesed off? There are 3 aires at Briare, the first one we saw was
next to the canal – nice spot, no spaces. There was another with
less ambiance about 300m away so we stopped.
After a spot of
baguette and camembert, we were on our bike recce and spotted that a
space had been vacated at the ‘ideal site’. I prostrated Hilda
on the ideal spot while Stuart sprinted back on his bike, threw it in
the truck and took off. I, in the meantime was in situ chatting to an
English couple with a Dutch barge moored in front of the ‘ideal
site’. I looked up to see a different motorhome – closely
followed by our Chausson bearing down on my bike. I stood my ground
and pointed at Stuart in the Chausson but the red faced beligerant
Frenchman refused to give up his claim to the ideal site and revved
his engine as he drove forward to crush my bike. Discretion was the
better part of valour and I dragged Hilda to safety.
Stuart moved to a
park in the street and we went off for a tiki-tour of the area. There
was the longest aqueduct in France just a stones throw away and lots
of canal and velo paths. When we got back via the ‘ideal site’
there was another vacancy and the still red faced Frenchman
magnanimously pointed that we could have this vacant spot, which was
big of him considering it was free. We decided the view was
worthwhile and pulled in.
We were enjoying a
cuppa when there was another ‘bonne spectacle’ - two Frenchman
having a shouting match about canal etiquette. It drew all the
mohomers out for a sideshow. I couldn’t understand much but did
catch the ‘bouche’ bit (mouth).
The French
lunchbreak still amazes us. We try to go with the flow but needed
items of repair from a hardware supermarket so biked about 7km to the
nearest Bunnings equivalent only to find it closed for 2hr
lunchbreak. Hmm, too far to head back so we treated ourself to a
pizza and a tiki-tour. On our tour we cycled past a line up of
caravans and campervans outside a campground – they too had timed
things wrong and arrived at reception just on 12pm.
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| Amboise cafe scene |
Lovely pic of Chenenceau!
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