Amboise to Angers - and places in between

So my last post ended with Tours. Oh yes, I remember, that was the town with the cathedral (basilica, actually) where over a quiet Sunday lunch I talked to the American girl doing the same thing as me - sitting in the cafe reading a novel in French and consulting a dictionary every few sentences. And there was that older French man who joined in the conversation to tell us about how he was helping with the Cathedral's 700-hundredth year celebrations for Saint Martin and how so many countries were participating but not England. Mais je suis Australienne. Except when I bump into kiwis, and at the Musee des Beaux Arts in Tours that afternoon there was a Chinese couple from Auckland who were amazed that I would be travelling by bike and sleeping in a tent. I amaze myself too I have to say. But I have my very own Betty-bien-etre. The massages are a bit rough and she leaves my muscles a bit sore some days, but what a workout she gives.

And what came next? Well that would be Villandry. I missed a turn and had to ride back 5 k but it was worth every spin of the pedals. There is some thing magical about cycling right up to the front gate of some magnificent site, not having to find a car park miles away, never having to pay for parking, Just tie up the bike, and wander in. Oh, best to take off the high-vis vest though.

In case you havn't guessed, by this time I had fallen deeply in love with France. And now my time was running out and that made my visit to Villandry even more heart-wrenching. I don't know what it is about France that brings emotions to the surface. I was a bit raw all of that last week and a bit numb for the first week in England. At Villandry it was the elegance of the chateau itself, the fresh flower arrangements in every grand room that set off the decor, the superb formal gardens, and the landscape all around - wooded hills and green valleys and a little village nestled up against the chateau grounds, looking as if it had been there as long as the hills themselves. I wasn't expecting to but I loved the geometric gardens.

Villandry is one of the most-visited tourist attractions in France and I absolutely know why. A huge percentage of visitors are French and I love that too, the respect for their own heritage.









A bit of a misty grey day, matching my mood perfectly, and suiting a gorgeous silent ride on smooth trails.

Ending up with the romantic Château d'Ussé with its turrets round and square, cream stone and grey tile roofs and a matching medieval chapel in the trees nearby.

 The Château dates to around 1462, but most of what remains today is what happens when a fairy tale castle is adapted to become the country mansion for the aristocracy. It still has the fairy tale air though - in fact this is the castle that inspired Charles Perrault to write Sleeping Beauty. The approach road is stunning, a quiet little side road that runs straight towards the mansion, across a small bridge with a pond alive with the sounds of frogs. The municipal camping area was not far away, a short ride through the village of Reigny-Ussé.



There over 300 châteaux in the Loire Valley. But for the next couple of days my big excitement was reserved for.....

I knew it was around this time, but I wasn't getting much news. Keeping my phone charged was a constant challenge and I was conserving battery time for all map look-ups. So it was a 15 km gentle uphill ride the next morning before I arrived in a tiny little village with a tabac. A not-so-historic village, with a block of very modern mixed residential/commercial buildings facing the town square, all with green roofs and solar panels.  In the middle of the countryside. I'm skimming the local paper and I realised that the Tour and I would be in the same place this very day. The excitement!

I rode into Saumur that afternoon, the very place the riders had left from that morning. No, I didn't see them, just the remains of the media circus that had moved on with the riders, but I was close enough. I chatted with a man from the north of England who had stopped to eat a sandwich at a bus stop and as a result accidentally found himself inside the restricted area on the first day, sitting right there where the vans pulled up and the riders themselves got out and got on their bikes.

But before Saumur, Candes-Saint-Martin 

As well as being one of the most beautiful villages in Frances, it is the place where Saint Martin lived and died.

He was the man who cut his cape in two to share it with a beggar. The piece of cape he kept then became an object of worship and is the origin of the word chapel. You can visit the Saint-Martin collegiate church where his house once stood. This is where the legend of “Saint Martin’s summer” was born. Legend has it that the flowers bloom along the Loire in November to accompany Martin's remains which were transported by boat to the cathedral in Tours.

The village marks the confluence of two rivers, the Loire and the Vienne. I hiked up to the Panoramique, which has grand views across the Loire valley.

Quite a hilly afternoon ride through vineyards, hilltops marked by church spires and crosses, and then through a stretch of troglodyte caves. Some are studios and holiday homes now, others are just garages or store rooms. Some look just as they probably did in the 12th century when they were first inhabited.

And into Saumur itself, 'home' for two days. And finally, some sunshine.

Final stretch of the trip for me was into Angers. I camped the first night just outside the city at Les Ponts du Ce. In a bogan bar where I stopped in desperate need of water in the middle of a particularly hot afternoon, the barman filled my water bottle without being asked. He gave me directions for a short cut to the island where the camping resort, and told me that the name of the place was meant to be the Bridges of Caesar, but a painter making a sign got interrupted in his work and the short version just stuck. 

The only other cyclist I saw here was a girl from Whanagarei on the second day of a two-month ride she hoped would eventually take her up to the Rhine, north through Germany and around into Holland.

But for me this was the end of my bit of the Loire. I crossed the river for the last time and rode into Angers in the morning traffic, and spent the next two nights in a quiet youth hostel where I had my own ensuite room. From there I took the train to St Malo and a ferry to Portsmouth. Damn that Schengen Agreement that means I now have to stay out of France for 90 days.  

Stunning riding along the river down from Saumur on quiet roads

The chateau in Angers is well fortified with a moat and these walls

Inside the walls

More of the castle and a view over Angers

Loire a Velo; Chaumont-Sur-Loire to Savonnieres

My usual early start from Chaumont-sur-Loire and not an open cafe to be found in the town. I skipped the chateau visit but it was a nice place to camp.

So now it is Saturday, and I'm cycling through these small villages and some stretches where there are modern housing developments, and I decide it must be Saint Cut-the-Hedges Day because that's what everyone seems to be doing. I'd be quite happy cutting my hedge if I lived here, and I'd offer cold water to the passing cyclists and give them vegetables from my garden.

Wait, I want to live HERE

No, forget the hedges, I want a house with dormer windows

Amboise is the next biggish town. Leonardo da Vinci spent the last years of his life here at Le Clos Lucé. The Royal Chateau of Amboise is an expensive one to visit, 12 euros. I opted for lunch in a tiny restaurant and tea rooms on the side of the hill.

The camp ground is on an island in the river. At the office - this conversation all in French - I learned that there was a music festival over the weekend.

She said the music would be going until maybe 3.00 am. In fact it was still going when I had my morning coffee and croissant in the campground cafe on my way off on Sunday morning. After days like these I'd sleep through anything.

Sundays in France can be a bit dreary with everything closed up, but Amboise has a wonderful market along the riverbanks. Farm produce, ethnic foods, even a bit of brocantes (antiques and junk).

Amboise, views from where I had lunch

Arriving on the island where the camp is.

From the island, looking back to the Chateau Amboise

Only 28 km to Tours, and I was there by lunch time. Some images from the route follow.

In the midst of acres of vineyards, a church on a small hill

And now Tours.

The Tours Cathedral. Bits go back to the 4th century 

Cathedral built during 12th to 15th centuries

Just the Tours Prefecture 

I got to see quite a bit of the suburbs of Tours, more than I wanted to actually. I missed a Velo Route pointer somewhere. Followed marked cycle paths through a large park, past the university, over a couple of bridges that might have crossed the Loire, or was it some other river? and through another park past a lake or two. An hour later and lots of google maps look-ups, getting more and more confused about which way my location pointer on the map was pointing and how that correlated to the way I was heading, I came to the realisation that I here I was going through the same carpark with this same children's playground that I'd ridden past ages earlier. You could say, well, I wasn't exactly lost. The maps told me exactly where I was, only thing is they did not tell me where to go next.

I just didn't know which way to go. Cycle paths in all directions, but where WAS that Velo Route? Google doesn't show it at all. I gave up on cycle paths and took to the roads where at least there were some signs reassuring me that I would be heading towards Saumur. I asked a few people and enjoyed being able to ask and get directions in French, and followed a bit of a shortcut past a gypsy camp. Not so reassuring. But after about 5 km I finally picked up the route again. Not a bad way to spend a Sunday afternoon.

Camped in a tiny little place at Savonnieres where there are caves that you can visit, though I didn't. But there was an interesting deli attached to the caves visitor centre, and I made the best picnic meal ever - chorizo and olive bread, with salty tapenade and feta in herby garlic oil and a bag of mixed salad greens.

Suèvres

Day three of following the Loire down river - how hard can it be? But coming out of Suevres I did my old trick of going the opposite way to that intended. I think it is to do with the sun being in the south and my direction-finding brain saying if you are facing the sun, east is to your right, but it's not, because this is the northern hemisphere isn't it, so get used to it or get lost. I keep getting lost. Except if you head off in the morning with no destination in mind, there is probably no such thing as lost.

This day turned out to be a ride from Muides to Chaumont and it might be one of the best on the whole Loire, but heck, they were all so good it is impossible to choose one day above the others. Villages, old stone arch bridges, some hilly stuff, woods, quiet shady backwaters riding along levees, a bit of gravel and some sand just to keep things interesting, riverside mansions. Mostly I was grateful for shelter from the head wind. This was the only day I rode in showers. It was actually cold most of the day, and the cold sank into my joints. 

Lots of other cyclists along the way, everyone calling out 'bonjour' as we passed. In Blois I stopped and had a pretty disgusting bit of quiche sitting in the street, chatting with an English couple cycling in other direction. Blois is hilly. I set off pushing the bike up a steep shopping street towards the Tourist Office and just came around a corner to find this in front of me. With the Orangerie off in a little park on the other side of the road. Chateau de Blois.

Now a national monument, it was home to King Louis the Seventh and several other French kings, and was also the place where Joan of Arc went in 1429 to be blessed by the Archbishop of Reims before she departed with her army to drive the English from Orléans.

Blois has a lot of medieval buildings but in the end it is another busy town and I prefer the smaller villages, so off into the peace and quiet along the river.

Now wouldn't you love to live in this riverside mansion?

With it's own 700 year old church? 

Maybe something a bit smaller? 

In one of the villages I passed this day - which I can't say.

I rode on through the wheat fields into the evening, and had begun thinking seriously about a stealth camp in the woods off the path. I had just picked a suitable bit of woodland when a snake crossed the path. The fourth snake I had seen in France, and the biggest. I know they are harmless grass snakes, but it seemed like a sign so I kept cycling. A tiny little campsite turned up and I got the tent up just before another shower. As it got dark I sat under a shelter with a Dutchman cycling on up river to join with the Rhine. How is it that you meet some people who you just feel you have known all your life? One of those amiable and meaningful conversations that flow so easily. 

In the night I had to put all my clothes on - I mean ALL, but I was still cold. 

Here's something good - I had bought all my camping stuff in Montpellier in a cheap warehouse called Decathlon that Nicholas took me to. Decathlon has a chain of stores across France, and a few days later I went to the one in Saumur to buy a heavier sleeping bag. A young shop assistant came to help, said, I can speak English if you would prefer. I would, I did, and for the sake of a ride back to the campsite on the other side of the river, was able to exchange my 3-week old used sleeping bag for a warmer model and only pay the difference. 

Big day on the Loire featuring not one but two chateaux

For my first day on the Loire I rode 10 k on the wrong side of the river before reaching a little place called Meung-Sur-Loire where I finally picked up the Velo Route. An early start on busy roads then bouncing along tracks through corn fields and whizzing along a fairly major road, I enjoyed that first cup of coffee.

Usually in the small towns and villages the only place for coffee is a useful shop called a tabac. Basically a bar, selling newspapers and cigarettes. If you want something to eat with your coffee, BYO is perfectly acceptable. I'd buy a croissant or two at a nearby boulangerie, plug in my phone, grab the free local newspaper and linger over my breakfast eavesdropping on the conversations at the bar. I could get what they were talking about, but as for the detail, lost on me.

For 9 euros I visited the Château de Meung, called the château of two faces because it has both medieval and classical façades. From the front gate it all towers and castle walls, but from the other side it is a grand mansion.

It was the prestigious residence of the bishops of Orléans until the French revolution. Inside, the rooms were set up to show what life would have been like during the Middle Ages. I listened in, french lesson of the day, as a group of school kids, probably six year olds, were being told all about the bedroom behaviours of the time. Great hysteria about the chamber pots and shared beds. I bet they loved the dungeons too. I did.

That ticket also covered the chateau in the next town, Beaugency. It has a very romantic tower room with fabulous views out over the river valley, said to be where the resident knight entertained Jeanne herself from time to time. I could well imagine!

Beaugency has a lovely motto it has kept over the centuries: Manibus date lilia plenis, which translates as “give handfuls of flowers”.

Stone age men and woman were here. The Gauls were here, and built in the early 12th century the bridge over the Loire. The English were here too - until Joan of Arc kicked them out.

These are in Meung - statue of Joan of Arc in front of the tower.

Now me, riding right on out of town to a campsite down river at Muides. Pitching my tent and rolling along to the pub up the street for a well-earned beer.

This was the first campsite where I came across other cyclists. The couple next to me were French-speaking Belgians with little English.

Down the Loire - off on a rocky start.

This blog is going to jump around a bit now as I catch up. The next few posts cover the bit of the Loire that I cycled, from Orleans to Angers.

First there's that funny scene in Bordeaux. I have a ticket to Orleans, I have checked with the conductor on the platform and, yes the velo carriage will be be there at the W sign down the platform towards the back of the train. The train pulls in, its a mile long. I'm looking for the velo sign and an elderly woman pushing a bike runs past me shouting over her shoulder "first carriage". She's tearing off down the platform towards the "A" sign, and I'm running along behind pushing Betty and trying to dodge passengers with huge suitcases on wheels and not fall into that gap between train and platform and this train is a mile long and she's still running in front of me and the first carriage is miles away and now I'm on the pedals trying to keep up and weaving between people down the platform and here it is but there are 3 steep steps up and I'm trying to lift and drag bike with all its load up into the carriage and someone gives me a heave from behind and somehow we get three puffing old people and three bikes and a bike trailer into that carriage just as the train pulls out. Turns out they are from Tauranga. They are at the end of their ride down the coast from Brittany.


I said goodbye to them in Tours, and took another train to Orleans, by which time it was early evening. I picked up the Loire à Vélo signs from right outside the railway station. Incidentally, there was a bunch of people cycling inside the station. Several of the railway stations across France have set up stations where people can recharge their devices by pedal power and people really seem to like the idea. Check out the video.




“Loire à Vélo” is a well-travelled easy cycling route that is mostly off-road. 800,000 cyclists take the Loire à Vélo each year. The gigantic project cost €52 million. The route attracts huge numbers of tourists, including about one-third from abroad, mainly from Europe (Dutch, German, Belgian, British…) but also from further afield (Americans, Canadians, Australians…). I saw a few Japanese. I met three kiwis and a few riders from the UK, but the route is clearly popular with the French themselves and most of the people I talked with in the campgrounds and along the way were French.

The route joins up with Eurovélo 6, a massive trans-European route that follows the Loire, Rhine and Danube, linking the Atlantic Ocean to the Black Sea over a distance of almost 3,600 km. Now there's a plan for next year.

Meanwhile in Orleans I was on the route, nicely separated from most of the rush hour traffic and spinning along happily until I started to suspect something was a bit wrong. Either the river was flowing the wrong way or I was headed for the Black Sea. Yes, I'd gone in the opposite direction to the one I thought I going. Again! Plus I needed to visit an ATM. That involved a few cobblestone streets. Practice for what was to come as I followed the river downstream and eventually out of town. Lanes became paths and then narrow tracks but I kept bumping along until I had to get off and push through long grass.

Google maps said I was headed for a campground. With only about half an hour of daylight left but at least back on proper roads again (read roads, with cars - not the Velo Route), the 'camping' turned out to be an abandoned bit of parkland in a dodgy suburb. What to do but keep cycling.  A bit further along the river there was an Aire - an overnight parking spot for camping cars. No toilet facilities but there was a tap and that was all I needed so I put the tent up and crawled straight in. Not exactly stealth camping, but free.

Next morning I followed the road a while before I finally picked up another one of these green signs and got onto the proper route again.

The actual cycle route is a bicycle superhighway.
But easy to miss a signpost, and following google maps
certainly makes for some bumpy rides until you get back on route.