Herbstferien Part 2 (Oct. 9-12)

Tuesday

Chocolate treat: a box of thin cookies covered in choclate

Destination: Amboise.
Breakfast again from the picnic basket/cooler supplies (apples, bananas, clementines, little cans of tuna, bread, yogurt, cheese, nuts) plus the required Pain au Chocolat and Croissants for the kids. Pile in the car. Chose "shortest route" on the GPS which took us along the Loire river all the way from Blois to Amboise, about 40 minutes. Along the way we caught glimpses of other châteaus, including Chaumont (which we might come back to) and a private one, Château de la viscomte. The Château d'Amboise was beautiful. ME wanted another audio guide and was pleased to announce to us that the chapel was also Leonardo da Vinci's tomb and she had learned about da Vinci on the audio tour at Chambord the day before (I didn't know this but he is the likely architect of, or at least a heavy influence on, the design of Chambord--lots of circles inside of squares inside of squares, etc, like da Vinci preferred). Here again I'll let the pics and captions continue the story...

Knight's road and stairs into the castle gates.

A gate in the Altstadt.

Da Vinci's grave: St. Hubert Chapel.

View down into the city pedestrian zone from the chateau walls.

View out to the Loire river from the castle walls.

ME with her audio guide.

At the base of the arches in the ceiling of the Council Chamber, there were carvings, each one different.

King Henri II's Chamber

View from the other side of the chateau down to the Loire with one of the 5 star hotels (wouldn't that be lovely?)

One of the challenges we are having is GE's behavior. She has decided to go into what J is calling "full squirrel" and having here terrible-3's right now. "No" is her answer to everything and she flat out disobeys us frequently. Navigating the castle tours is forcing us to get very creative with how we handle her behavior since we can't have her climbing on the furniture, running through the great halls or screaming in the same room as a tour guide! We are doing a lot of trading her between us, sitting down with her on our laps to "take a break" and such. Thankfully many of the tours include long stretches outside in the gardens!

After another grocery store raid and picnic along the Loire (luckily dodging rain showers again!) we drove up into the city to the Clos de Lucé, a smaller manor house/palace where Leonardo da Vinci spent the last 3 years of his life and where he died. The house and grounds were beautiful... The gardens were especially fun: life-sized replicas of some of LdV's inventions. The girls got very muddy playing in the revolving armored tank!

The bedroom where LdV died.

A 3D video demonstration of how the armored tank worked and a small replica.

Yes, it's a real cat!

Someone was getting very sleepy being mesmerized by the fountain.

A little refreshment at the cafe in the French garden.

Check out the muddy pants and shoes! There was mud in her hair (hard to see in these pics), all over her coat, and on her face!

And then the sun came out!

Another quick stop at the grocery store and back along the Loire bank, this time on the other side. Spotted lots of "caves" (wine cellars underground in what used to be the caves where the white stone was quarried that was used in building many of the châteaus built in the region). Might head back there sometime this week. Stopped in Chaumont to eat at "Le Port" along the river, the castle towering above us on the hillside...

For supper: pickled onions, salami, red wine

Or... Gazpacho and a rapunzel salad with sun dried tomatoes, some of the pickled onions, cucumber slices and sardines in lemon juice with basil.

 

The view up the hill toward the Chateau Chaumont-sur-Loire.

Wednesday

A little slower out of the starting blocks this morning: we didn't get out of the hotel until after 9. We spent the morning in Blois. This time a little shopping in the quaint old town pedestrian zone (window shopping, choclate for the day--from a fancy chocolatier: a bear on a stick for each girl and a small bar of milk chocolate--& a sweater for HR!) then meandering up the hill via the huge old staircase of the historic quarter to the Cathédrale St-Louis. A funeral was in progress so we explored the gardens around the church instead, enjoying the view over the city and finding a playground to play at. Then a turn through the cathedral and it was time for lunch!

Climbing the medieval staircase from the lower old city section up into the historical section (not sure why they are distinguished as old and historical, but that's what the signs all said!)

Cathedral St-Louis

We got a table at the Pizzeria overlooking the market square and had a fabulous lunch (cheese pizzas for the girls, a tapas of olive patés, finely cut salamis, assortment of breads, salad, and a cheese platter with 3 different regional cheeses).

With everyone satisfied we dashed through a rain shower to the car and headed toward the town of Bourré near Montrichard. Stopped at an Intermarche grocery store for supper supplies on the way (GE was taking a much needed nap in the car and we knew the next tour didn't start until 3).

The rain cleared and we sat in the sun a while to wait for our tour to begin: La Cave des Roches, a mushroom farm inside one of the old underground stone quarries. The tour took us through a former tuffeau quarry now filled with mushroom cellars growing a wide variety of mushrooms, including a rare, difficult to grow variety that sells for more than 40E per kilo and is used in Parisian restaurant specialties!! Roches is one of the only suppliers for this mushroom--it takes 6 months to grow to maturity! There is also a very cool monument to the limestone building style of the region cut out of the walls underground that a local stonemason spent 3 years carving.

The typical white button mushroom.

Can you tell what kind these are? This type of mushroom grows best when it's periodically stressed so the mushroom pickers will smack the top of the stacks whenever I they go by to shake the whole stack and make the mushrooms grow bigger! The tour guide said: good for the relieving the stress of the workers and for stressing the mushrooms!

A tree carved into the limestone memorial

A cat climbing in through a gate!

We then returned to Chaumont and set up picnic on a quiet green near the gardens and let the turtles turn into squirrels (i.e. let the girls who had been so well-behaved all day let loose their wiggles and run wild). Smoked salmon, red wine, Gaspacho, goat cheese, rapunzel, and mushrooms from Des Roches on the menu tonight! (Well, at least that was on the menu for me and J!)

Ah, the joys of playing with horse chestnuts!

Thursday

Pouring rain this morning. Ugh. Put a heavy damper on things--until now it would just spit or shower and then stop. I can handle the cloud cover with intermittent rain but this just made everyone feel wet straight through despite umbrellas and rain coats. We piled in the car and drove to Cheverny. This château is still occupied by the current Marquis and his wife and 3 children. Their private apartments were, of course, closed to the public, but the remaining 3/4 of the château were richly furnished with good historical and interesting info provided in the self-guided tour book.

Love the painted details on the ceilings and walls.

The birth room--there was a separate, special room just for giving birth and then lying in to present the new child to visitors!

My favorite room: the play room with early version of the tricycle!

One of the washing up rooms off a bedroom.

See the copper tub reflected in the mirror?

The laundry room!!

The arms room.

The King's bedchamber: The bed was slept in by Henri IV when he came to the castle to visit. The canopies and drapes helped keep the heat in and the raised dais was an outward sign of wealth (plus it helped protect the bed from dampness).

The Grand Salon.

It was still raining when we finished but it was close enough to lunch time that we decided to head to our next destination, Chaumont, and search for a restaurant seeing that a picnic was out of the question. A pizzeria/kebeb restaurant was right at the corner across from the entrance to the château grounds. Perfect! While we ate, the clouds cleared and the sun came out! We hit the souvenir shop for the girl's collections, then headed up the hill through the historic grounds. We decided to split up: big girls with me, little girls with J, because the little ones had already exhausted my stores of patience in the Cheverny château. J's turn. I wanted to take my time going through this château and not have to chase GE! J cut the little ones loose in the gardens where they pretty much played and ran and got wet and muddy while the older two meandered through the château with me.

See the tree house up to the right? The gardens had a variety of different sculptures and art that were all tied somehow to nature. There were four or five different tree houses scattered throughout the garden grounds, but only for looking up at and imagining, unfortunately!

This castle reminded me the most of a Disney castle!

The initials of Catherine de Medici.

The council chamber with exceptional 17th century Majolica tiling brought by the Broglie family from the Collutio Palace of Palermo in Sicily.

Portrait of Diane de Poitiers who received the Chateau Chaumont-sur-Loire from Catherine de Medicis in exchange for Chateau de Chenonceau.

"Cat M 1554"--Catherine liked to put her stamp everywhere!

The next series of photos from the castle tour are from part of the art installations that were throughout the castle. Every year Chaumont-sur-Loire features different artists in the gallery rooms and in throughout the grounds (like the sculptures in the photos earlier). One of the featured artists this year decided to use rooms that have not been restored as the backdrop for a series of stained glass pieces. I found the un-refurbished rooms fascinating--especially the old wallpaper and the glimpses into some of the more practical rooms like the servants quarters and the kitchens.

We met up just as we came out of the château and I took all the girls to the café while J had a chance to go through the château. The little girls wanted to be our tour guides through the gardens since they had already explored them. So we followed them through some truly remarkable garden installations. Every year Chaumont hosts an international garden festival lasting June through this next week. The installations are designed by artists and landscape artists and incorporate both visual art and plants/flowers. So there weren't just plants to look at but tactile art displays and interactives! The girls loved it.

When it was finally time to go and we were all piling into the car, HR realized she had left her purse/bag somewhere! Oh dear! It had her DS, wallet, a souvenir she had purchased with her own little allowance money, among other treasures. I remembered seeing it hanging on the back of a chair at the outside café were we sat down for some snacks and water from the ever-present backpack. J headed back in... When he didn't return right away, I knew it wasn't still there. Poor HR was heartbroken! After 15 minutes or so he finally came trotting out, purse in hand! Daddy to the rescue! When it wasn't where we thought she had left it, he started asking around at the café, the exit points, and the entrance to the château. The guards at the château called around and said someone had turned in something at the boutique shop in the gardens. J was able to describe it and confirm that it was the right one. So quick trip back to the gardens and then out to the car with the recovered treasure bag in hand.

The sun was still out so we headed for the hotel watching for signs to a supermarket. A quick side trip into a village for a grocery-store-raid and then on again following a different route home. All of a sudden we both spotted a lovely park next to a meandering stream with benches and picnic tables. Perfect supper spot! Another lovely dinner, some playing on the green, then back to the hotel. A fabulous ending for a day that started out so dreary!