Au revoir Amboise, Bon jour Beynac!

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We drove from Amboise to Beynac today – a drive that Googlemaps claimed would take us about 4 and a quarter hours. We decided to add a stop at Oradour-sur-Glane which still should have made it less than 5 hours driving time. We left at 10:30 and we were scheduled to arrive at Beynac at 6 pm. Pas de probleme, right? Well, let’s just say the day has its lows – but highs as well.

Stopping at Oradour-sur-Glane was similar to visiting Dachau: you can’t say you enjoyed it but you are glad you took the time to experience it. Oradour is a small French village that the Nazis ordered destroyed four days after the D-Day invasion. On June 10, 1944, all 632 inhabitants, including some 200 children, were killed; many were tortured and many were burned alive. De Gaulle ordered the town preserved as a testament to the horrors of war (and the Nazi regime in particular). An emotional experience.

We took the country backroads, passing through numerous small French villages. We couldn’t stop at each one but we were tempted! Truly, there were so very many that were so very beautiful! Here are a few castles that we came across – no signs, no tourists, just these incredibly old, amazing fortresses.

Sometimes Bunny just took photos from the window as we passed through QUAINT little towns:

Traffic took an ugly turn at around 5 pm (rush hour? we were close to a larger town). We tried to call/text our Beynac contact but our cell phone wouldn’t work. Sheesh! Bunny was freaking out a bit because we were going to be at least a half hour late and had no way to let the woman who would be meeting us know. The town of Beynac is small – we were meeting here at the post office. 🙂 So we get there; still no cell service. Bunny walked into the town pharmacy and asked if she could use the phone. The woman spoke a smidge of English – but she knew the woman we were supposed to meet and called her up and she met us and it all turned out fine. Martine (Beynac host) speaks virtually no English so Bunny again got to try her French out. We all survived (I guess that means Bunny speaks “survival French”?).

MUCH more about beautiful Beynac in our next blog!

More Castles, Caves – and Serendipity

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Today (our fourth and final full day in Amboise) was full of hills and valleys, literal and figurative. 🙂

We decided to drive through the countryside to a few of the castles we hadn’t seen. Just for a peek. Our first stop was Azay-Le-Rideau. Lovely town – but the castle’s roof was being refurbished and there was a ton of scaffolding. We caught a glimpse of the castle (below) but not much.

We were hoping to see more of the troglodyte caves that are everywhere in the Loire. We read a brochure at our apartment about an “authentic troglodyte farm” in Azay-Le-Rideau and we made the mistake of: 1) believing the reviews on tripadvisor; and 2) ignoring the fact that Rick Steves’ does not recommend any of these places in his book. It was a semi-interesting stop but not worth either our time or the entrance fee.

We then drove over to see the Usse castle, which is purportedly the model for the castle in Sleeping Beauty. Got a good pic of it (below).

We decided to kind of roam around the area (small, lovely, medieval towns everywhere) on our way back to Amboise. We were meandering along the backroads and Marty said that he needed to go to the restroom. Hmmm… No cafes or public toilets (or even large trees close to the road) in sight. The situation was becoming desperate, if you know what I mean. Marty saw a little vineyard with an “ouvert” (open) sign and we decided we really wanted to do a wine tasting. 🙂 Marty managed to taste one wine before asking where the restroom was. Anyway, it was a GREAT stop. The guy (Francis Jourdan) did not speak much English but between his English and Bunny’s limited French, we had a lot of fun. He brought out a wine that was among those tasted by Obama and Putin at the 70th D-Day commemoration in 2014. Bunny asked him if Obama liked it and he said, basically, that he must have cuz he and Putin weren’t talking in the morning but after the wine tasting they had a long chat. 🙂 We bought a bottle and we’re hoping to bring it home to share with friends/family.

A good day!

“Another day, another castle (or two)…”

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The title of this post is a quote from an English gentleman who – with his wife – was tailgating in the parking lot of Chambord Castle. We stopped to talk with them on our way in. (These little unexpected conversations with locals/tourists/both are probably the best part of the trip!)

Anyway, on our third full day in Amboise, we visited two beautiful chateaux – Chaumont and Chambord. Chaumont is another fairy tale castle overlooking the Loire. There has been a castle here since 973 (!!) but construction on the current one started in 1468. This is the castle that Diane de Poitiers, King Henry II’s mistress, was given when Catherine de Medici kicked her out of Chenonceau after Henry’s death. Pauvre Diane! (I thought they just had them guillotined!)

The true granddaddy of the Loire castles is Chambord. It is IMMENSE – 426 rooms, 282 fireplaces and 77 staircases (every source I check has different numbers – e.g. “440 rooms and a fireplace for every day of the year” – I guess those in charge of keeping track lost count and just ballparked the number). This was one of Francois I’s (“Francois Premier”) castles, built for hunting weekends, parties and, just generally, to impress folks. And it does! We got lost (okay, Bunny got lost) several times while touring this gigantic castle. Construction began in 1519 and took over 40 years (Francois had passed on by then). And, although no one is sure, the rumor is that Leonardo da Vinci (Francois’ pal) may have been the main designer, particularly of the double helix staircase in the center of the castle. We kept saying “WOW!” over and over as we walked around; we also concluded that perhaps the construction of “weekend chateaux” like this one may have prompted the peasants to revolt…

The real reason I came to France 😁

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This is a view of my morning briochette et café au lait – with a backdrop of a 15th (?) century tower wall – from my ringside seat at the sidewalk cafe just steps from our apartment in Amboise. From here I can watch villagers walk by with their morning baguettes tucked under their arms, reply bonjour! when the occasional gregarious local acknowledges me, eavesdrop on lovers’ arguments – or simply post obnoxious blogs about the joys of sitting in sidewalk cafés in small French towns…

Chenonceau, Le Château des Dames!

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We spent most of the day yesterday at Chenonceau. We were sooo very impressed by this 16th century castle which is dubbed The Ladies’ Château due to the involvement of numerous women in its construction and history. It was a beautiful day, perfect for photos and for walking in the gardens and surrounding forest. Here are a few photos.

Marty REALLY liked the numerous, humongous fire places.

Marty was also fond of the paintings. This one was a favorite of his. When I asked why, he replied succinctly, "I like art." (Methinks it was the subject matter??)

This place and its history is SO amazing! I will try to give more history when I’m not basically texting all of this on my tablet…

One more note though: The motto of the husband and wife who built Chenonceau was S’il vient a point, me souviendra. Basically it means “If I make it to the end of this construction job, I will be remembered.” Marty is seriously considering posting this sentiment on his garage. ☺

Sunday in Amboise

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While in Montbard on Sunday everything is closed. In a tourist town like Amboise everything is open because it is a big tourist day. As soon as we left the apartment the city was alive with people in the streets. Most of them going to or from the “Market”. The Amboise market is HUGE. While markets like this in the states are used primarily for small farmers to get their good s to the public. The Market in Amboise is a way for entreprenuers of all kinds to get all kinds of goods to consumers. You can buy any kind of food you want, Also anything from hats to jackets or pants. Bunny even noted that one booth reminded her of the dollar tree. There was also a booth selling womans sexy lingerie (insert joke here). I would estimate that the market went on for 6 blocks and there were 2 aisles with booth on both sides.

This is Piala … It was delicious….

We bot a whole roasted chicken from here for 12 euros …. a little expensive …

We later learned that we could have got a chicken for 5 euros and cooked it ourselves. But we couldn’t remember if our place had an oven or not ….

We got back to the apartment with our goodies … pigged out for an hour and then made our way over to the castle. Our plan was to walk around the castle and then go to the Leonardo Davinci house. We got down town and learned they were hosting a running race for all ages. We spent part of the day watching the activity.

The Leonardo Davinci house was just a short walk from downtown. Along the way we ran into dwellings called troglodytes homes. These kinds of homes are famous in France. They are homes built into the side of a cliff.

We got to the Leonardo Davinci home and it was facinating. It was full of history, stories, and examples of his inventions.

We walked back to our apartment exhausted from the days activities……

Welcome to Amboise France

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About 2 hours to the southwest of Paris is a small town in the Loire Valley called Amboise. This is considered a great location to hub out of to visit all of the great sites of the Loire Valley. The Loire valley surrounds the Loire river and is known for having so many Chateaus and castle. In the 1200 to 1800’s this was the land of the rich and famous. Everyone who was anyone built or bought huge “homes” (aka chateaus or castle) here. The Lake Oswego of France.

We arrived around 6 pm on Saturday night and got the key and moved in to our apartment. A 3rd floor 800 sq ft apartment right in the downtown area of the city. There are 2 gelato shops within 10 feet of the door to the building. We are on one of the main streets to the whole city.

The above clock tower is part of the original gate in the wall around the city and the castle in the middle of the city. The door to our apartment is about 25 feet past the gate on the left had side. From where I took this picture I could just turn to my left and I took this picture of the castle.

We got settled into our apartment and went out foraging for food. We decided on chinese food to go and got back and watched French TV and ate Chinese food. Exposing ourselves to many cultures.

On the way to Amboise we made a quick stop in Vezeley France. It was only took us 45 minutes out of the way from Montbard to Amboise. Vezelay is a very well preserved ancient town built on a hilltop in the 9th century (thank you wikipedia). It is best known to house the remains of Mary Magdalene and also a major of the starting points for the pilgrimage to the Santiago de Compostela (look it up on wikipedia).

As we walked into the church we discovered they were having a service at he time. Bunny and I sat for the service. Bunny thoroughly enjoyed it. I stayed awake for most of it.

DON’T GO TO THE MARKET HUNGRY!!

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We are now in Amboise, in the Loire valley. They have an incredible weekly outdoor market. We went there to get broccoli and eggs. This is what we returned with:

More about these markets later…

My mini-immersion experience

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(The photo is of Claudine seeing us off on our last day in Montbard.)

Marty took over blogging duties for a few days while I TRIED NOT TO EMBARRASS MYSELF TOO MUCH WHILE TRYING TO IMPROVE MY FRENCH. ☺😄😨 Truthfully, Claudine is just so damned nice and encouraging that she made it relatively painless. Still, I really struggled to carry on any sort of conversation (reading and writing are fine but my goal was not simply to have a French pen pal!).

So here’s the takeaway on this mini-immersion experience: One observation is that it’s not as easy as it looks!!! Translating is not the same as communicating and PRACTICE is essential. It’s actually physically exhausting.

The second thing I learned is that, while it would be nice to say that I became just a bit more fluent – and hopefully I did, getting to know Claudine and her friends and a few people in Montbard was the true highlight of the week (and Claudine’s cooking!).

A final observation about this adventure – because, for me, it WAS an adventure. In contrast, there are millions of political immigrants around the world at any point in time. Most are desperate; survival is their only goal. I can only imagine what they would say about the “immersion” experience. It’s not an adventure for them, at least not a voluntary one. It’s not a vacation; they aren’t taking in the sights, buying souvenirs. They don’t get to go back to their homes, families and friends. And if I’m somewhat exhausted even with all of the help I received, I’m thinking that they are barely hanging on…

Montbard day 5 Bunnys final Lesson

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The final day of lessons for Bunny. We start off the day with a trip to the boulongerie for pano chocolate and crouisants.

After breakfast we went to the local “farmers” market to get a little bit of knowledge on how to buy groceries at the market.

Then to a cafe after the market for a coffee at the local after market hangout for everyone. Then back to the apartment for another of Claudines wonderful lunches.