This morning we left Tours and drove a short distance to the Chateau Chenonceau. Chenonceau is the Chateau built on a bridge over the River Cher that you often see in guide books. It is called the Ladies’ Chateau because of the many ladies who lived here, built it and preserved it. They include Catherine de Medici and Louise Dupin. During WWII the river was the dividing line between occupied and unoccupied France. The French resistance used the chateau as an escape route for refugees fleeing the Nazis.

We finally had a sunny day so it was a perfect day to explore the chateau and it gardens.

The inside of the chateau for quite stunning too.

Before leaving we checked out the maze.

From Chemonceau we went to nearby Amboise where we are staying tonight and tomorrow night. It is a lovely little village on the Loire. We had a great dinner at an Italian Restaurant. I forgot to take pictures of the pasta and pizza. The salad was great too.

On our way back to our hotel we got to see something we have hardly seen on this trip, a sunset!

Towards the end of our trips we like to slow down a bit and stay in places for two nights. In Tours we are staying in a bed and breakfast called La Héraudière. Our room is in what was the original farm house. The room is big and very comfortable. There is even a bread oven in our room!

This morning we booked a tour at La Cave de Vouvray. It was fascinating. The Vouvray region grows almost exclusively Chemin grapes. They make primarily sparkling wines. Over the centuries as the people of this area have quarried limestone for construction projects they have created elaborate cave systems. The Vouvray caves that we toured have three kilometers of galleries!

The caves currently contain five million bottles of wine! The one wall of bottles in this picture is multiple rows deep and contains 141,377 bottles

The tour was incredibly interesting and we had our English speaking guide to ourselves.

At the end of our tour we tasted wine and bought some to ship home.

This afternoon we went for a short walk along the Loire.

For dinner we went back into central Tours.

Today we left the Atlantic coast and drove almost three hours east to the town of Tours. Our Chambre d’Hotes reservation said we could check in at 5pm. We are staying at La Héraudière.

It took about 3 hours to get to Tours. We drove to the town center, parked and walked. First we went to the tourist office and got a map.

Tours is a really pretty town.

We drove to La Héraudière and parked on the street to wait until we could check in. About 4:30 the host came out, knocked on the window and invited us in. He recommended we eat at a restaurant in the town center called Leonard de Vinci. It was a lovely and very good meal.

We drove further north along the coast today. At the grocery store where we stopped to buy bread I saw my first ever fresh oyster vending machine. It’s right next to the laundry machines in the picture below. You could buy 24 fresh oysters for €11.95.

In the produce section of the grocery store I saw something else I have never seen before, a white mushroom growing kit.

Next we checked out the Passage du Gois. It is a 2.5 mile long causeway from the coast to the island of Noirmoutier. It is flooded every day as the tide goes up. You can drive on it for 1.5 hours each side of low tide. They have a foot race across it every year and the Tour De France has gone over it. We just happened to be there near low tide so we drove across.

Tonight we are staying in a B and B called Le Moulin des Tréans. The owners made a reservation for us at a great seafood restaurant, La Maison de L’Eclusier.

We didn’t have breakfast at the place we stayed in Saintes. Instead we went to a nearby Boulangerie and bought pastries which we picnicked on down the road a bit.

We were heading towards the town of Rochefort which isn’t very far from Saintes. But first we decided to explore the island of Ile d’Oléron. Based on the amount of parking we saw it must be a very busy place in the summer. We parked first on the west side of the island and walked along the coast.

Ile d’Oléron is famous for its mussel and oyster farming. We saw farms everywhere. We drove over to the east coast and walked down to the water to see some of the mussel farms. Mussels grow on ropes attached to piling.

After leaving Ile d’Oléron we drove about half an hour to the Pont Transbordeur in Rochefort. It’s very near where we are staying. The Pont Transbordeur is a massive structure that was built around 1900. It allows a gondola suspended from a trolley to ferry people across the estuary of the river without hindering shipping.

For dinner we went to o small local restaurant in Rochefort, Les Béatilles. It felt like a quintessential French experience. The two waiters were very friendly and helpful and the food was wonderful.