Tours — maisons à pans de bois

The main square in the historic center of the city of Tours is called la place Plumereau (often shortened to place Plume). Of it, the Michelin green guidebook says that it is un des principaux centres d'animation de la ville... Aménagée en zone pietonne... la place Plume est bordée de belles maison du 15e siècle à pans de bois. Many of these houses were restored in the 1960s and '70s.

The Cadogan Loire guidebook notes that the place Plume is "packed with bars and restaurants" — sidewalk cafés, in other words. The network of streets around it is filled with remarkable beamed houses, the Cadogan continues. Here are some photos I've taken of the houses over the past 20 years.

Around the cathedral in Tours

Continue driving west from Chenonceau or La Bourdaisière and you'll wind up in Tours, the biggest city in our region, le Centre-Val de Loire. It's bigger than Orléans, Blois, or Bourges. Here are some photos I took in Tours in late March some years ago. I was walking around the cathedral, Saint-Gatien.

In its description of St-Gatien, the author of the Cadogan Loire guidebook quotes the writer Henry James: "There are many grander cathedrals, but there are probably few more pleasing; and this effect of delicacy and grace is at its best toward the end of a quiet afternoon...."

The Château de La Bourdaisière

About a 20-minute drive west of Chenonceaux, on the road that leads to Tours is the Château de la Bourdaisière, which, despite its Renaissance look, was built in the 19th century. It replaced a medieval fortress that had been torn down in the 18th. It's operated as a luxury hotel. Some guys Walt knew from our California days stayed there back when we had just arrived in Saint-Aignan. A bat flew into one of the windows in their room, and they had to scramble to get it out. I'm sure they've never forgotten that adventure.

La Bourdaisière is also known for its festival de la tomate, which will happen on September 7th and 8th this year. They grow près de 800 variétés de tomates de toutes les couleurs et de toutes les formes, according to the Wikipédia article about the château.

Courges à Chenonceau

Besides flowers, another colorful crop being grown by the gardeners at Chenonceau back in Sept. 2011 was winter squashes (courges). I took pictures of those too. I was using a Panasonic Lumix ZS1 digital camera. I still have that camera and use it once in a while.

There's a lot to do and see at Chenonceau on a nice sunny day.

Chenonceau flowers

Chenonceau is not all about vieilles pierres and flowing water. It's also not all about the gardens of Diane and Catherine. There are also fine, colorful flower gardens you can walk through. These are flowers that will decorate the interior of the château, I guess, and maybe the restaurants on the château grounds as well.

Just a few more...

These are pictures I took at Chenonceau in September 2011. I've been there 10 or 12 times — maybe more — since the year 2000, when it was our first stop after we had moved into a gîte in Vouvray and had spent our first full day in France just walking around the town and through the famous vineyards there. The next day we hopped in the car headed for Chenonceau. I think I must have been there back in the '70s, 80's, or 90s, but my records don't go back that far.

More Chenonceaux details

Above, on the left and on the right, are two photos showing Diane de Poitiers' garden at Chenonceau. I gave it short shrift yesterday. It is twice a big as Catherine de Médicis' garden nearby. In the middle photo, a photo I took from inside the château showing visitors arriving at the front door of the castle.

In the Cadogan Loire guidebook, there's what seems to me a good summary of the Diane and Catherine story. It's too long for me to post, but I can give you the gist. Diane was king Henri II's lover. When he became king, he gave Chononceau not to his wife, queen Catherine, but to Diane. Then Henri II was killed in a jousting accident in 1559. Catherine wanted Chenonceau for herself so she told Diane to pack her things and move into the Château de Chaumont-sur-Loire. Diane had spent very little time at Chenonceau anyway. The had a castle up near Paris that she seems to have preferred. Voilà.

Above right is a detail of Chenonceau's stonework. The photo in the middle shows the tile floors inside the château. And finally, on the left is another shot of Chenonceau reflected in the waters of the Cher. I took all these pictures 20 years ago. It's hard to believe...

Chenonceau's gallery and gardens

Above are two photos of Chenonceau's grand gallery, built late in the 16th century on the bridge that spans the Cher river. Of the gallery, the Cadogan guide I have says "despite its magical light, it's slightly disappointing to find the long, elegant room empty. The place is so patently made for celebration that nothing short of candles, moonlight, and dancing would make the atmosphere live up to imagination." The gallery is 6 meters wide and 60 meters long. That makes it nearly 4,000 sq. ft.

The Château de Chenonceau reflected in the waters of the Cher.

There are two formal French gardens at Chenonceau. One was commissioned by Diane de Poitiers, who lived at Chanonceau from 1547 until 1559, when she was forced to go live in the Château de Chaumont-sur-Loire by the queen, Catherine de Médicis, who wanted Chenonceau for herself. Catherine commissioned her own garden, which measures 55,000 sq. meters. Diane's garden measures 120,000 sq. meters and supposedly looks now just as it looked in the middle of the 16th century.

Chenonceau on a bright July day

If you want to go to a place like Chenonceau on a bright sunnny summer day, you'll do well to get there as early as possible. That's what I did in 2004, when we had an American friend of a friend visiting. She really wanted to see the Loire Valley's most glamorous château. We stopped there one afternoon when we were driving around. When I saw the fleet of tour buses and the crowd of tourists standing in line to buy tickets, I told our visitor I couldn't go through with it.

If the lines were that long and the buses that numerous, the château would be a mob scene. I told her I would make her a deal: if we just drove on that afternoon, we would get up early the next morning and drive to Chenonceau so as to arrive at 9 a.m. Chenonceau is less that 30 minutes from our house by car. The tour buses don't start arriving until 10:30 or 11:00, after the passengers have had breakfast. So that's what we did, and you see the result. No crowds in my photos. No shuffling along, cheek by jowl, to try to get glimpses of what makes Chenonceau so beautiful.

We were lucky with the weather. In this climate, summer morning are often warm and still. Summer afternoons can be hot and humid. Warm and still mornings make for good reflections in the waters of the Cher river, which the Chateau de Chenonceau spans.

In the photo below, you can see clearly how Chenonceau castle is really two separate buildings. And then there's the wing that was built on a bridge over the river.