Amboise : le château, la Loire, two towers, etc.

Le château et la Loire en octobre 2000

Two towers and a "trogloditic" house (cave dwelling) between them

I took a photo of this wall painting at a Touraine-Amboise wine cooperative in the village of Limeray.

Out of the forest and into Amboise

You can see the château at the end of the road into Amboise. These are December photos.

At the château, turn left on the road along the Loire that leads to Tours.

The first section of the road to Tours from Amboise looks like the photo on the right above. On the left, traffic coming into Amboise from Tours.

Into the woods, on the way to town

This is another post about driving to Amboise from Saint-Aignan via Montrichard. I took these photos a long time ago, back when digital cameras were just start to sell. I got my first one in December 1998, and I've had eight or ten of them since. I still have five of them, but I don't take nearly as many pictures today as I did before the Covid19 pandemic rocked the world.

Above, entering the Amboise forest is almost like entering a tunnel.

The sun was starting to break through the fog, and the frozen fog was melting.

Forests like this one are well managed, and there are many of them around the country. Trees are cut down regularly to thin the woods. You often see hunters in the forest during the season.

Driving toward Amboise from Montrichard...

...on a frosty December morning. We had had a few hours of freezing fog overnight and the treetops and other vegetation were sparkling white. I can't remember why we were going to Amboise. The drive was dangerous because of black ice, but off we went. Leaving Montrichard you drive across a big flat plain (farmland), and then you enter and pass through the forêt domaniale d'Amboise — 6,000 hectares (nearly 25 sq. miles) of forest on the southern edge of the town. It's a 30 or 40 minute drive from Saint-Aignan to Amboise via Montrichard.

Street signs (and wines) in Amboise

The town of Amboise (pop. approx. 13,000) is part of the metropolitan area of the city of Tours these days. Famous nearby wine villages are Vouvray and Montlouis, both producing high-quality sparkling and still white wines using Chenin Blanc grapes. Amboise itself is one of ten villages that produce wines under the name Touraine-Amboise using Chenin Blanc (also known as Pineau de la Loire) for whites and both Côt (a.k.a Malbec), Gamay, Cabernet Franc, and Cabernet Sauvignon.

I enjoyed a walk through the streets of Amboise in March 2004, when we had lived here for less than a year, and took these pictures of elaborate and colorful shop signs.

Le Château d'Amboise, et les rues

Amboise is one of the towns that attracts the most tourists in the Loire Valley. Walt and I thought about living there back in 2002, when we came here to see some houses for sale and see if we could find one we could easily afford. The real estate agent we were working with recommended Saint-Aignan instead, and we found our house here almost immediately.

No regrets, but I still enjoy going to Amboise fairly often just to enjoy the views and the atmosphere.

These, above and below, are some photos I took in Amboise on a gray day in March 20 years ago.

Le marché d'Amboise (2)

Here are a few more photos that I took at the Sunday morning market in Amboise (Loire Valley). Above, des artichauts, des parts de flan, et des têtes d'ail tressées. Below, des poissons et une paëlla.

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I had my follow-up meeting with the ophthalmologist who performed my cataract surgery over the course of the summer. The news was good; he said the right eye is all healed and the left eye appears to be healing nicely. His examination took all of five minutes. We drove an hour up to Blois and an hour back after that five-minute session. Tasha enjoyed the ride. Walt did the driving.

The outdoor market at Amboise

Amboise is only 10 miles downriver from Chaumont-sur-Loire. Here are a few photos I took on a visit to the outdoor market there on a Sunday morning years ago. It's one of the best-known towns and biggest markets in this part of the Loire Valley. It's smaller than Blois but a lot bigger than Saint-Aignan or Montrichard. Amboise, Blois, Tours, Loches, and Chinon were all royal cities at different points in time.

Air-cured dry sausages (saucissons secs) are a standard French item for eating with a glass of wine at apéritif time. The way we eat them is to rince a the sausage or a section of it under tap water. That washes away the white powdery fleur and softens the sausage's casing so it can be pulled off. That's how we've seen neighbors here prepare them before cutting them into slices.

Other finger-foods served at apéritif time are olives and cherry tomatoes.

But please don't eat the flowers! Or the tartes and tartelettes, or at least not yet — they're for dessert.

Follow-ups

What a week this has been! Tomorrow is my follow-up meeting with the ophthalmologiste who operated on my eyes in June and again on September 3. If he says everything is healing normally, as he told me in June, then I won't see him again until October 9, for a vision test and a new prescription for glasses. Meantime, here are a few more detail views of the 15th-century Château de Chaumont, which is a 30-minute drive from Saint-Aignan.

Several more views of Chaumont

One of the best places for views of the Château de Chaumont is from across the river — in other words, from the right bank of the Loire. The château is built on a high bluff on the left bank.

Above left is a view of the river and the modern bridge that spans it. I took it from the grounds of the château. On the right is a shot of the château with its drawbridge either half way up or half way down. I can't remember which. It was the only time I ever saw it in that position.