Day 1 on the Loire - 🇫🇷Bubbles, White and Red🇫🇷 - CycleBlaze

September 16, 2022

Day 1 on the Loire

Hilary and Christopher on the river Cher as we approached the château
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Tim in the stern of our canoe looking back at the château
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Today was our first day of riding in the Loire Valley.  We started with a 20km ride to the Chenoceau Castle one of the most famous castles in the Loire. As it turns out we did the ride in the reverse way to what was planned but that turned out to be a good thing.  We came across a lovely market on the way out of town.  Also, we came across the canoeing place completely by accident only to find out that we did not have a reservation as we thought but we could still canoe if we went in the AM, so we did.  We went on a 6km canoe trip down the Cher river fight past and under the Chenonceau château.  After the 2 hr trip we had a picnic lunch followed by a tour of the Château.  By now is 4:30 so we took the short route back to Amboise.

We had a lovely galette and crepe dinner tonight with some Sancerre wine.  Off to Blois tomorrow.

The bike route road sign.
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Air balloons were out for an early morning wine tour over the Loire.
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Blue lobster at the market at 40€ a kg. ($53 Cdn or $40US)
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What they call canoes here.
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Veggies at the market.
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Hilary and Christopher at the start, they were not quite as refreshed at the end of 6km
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J&B at the start.
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John and Beth on the river Cher in upstream from the château
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Tim and me. I wore the helmet for sun protection but also in case Tim hit with the paddle for doing something stupid. I did mention that I am a terrible canoeist.
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Gail JohnsonAnd it does look like Tim is doing all the work!
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2 years ago
At the entrance to the château
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The château without the people
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Something for Murphy
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The great hall that is above the arches on the river was used as a hospital ward during WWI. 2254 soldiers were treated here.
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Tim in the pantry of the huge kitchen
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A wood bread oven that looks like today’s pizza ovens.
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Louis XIV. I can’t imagine men dressing like this today nor women wearing what they had to wear in this era.
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One of many gardens on the grounds
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The arches over the river under which we canoed
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Catherine Medici’s bedroom. She inhabited the castle in the 1500s and made the greatest number of changes to the château. The Belgian tapestries through the château were amazing and dated back up to 5 centuries.
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A group of canoeists misbehaving and dumped a canoe, good luck getting back in.
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Catherine Medici was married off at the age of 7 and this saying explains how she felt about her life.
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The Medici crest. The
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John and Beth in the gardens with the château in the background.
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And me
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An example of hospital ward that was in the castle.
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My galette dinner, no photo of the dessert crêpe.
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Today's ride: 37 km (23 miles)
Total: 182 km (113 miles)

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