Day 5: Nantes to Blois

August 14, 2024

The Machine Island (Joe's comments added)

This shows the island and the location of the Machines, but not the beer garden, our train trip to Blois, or our meanderings within Blois.

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Included breakfast is a nice feature, because it gives you something instant to wake up for. At Le Spot hostel it's a buffet, but a sign sets limits on what you can take. We mostly ignored that!

Group hug primes kids for a day together.

Suitably fueled up, we set off for the large island that sits in the Loire opposite Nantes. Nantes is a port city, and has had a lot of shipbuilding and other industry along the waterfront. A lot of this has been converted to residential and retail activities, as well as tourism.

A prime example of the tourism conversion exists in and around a former shipbuilding and launching facility on the island. It's a bit of artistic genius which combines rough metalworking technique with an ecological ethos to produce a world of strange animals and sea creatures.

The most flamboyant of these is a huge motorized elephant, that cruises about a section of the island, scattering tourists and spraying water. You can also ride atop it, in a fantastical saddle area. So as the public used to come to watch ship launchings right here, they now watch the elephant.

We arrive at the "Machines" site. It consists of the Elephant, a "carousel" in which live a couple of dozen fantastical animated riding creatures, and a workshop which can be visited.

The elephant displays the strange mechanical vibe of all the creatures here.

The kids of course were eager to document the apparition.

This is where you ride, high on the Elephant

Our visit to the Machines packed the additional thrill of meeting up again with our cycling friend Michel. But this time, since we were bringing a son and three grandchildren, Michel joined in by bringing his wife Jeannette, plus two daughters and three grandchildren. To boot, other cycling friends, Jean Claude and his wife, and Pierrette (who took a one hour train ride to get here), all joined in! While we waited for them all to arrive, we had a quick peek in the gift shop. Thge kids quickly spotted this octopus, which has the feature of easily sitting on you. A similar sculpture sits atop the carousel.

Aha, the rest of our group for today has arrived. Michel is visible on the left, Pierrette on the right.

Jean Claude points out something to Dodie

Maybe Michel will help me get all the IDs right, once he sees this page.

Although built in the same general way, each of the creatures in the carousel has a unique form and construction. Here is a selection:

Above one creature, some animated flying fish.

We'll give them a close-up, since they are bird-like.

Looking down from my perch in the carousel, some scattered elements of our group can be seen resting in the shade.

This pair is not part of our group, but they got in here by riding a unique trike!

After some fun with the machines, we all looked for a bit of a ride. Michel proposed guiding us to a beer garden. Sure, ok.

We are marshalling our column. We put 12 cyclists in a line, enough to frighten off any car drivers in our vicinity.

Following Michel in his trike is a familiar pleasure.

No need to scare too many cars, in cycle friendly Nantes.

Here on the waterfront opposite the island, former merchants' houses or warehouses are tilting on their foundations.

After several beers, or more like ice creams, we said a fond farewell to all our Nantes friends, and made our way to the train station. We had tickets on the Loire a Velo train for our next destination, Blois. We took a break in front of the station, until time to find our track, which of course is not announced until it is almost too late to reach it!

Evee and Amelia rest up for the next stage.

We were not set to take advantage of the full force of the Loire a Velo train arrangement. In cooperation with the train company, the tourism people had retrofitted several train coaches to house only bikes. With the right reservation, staff would take your bike and store it away. And guess what, we had the right reservations!

And then they would take your bike for you. We had our reservation details attached to each bike, so they would come off correctly, at Blois.

The route and the train idea is so popular, that the much vaunted bike car was filled up immediately. So things reverted to the good old jamming bikes on hooks, in corridors, and wherever.

Since our bags had to come off the bikes, here they are clogging up what could have been space for three hanging bikes.

But this time the train journey was swift and direct. They remembered to bail our bikes out of the special car, and soon we were searching our our apartment in town. It's a bit late (or a lot late) - see, our lights are on.

Dodie scored again, with a large apartment that is part of a hotel/restaurant. It has several rooms, and the needed six sleeping spaces. Really nice.

Since it is after midnight, we will not put in the kids' or Joshs' take on the day, nor any of their excellent photos, until morning. Tune back in for it!

Joe:

I thought the mechanical elephant was really cool

we went in a huge carasel it had 3 floors! but poor amelia waited 7 turnes in line and then some vip people took her spot and she gave up.

I took this because I like headless birds

See all the luggage we had on the train!

This was first time trying to take a selfie with a real camera.

I thought Evelyn looked cute while asleep.

Today's ride: 20 km (12 miles)
Total: 46 km (29 miles)

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