Visit to Tours and the Loire Valey

Visit to Tours

In April we went to visit Isis and her mother Sabine who live in Tours.      We had hosted Isis for a delightful week last year to help her develop her English language and hit it off with Sabine when she came to collect Isis at the end of the week.   It was great to see them again in their superb town house.    We loved Tours too.

Isis, Sabine and Jeff had a Saturday night  jamming session

Jeff, Sabine, Isis and I at Chateau du Clos Luce

On the Sunday they took us to Amboise where we saw the Château Royal D'amboise.      Originally a Gallic outpost it was first built and then replaced by a feudal fortress.    This castle is among one of the first Royal residences, which introduced the Italian taste in the Vallee de Loire with an exceptional collection of furniture Gothic and Renaissance.     We also looked at the the Château du Clos Lucé the final home of Leonardo Da Vinci. 
    

Sabine produced an ‘english’ picnic which we consumed sitting by the river Loire.   

We also saw in Amboise and in the area lots of examples of Troglodyte homes.   They are historic, domesticated cave dwellings that are quite common in the Loire Valley.    As we walked up rue Victor Hugo toward the last home of Leonardo da Vinci, we passed by half-timbered homes and troglodyte dwellings tucked into ancient cliffs – unusual dwellings with flower boxes, brightly-colored shutters and little stone alcoves that held their satellite dishes.      

It seems Mick Jagger owns one of the many beautiful chateaus in the region (no he is not a Trogite) – we did not spot him, but if we had, we would just smile and say ‘thanks for the music'.   I have seen him on show twice in Buffalo, America (circa 1978) and Wembley in London (1982) so would be nice to score a hat trick on that one.

It was a lovely drive home that evening through the beautiful historic town of Chinon. The Loire Valley is of course very famous and we could see there was lots of good reason to go back and spend some more time there soon. It was only two hours drive from home. We love Isis and Sabine and it is so nice to have such lovely amis français.