Best Western Le Vinci Loire Amboise

... of France after the revolution, but he insisted on being crowned under the King colors rather than the tricolor of the revolution. As a result Napoleon stepped up to the plate and took the prize from under his nose. In more recent history the chateau was used to hide and store much of the Lourve's art work during WWII. <br><br> Words can't describe all that we saw in the Loire Valley so we hope our photos help.<br><br> Goodbye Loire Valley, hello Dordogne here we come!

Awoke to blue skies - yippeee - as it was forecasted for more rain. We set off to Blois chateau first thing. We never really intended to come to Blois but it was part of our multi-entry ticket. Blois is all about the architecture, however the state apartments were ...

Next stop Cheverney. This chateaux had less of a grand opening as it was able to be seen from the road, however the size of the grounds impressed. One would not have guessed what lay inside. We were wowed by Chenonceau but by Chevereny we were blown away. The detail of the rooms were simply overwhelming and at times hard to take it all in...just check out the photos we have uploaded on this page.

... that straddles the River Cher and is surrounded by gardens which even though its late October are still stunning. Inside over 3 floors we take in the places beauty - all of the rooms werer specatuarly painted withj deep blues, green and gold finishes, fine tapestries hang down the ceilings, large oil paintings litter the walls, period furniture gives us an insight into the life of its inhabitants over the years. This chateau wowed us!<br>

... another lot of her famous hamburgers - fine grade meat patties on a french bagette loaded with stinky camembret (yum), tomato, spanish onion and lettuce and of course washed down with a glass or two of Rose - good work! After dinner we went out exploring. A lovely little town of around 10,000 with its chateau on the hill its main attraction. We had read it was best from the outside and so we obliged.<br ...

<br>(Whitney)<br> <br>We wanted to see some cool castles so we headed to Blois in the Loire Valley in France, abouttwo hours south of Paris. It took us ages to get from Bruges to Blois because we took a roundabout way of getting there to avoid paying high supplement fees on the fast TGV train. We arrived at our hotel around 8- we managed to find a cheap last minute hotel again which wasnice. We only had one day in the castle region so we toured through the ...

... devotional works, which are worth a look.<br><br>Once the rain stopped we headed into the gardens. The gardens are separated into different sections &#8211; ornamental, herb, vegetable, and several new gardens which have recently been added, the cloud room which is all in cool colours and the sun room in warm colours. I enjoyed the whimsy of the love garden, which symbolised the 4 faces of love &#8211; Tender love, Passionate love, Fickle love, and ...

... Tonight we dined on smoked salmon, duck liver foie gras, blue cheese and baguettes. We also enjoyed a very nice local Savignon blanc from Vouvray, one of the little towns along the Loire we had driven through on our way home. Matt also wanted to try a small bottle of dessert wine, which was the perfect end to a decadent meal. We had quite a buzz up after all the wine and somehow managed to watch 7 episodes of our recently discovered favourite sitcom, How I Met Your Mother.

... rehab'ed version with very detailed dioramas of the siege and taking of Orleans. I missed most of the audio/visual show since I went to the bathroom when they handed out the headphones. It seems like a lot of effort to dramatize the very short life of an obviously schizophrenic teenager. We did some shopping-they had their Christmas market set up-I bought a few gifts and tried to conduct the transactions in french with some success.After an easy ...

... century, the chateau was built for a mistress of Henry II. Upon his death, Henry's wife, Catherine de Medici, kicked out the mistress and moved in. There are now 2 gardens - one for each woman. The chateau sits, literally, on the Cher river. The original was built beside the river, but then a bridge was added off the back and a 3 story structure was added on top of that. During WWI the bridge ...