{"id":466,"date":"2012-05-09T17:30:20","date_gmt":"2012-05-09T16:30:20","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.petersphotogallery.com\/rodneyandlaura\/?p=466"},"modified":"2025-11-23T05:23:07","modified_gmt":"2025-11-23T05:23:07","slug":"the-loire-valley-and-more-chateaux","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.petersphotogallery.com\/rodneyandlaura\/2012\/05\/09\/the-loire-valley-and-more-chateaux\/","title":{"rendered":"The Loire Valley And More Chateaux\u2026.."},"content":{"rendered":"<p>We never got to watch a movie last night because, as I was\u00a0posting the last blog, I met Caroline and Callum from 100 kms north of Bourke in Australia. They\u2019ve taken time out from their cattle property and are travelling with their\u00a0three children, Callum (10) and twins Grace and John (8). They\u2019ve been to Dubai, hired a huge RV in Paris and are now\u00a0dashing around France for 2 weeks and today they are on their way back to Paris before flying to Edinburgh and then America.\u00a0 While the children watched \u2018Sinbad\u2019 in French on the Campsite TV, we drank wine and discussed the cheeses and meats in front of us.\u00a0 They seem to have treated their time\u00a0around France as a gourmet trip and despite the weather have had a wonderful time.<\/p>\n<p>On Wednesday morning, we packed up again and then drove to the Chateau de Chambord, apparently the biggest of all the chateaux in the Loire region. It is a wonderful chateau, both inside and out.\u00a0 There are 365 spires and you can actually walk around the roof of the chateau and marvel at them all.\u00a0 Inside there is the most amazing double spiral staircase which\u00a0may, or may not, have been inspired by Leonardo da Vinci. There are 2 concentric spiral flights that wind independently around a hollow central column. So if 2 people take different flights they can see each other through the openings, but they will never meet.\u00a0 It\u2019s great fun and I fancy one in my home one day; we&#8217;ll just need a far bigger house to fit it in.\u00a0 We wandered around the numerous rooms spread over three floors and then had very nice quiche lunch in a caf\u00e9 next to the Coach Room, under the Royal wing.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<figure id=\"attachment_467\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-467\" style=\"width: 600px\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-large wp-image-467\" title=\"Chateau de Chambord\" src=\"https:\/\/www.petersphotogallery.com\/rodneyandlaura\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/05\/107-Chateau-de-Chambord-600x399.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"600\" height=\"399\" \/><figcaption id=\"caption-attachment-467\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Chateau de Chambord<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<figure id=\"attachment_468\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-468\" style=\"width: 600px\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-large wp-image-468\" title=\"Chateau de Chambord\" src=\"https:\/\/www.petersphotogallery.com\/rodneyandlaura\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/05\/103-Chateau-de-Chambord-600x400.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"600\" height=\"400\" \/><figcaption id=\"caption-attachment-468\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">On the roof of the Chateau de Chambord<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<figure id=\"attachment_469\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-469\" style=\"width: 400px\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-large wp-image-469\" title=\"Chateau de Chambord inside staircase\" src=\"https:\/\/www.petersphotogallery.com\/rodneyandlaura\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/05\/106-Chateau-de-Chambord-inside-staircase-400x600.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"400\" height=\"600\" \/><figcaption id=\"caption-attachment-469\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Inside the staircase at the Chateau de Chambord<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>After\u00a0our comprehensive coverage of the chateau,\u00a0we drove up to Blois and found an Aires for an overnight stop, right behind the Chateau de Blois in the centre of town.\u00a0 We wandered through gardens, around the Chateau, down medieval streets and discovered that France had actually opened today.\u00a0 At first it felt strange to be amongst traffic and busy shops, but we soon got used to it.\u00a0 Then after a gourmet meal of beans on toast and one episode of Michael Palin\u2019s \u2018New Europe\u2019, we settled down for another night in Eileen, this time, for the first time,\u00a0in the centre of a town.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<figure id=\"attachment_470\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-470\" style=\"width: 600px\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-large wp-image-470\" title=\"Blois\" src=\"https:\/\/www.petersphotogallery.com\/rodneyandlaura\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/05\/109-Blois-600x400.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"600\" height=\"400\" \/><figcaption id=\"caption-attachment-470\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Blois<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>We never got to watch a movie last night because, as I was\u00a0posting the last blog, I met Caroline and Callum from 100 kms north of Bourke in Australia. They\u2019ve taken time out from their cattle property and are travelling with their\u00a0three children, Callum (10) and twins Grace and John (8). They\u2019ve been to Dubai, [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":469,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"site-sidebar-layout":"default","site-content-layout":"","ast-site-content-layout":"default","site-content-style":"default","site-sidebar-style":"default","ast-global-header-display":"","ast-banner-title-visibility":"","ast-main-header-display":"","ast-hfb-above-header-display":"","ast-hfb-below-header-display":"","ast-hfb-mobile-header-display":"","site-post-title":"","ast-breadcrumbs-content":"","ast-featured-img":"","footer-sml-layout":"","ast-disable-related-posts":"","theme-transparent-header-meta":"","adv-header-id-meta":"","stick-header-meta":"","header-above-stick-meta":"","header-main-stick-meta":"","header-below-stick-meta":"","astra-migrate-meta-layouts":"default","ast-page-background-enabled":"default","ast-page-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"ast-content-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-4)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-4)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-4)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-466","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-europe"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.petersphotogallery.com\/rodneyandlaura\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/466","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.petersphotogallery.com\/rodneyandlaura\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.petersphotogallery.com\/rodneyandlaura\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.petersphotogallery.com\/rodneyandlaura\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.petersphotogallery.com\/rodneyandlaura\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=466"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.petersphotogallery.com\/rodneyandlaura\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/466\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":8132,"href":"https:\/\/www.petersphotogallery.com\/rodneyandlaura\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/466\/revisions\/8132"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.petersphotogallery.com\/rodneyandlaura\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/469"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.petersphotogallery.com\/rodneyandlaura\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=466"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.petersphotogallery.com\/rodneyandlaura\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=466"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.petersphotogallery.com\/rodneyandlaura\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=466"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}