Loire Valley Mélange

A collection of random experiences and stray thoughts while in the Loire Valley…

Our chariot for the trip: a Renault Captur. It’s a small, small SUV that turned out to be quite comfortable for our trip. It had aircon, GPS, and most everything was automatic. We got it from Avis at the Gare de Lyon for €196 for what amounted to 3 days. That included full coverage. Standard shift, which was a blast to drive. Here is my one parallel parking job during the trip and I got it on the first try!

If you rent a car at Gare de Lyon, all car rentals are located in Hall 3, outside the main terminal. You’ll find three elevators with signs to car rentals, but no buttons to press to summon the elevator. Walk to your left, you’ll find one lonely elevator that will take you to Floor -1.

Speaking of F words, how about “Flunch”!

We saw this inside the Auchan shopping center in Blois. We had to make a pitstop at the mall to top up our internet since we foolishly used all of our gigabytes on our hotspot using Google Maps as our navigation. Should have just used the one that came with the car…Orange offers 10GB of data for €15 to tourists – a bargain!

Also at Auchan (a Targety/Walmart combo kind of store) we found this…

Many of us would die to have a cheese selection like this at <insert upscale market here>!

While we’re on the subject of food…

Did your buttery heart skip a beat when you saw this little coin?

Or how about this? This was lunch one day between chateaux.

All over the Loire were sunflower fields fully in bloom…

So beautiful! For three days we were surrounded by beautiful French countryside.

Speaking of beautiful, we stayed at a country manor called Les Sources de Cheverny. Here was the sign at the beginning of the driveway…

and then here was the driveway…

and the grounds were just as lovely. Here is the yard in front of our room. We had two chairs to sit outside and just listen to the wind whistle through the trees and the birds singing happily…

Here’s a shot between two of the buildings looking out to the fields where you could go horseback riding. You can book it through Hyatt Hotels.

Masks are worn religiously here, they have 500 year old memories of the Plague. Masks were even memorialized in the chateaux, so they know they help stop disease.

The Health Pass is a thing. Read the earlier post on the subject to learn how to get yours. It is now two days past the commencement and we are getting checked 100% of the time as we enter establishments. They scan your pass using an app on their device that checks your QR code against the national health system database. Takes 2-3 seconds for them to check.

Some people here are also devotees of Jenny McCarthy (or is it the equivalent of Republicans? Trumpistas?) and the anti-vaxx movement, and they have been demonstrating in the streets. The government’s response? A collective shrug: “what is the point of demonstrating against a virus? It cannot hear you and doesn’t care. Now go get vaccinated.”

We’ll see you later in Paris!