The last few days along the Loire have been peppered with châteaux. Opulent, impressive castle-like buildings, mostly built in the 14-16th Centuries – although some are now looking somewhat dishevelled . A château is a private house or manor estate for a rich family, almost certainly from a nobility class. In English we would use the word castle to describe them, but Google tells me that in France castles are more for military purpose and a château is privately owned.

We have mostly been observing the châteaus as we cycle along, stopping for a picture or a short break in their grounds – sometimes to have a nap. Which is free to do and saves us having to figure out what to do with the bike.

We went inside the Château in Amboise, on a particularly humid and hot evening and learned that Leonardo Da Vinci, after his death, was originally buried in the grounds of this château. (He’s since been moved to another place).

We also pedalled through the forest to visit Château Chambord, which inspired the castle in Disney’s Beauty & the Beast movie. It’s also the largest château on the Loire. Not hard to see why – as it’s huge!!

Another feature of our days is going to a bakery in the morning, getting pastries for breakfast, bread for lunch and gateaux for afternoon treats. We’re in the habit of buying bread and cheese each morning for our picnic lunches, and we often buy ourselves a cake or sweet to have after lunch. My favourite is lemon tart, Robin has been enjoying Kouign-amann, especially in Brittany, and apricot tarts. We also both enjoying flan. And when we stop for dinner, I will usually have crème brûlée, not something I usually have at home.

We have managed to arrange our pannier to perfectly store a baguette, without putting it directly in the pannier. We cycle along with our baguette sticking out a wee bit, but we’ve not lost a loaf so far. Robin has commented that when we’re not longer in baguette-land, we’ll have to find a new way to carry our daily bread supply. But for now, we continue to enjoy our french bread, cheese and gateaux.