Season 5. Episode 8. It’s good to be the king! Or is it?

Season 5. Episode 8. It’s good to be the king! Or is it?

August 23, 2025. Treilleurs to Nantes, (train from Nantes to Tours), Tours to Amboise and Chenonceaux 35 Miles. 

August 24 2025. Chenonceaux to Chambord to Blois. 55 Miles.

Our bed and breakfast host Guillaume (William) surprised us with a candle in our baguette to celebrate today being our 33rd anniversary.

So this is a good space where I pay tribute to Heather. My love, best friend, partner in life, and sidekick for joining all my crazy expedition ideas. She’s super smart, incredibly determined, truly reliable, a wonderful mother, grounded, real, down to earth, practical and cute to boot. I’m barely able to keep up with her on a bike and in life. I’m lucky she’s still tolerating me! 

(When I showed this blog to Heather, I did not include this paragraph. So it’s a surprise and she is seeing it at the same time that you are. I am compensating for her having an anniversary card for me that morning, and I not having one.)

Our B & B had some other unusual guests and Heather made fast friends.

A first I’ve seen anywhere in our world travels. Matches left in the bathroom to deodorize post-use I presume. And to answer the question of curious minds (that means you cousin F), we didn’t light any.

After an 8 mile ride to the train station in Nantes, we loaded up our bikes for a 2 hour train east to the town of Tours for our side trip to the Loire Valley. (We will take the train from Blois back to Nantes in 2 days to resume our progress in a southwestern direction.)

Special bike racks in the train.

We continue to be super impressed with how bicycling as a mode of transport and recreation is simply and widely built into the French infrastructure. 

The French in France are secure enough to post bilingual signs regarding safety. We’ve seen English in several spots for safety. I wish it were the same in my native Quebec that sadly employs “language police” to patrol and fine offending uses of English.

An image along the Loire.

Nearly all the local city halls we ride past, have the national French motto of Liberty, Equality, Fraternity. Very few have not.

While we certainly see many French cyclists wearing spandex shorts and tight fitting cycling jerseys, the majority are dressed in what we’ll call normal clothes for going out. Plus I loved her Pellegrino water bottle.

Like most rivers, the surrounding land is fertile and the Loire is known as a wine producing area. we passed many fields of grapes.

Vin Blanc.

Vin Rouge.

We rode by the Chateau d’Amboise.

There are over 300 chateaux in the Loire region and there were 2 that I’ve wanted to see since 1991. In that year, the travel company I was part of started running bike trips in France. We had a trip to the Loire that I was marketing and selling, and to do so got slides from the French tourism board in New York. The image they sent me of Chateau Chenonceau spanning across the river Cher has held my imagination ever since. 

And in real life it did not disappoint!

Chateau Chenonceau was originally (1517) just a castle on the north side of the river. Only afterwards (1547) was a bridge built from it to the south side to extend gardens. And only later (1549) did Catherine de Medici build the 2 stories of ballroom and gallery atop the bridge. 

400 years later Catherine’s extensions, arguably a vanity project, would be crucial. In 1940, when France fell to Germany the line marking occupied France from Vichy France was exactly on this river. The Menier family who owned the castle helped smuggle French villagers and Jews from the occupied north to their freedom in the south exactly through the gallery and steps that we walked through today. 

See “vous etes ici” (You are here.)

The Loire Valley was the seat of the French court and nobility from the 10th century onwards, thus so many castles. Early on, castles were defensive, like forts for security. Later, they were grander and expressions of wealth, status and power. 

Chateau hotel de Chissay.

More assurance that cyclists are safe and respected.

Chateau de Fougeres sur Bievre.

We were now on route to the second castle that was the main target of this side trip into the Loire: Chateau Chambord. 

But first a snag.

Pretty clear not to go through.

Readers of this blog recall similar signs in English in the USA do not deter us. We treat “road closed” as more of a suggestion. In Big Sur (2023) we had a glorious moment going through and in WA state (2024) we were almost arrested.

We ended up off trail, dead-ended to a fortress wall that trapped us as it extended as far as I could see in either direction. Worse was we were swarmed by more mosquitoes than ever in our lives. It was awful and we retreated.

Chateau Chambord - truly impressive and worth the effort.

Fun fact is Chambord was one of about a dozen places the French hid artistic treasures of the Louvre from the Nazis during WWII. Mona Lisa was hid here for a time. 

Lunch for my Queen.

Backside.

I recall my first visit to France way back in 1983 as a 20 year old. I remember leaving Versailles and the Louvre thinking: well no surprise there was a French Revolution when you see the lifestyles and displays of wealth that was unearned by industry or by invention but supported only by taxation. On top of all the other chateaux, Chambord reminded me of that feeling. 

So while Mel Brooks may have taught my generation that “it’s good to be the king!” (History of the World part 1), note where is the French monarchy today?  Liberté, Égalité, Fraternité!

© Copyright Mark Segal 2025.