September 17th 2014: France: Loire Valley

Monty the Motorhome is parked up amongst the vines of Ghislaine and Thierry’s vineyard where they produce Domaine de l’Asseliere wines.

We’ve travelled down the Loire valley, past Tours, and into the Indre et Loire region. The area seems one vast vineyard - grapes are as common a crop here as wheat and barley are at home.

The day started with a visit to Chateau de Chambord, half an hour’s drive from Blois. This is the largest and most popular of the Loire chateaux. It is huge - more than 440 rooms, 85 staircases and a forest of 365 chimneys. A Great Staircase is at the heart of the building and four hallways run crossways, meeting at this heart. Rooms are a mix, some with sumptuous furnishings, some quite bare, others full of paintings and tapestries. We spent a couple of hours in the house, before lunching at the van and then a quick exploration of the grounds immediately adjacent to the house. 

The Parc de Chambord around the chateau is an enomous walled game reserve - the largest in Europe. Wild boar and Red Deer roam freely, though we did not see any. Our initial plan was to walk, but Ruth was feeling brave so we hired some bikes. So, this was first time she has ridden for 24 years! She immediately proved that the old adage of ‘once you’ve learnt to ride a bike you never forget’ is true - much to her surprise. We had an hour of gentle pedaling on car free paths and really enjoyed the experience. Maybe Monty’s bike rack will have two bikes on it sometime in the future.

Then came the drive down the Loire - a really pretty river with autumnal colours just starting to show in the surrounding vegetation. The route was also peppered with chateaux, some in dramatic settings.

Our site for the night is a French Passion. This network of stopovers for motorhomes have hosts who are farmers, winegrowers, or craftsmen/women. They usually have their own produce available for sale, but there is no obligation to buy.

We just took a random choice and rolled up at Passion No 37140. We pulled into an empty courtyard and within minutes the owner was giving us a personal tasting of his wares - one Rose and three Reds. The Rose was not really to our taste - too dry. However the reds were different. Two were from vineyards in the valley and vines planted 20-30 years ago - one from last year, while the other was from 2012. The third was a 2012 vintage from vines planted by the host’s grandfather in 1933 and growing on the hillside. Now Ruth and I are not wine connoisseurs, but we could really tell a difference between the 2013 and 2012 bottles. The younger wine was slightly more acidic - still quaffable - but the 2012’s won hands down. At €5.80 (valley) and €6.60 (hillside) we thought them reasonable in price, so decided to lay down three of each. They may not be lying down too long! A further purchase of a 1kg tub of local honey meant our host was more than pleased we would be staying the night. He offered a site in the vines, about 200m off the road. We drove up and found a large grassed area that was peaceful and deserted. There does not appear to be any other vans using this site tonight.