World Tour

June 4 - Tuesday Saumur to Chennonceaux "Hey, it's the Fourth of July!" - S "I know." - J We were taking the 0812 train back to Tours. We had gotten to the train station, purchased our tickets and had spotted a ramp across the tracks to platform B. Jon hesitated before actually crossing the tracks. I asked him what the hold up was since the tracks seemed clear and no one had given us a second glance any other time we had done the same thing. Well, apparently the French are a little more formal when it comes to rules and regulations. Where in Italy you were pretty much on your own when we passed by the offices of the train staff and they saw us making our way to cross the tracks on the ramp a staff member came out telling us we had to wait. She went back into the offices and apparently called to let the powers that be know that we were crossing the tracks. She came out wearing a bright greet reflective vest and stood by the tracks as we crossed. See, the French do care! We really need to stop second guessing and trying to come up with a plan to getting on the train because we've been wrong every time we've tried to be ready to board. We had our breakfast all laid out waiting for the train. We were expecting a train with many cars as we though it would be a busy time of morning. A train with two cars pulled in from the directions of Tours so we ignored it. Then as 0812 came closer we started to get a little suspicious, then Jon saw the train conductor move to the end car which was also an engine pointing in the direction of Tours. "I think that's our train". Crap, we crammed all our stuff into bags and started jogging with our bikes down the platform. "Tours?" I asked the conductor. It was. Crap, crap, crap. We really started moving down the platform not expecting anyone to be particularly helpful in loading our bikes. The conductor (I think he was new) actually helped us after all! He had a supervisor type of person with him and we were able to get the bikes loaded and off in a pretty timely manner. Geez, that sucked but could have been worse. I so thought we wouldn't make that train. The ride to Tours was less than an hour and before long we were back in the train station and finished our breakfast. A short ride through town with a brief stop at a church with beautiful stained glass windows and we were back along the Loire. It was late morning and we had a good 40 kilometers to go before we got to our first chateaux. We pulled into the village of Blois (pronounced "Blah" with an american accent - the French and English make it sound better). We hit the public toilets and stood outside a chateaux looking at the quaint village. After I returned from the restroom I found Jon talking to a man from Ireland who was on his way to Le Mans. Apparently there is a race that followed the same route that the Le Mans 24 hour race that had used the week before. The man was part of a club of MG owners who would be participating. The conversation turned from the bikes to economics as it so often does, it's that or politics. The man said that Ireland has a lot of money and the young people are making it hand over fist. We liked the sound of that as we hope to make it to Ireland on this trip. Maybe we would find a reason to stay longer. Then the man talked about the Bar he had just eaten at stating that "The crepes were crap." but with his accent it sounded like "The creps were crap" I thought that was great and it became my catchphrase for the day. Try saying it. The sentence just kind of rolls off the tongue, doesn't it?! His was also displeased by the fact that they had not put any grand marnier in his crepe/crep. Now knowing where not to go for crepes in the village we went our separate ways wishing each other good luck. The chateaux Sur de Luce was the last residence of Leonardo De Vinci before he died. It was small but well maintained and apparently had good funding, largely from IBM which was mentioned frequently throughout the selfguided tour. We started out in the chateaux, seeing the room and bed where he died and various other items that had been preserved and or restored. What really made the place special was that (through the funding of IBM) many of de Vinci's inventions were build according to his writtne plans and sketches. The inventions were scattered throughout the grounds in a quiet, serene wooded area about 10 acres in size. There was also a stream. His thoughts and ideas on motion of human beings and animals were big influences on many of his inventions, specifically the transfer of energy to motion. It was a park like setting which would have been relaxing had it not been for the hordes of school aged children running from exhibit to exhibit. Oh, we also saw a special exhibit which was a life size reacreation of da Vinci's Last Supper with each disciple enlarged with a narrative explaining their role in this piece. Unfortunately, all the explainations and narratives were in french so we didn't get too much from that but it was still cool to see it. All in all, Jon thought it was an impressive display on who the man was and how he thought. We arrived in theh village of Chenonceaux after a brief stop at a boulageri and charcuterie for bread and some salami (our original reason for stopping was for water). The bike parking lot didn't look like a good place to leave fully loaded bike so we quickly pedalled to the campground and left our bags at the reception desk. The chateaux closed in two and a half hours. Once we were in the day's ride in the heat was put aside as we looked at the original floor tiles still able to clearly see the design on the areas near the wall where no one walked. The ceiling rafters, tapestries and especially the kitchen were well preserved. The location along the Cher was serene and the gardens were beautiful. The gardens are open at ngiht with a light display which I wanted to see but decided against for another €5 and Jon didn't want to come back because he didn't want to miss the World Cup game. We had also realized that morning that the headlights on our bikes had been stolen while in Saumur. I originally thought it was another casualty of the robbery but we both remembered talking to Ron about the LED bulb the second day we were in Saumur. We'll have to make a list of all the stuff we've lost or had stolen while on this trip. Sadly, we just took it in stride. What can you do? Now we have to make double sure that eveything is locked up and there is nothing removeable on our bikes when we leave them locked up anywhere. The end of the day was a good time to go to the chateaux - crowds had really thinned out, actually, there were no crowds at all, there were no tour buses and we pretty much got to see the impressive kitchen quarters all by ourselves - it was cool. They had a big collection of copper pots, lids, platter and other tools displayed, the butcher blocks, oven, and tables were really impressive. We were nearly the last people to leave and got back to camp with plenty of time to set up our tent and eat some dinner. Jon went off to his game and I konked out until Jon woke me up. There was intermittant flashing light in the sky and Jon was asking me about it. Since I was asleep I had no idea what he was talking about so I got out of the tent. At first we thought it was from the light show at the chateaux but that finished at eleven and it was about eleven thirty then. Jon suspected lightening. You couldn't hear any thunder, there was just the flashing light. Jon wanted to put the fly on the tent and told me to tuck everything into the vestibule. I was not really caring at the time, wanting to go back to sleep. The flashing continued and a few minutes later was accompanied by super loud thunder. Then the wind came. Then the rain. Then the lightening and thunder. Then more wind. Then more rain. The thunder was really loud. You could tell as it came closer, was just above us and when it was moving on. The wind was really bending the branches on the trees, the tent was shaking and the stakes on the vestibule was shaken loose. Everything that wasn't totally covered was drenched - like my tennis shoes. Thankfully, Jon had brought in the laundry earlier, just in case. You could hear little kids crying in neighboring tents - it was pretty freaky. With our tent lighting up, from the lightening, shaking from the wind and listening to the rain pelting the tent you're reminded how inconsequential you are when mother nature decides to stir things up a bit. Well, the area did need some rain. Less than an hour later things settled down and we were able to get to sleep knowing that we would be getting a late start to the morning to Cheverny and Chambord as we waited to everything to dry.