Despite mixed weather, we truly discovered why the Loire valley is such a tourist attraction today. Cycling at high speeds down the long, flat roads, we cycled through many beautiful villages and past wineries, châteaus, churches and troglodyte dwellings (I.e caves and houses built into the hills).
The wheat fields appear to have been taken over by poppies, and Brittany was salivating all day at cherry trees full of fruit. She also liked the look of orchards being used for dried apple and pear products – some of which will undoubtedly find their way into our panniers over the next couple of days.
Our only stop for the morning was in Samur, where we decided to by a couple of inner-tubes a replacement for our replacement bike pump from the local decathlon. We gave our original 6 euro replacement pump to a passing English “traveller” who has been working and walking across France for the last 5 years.
At lunch, we stopped by the Château d'Usse. Simon had forced Brittany to cycle further and further, waiting for the 'perfect' lunch spot – by the time we reached the château we were both starving and ready to eat anything. We didn't even bother to see the château (which was big and chateau-ey), but we have a long chat with a family of 4 from Miami travelling on two tandems. They admired our tandem, our light packing and Simon's thighs (!?). They seemed to be travelling about 30 miles a day to our 80 miles – which kind of made up for those patronising b&rst%rds in England telling us were were “taking it easy” on our LEJoG trip.
On the advice of the Floridians, we decided to head straight through Tours to Amboise, which is a delightful old village (now very touristy) overlooked by its own (yes, you guessed it...) château. Leonardo Da Vinci increased its attraction (?) by dying here. We managed to find a pricey B&B in the centre of town but walked across the bridge for dinner (see photo).
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