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So today has come - the travelling day, good-bye England, and hello La France… an early start so we could settle in early-ish had been planned, so alarm on at 5:15am… After a late night last night, feeling slightly creaky (and cranky) in the morning and awoke to some London rain (not really drizzle, truly rain!) No taxis to be seen outside the window so the hotel called us one and we were on our way to Kings X Pancras to catch the Eurostar.
I am in such trouble for organising the travel day with no wi-fi connections on the day of the first Lions test. Richard is looking rather grim and looking out for any thought of a connection or television throughout the day... but one thing is sure, there will always be another rugby match (and there will be next week, but that is another travelling day - what was I thinking?)
Some rather nasty breakfast from the station and we were told to get on the 7:31am train, just as well I had booked as it was full (actually overflowing with everyone's bags). The train got caught up waiting for congestion in the tunnel so ended up being half an hour late, but that was ok as I had left 2 hours to get from one side of Paris to the other to catch the train to the Loire.
We joined the taxi queue and all worked well with a van coming up to take us to Gare d'Austerlitz - I even practised a little French on the way (un petit petit peu!) Claire and I enjoyed going around the shops at the Gare to buy some lunch… lovely chocolate eclairs, and baguettes with some jambon et fromage… lovely! Then on the next train to Amboise. All had a little sleep on one of the trains.
We arrived at Amboise to….. nothing! No taxis were waiting, some passengers were picked up by some friends, no staff at the station, so I rang the hotel and got them to send us a taxi to pick us up. Taxi ride over a bridge past a couple of fishing boats to a lovely hotel by the side of the river (Loire, that is…) We unpacked and washed a little, and contacted our bicycle man to make an arrangement to meet at 5:30. We walked into town and found to our amazement a festival with loads of brass bands, drums, and many people dressed up in medieval costumes who enjoyed having their photo taken… and loads of locals all with a mask with a big nose, rather like Cyrano de Bergerac, not sure what it was all about, but everyone seemed to be enjoying themselves as they paraded up to the chateau at the top of the hill… We wandered down the shopping street to find some lovely shops with cheeses, meats, bread, soaps and various other local commodities. No shortage of places to buy our lunch from.
Back to the hotel to be briefed by Sebastian about the bikes, and the maps, and high excitement as we tried them all out. Then off to dinner in the village where we found a little brasserie. I had to have a kir royale, before we tried to decipher the menu. A little English and a baa-noise helped us determine a lamb soup, which despite all that effort to understand it, we did not order. Richard had a burger… yawn!! Miles and Claire had a pot au feu (corned beef and vegies) and I ordered duck with honey and rosemary which I was excited to tuck into, until Rory promptly spat out the first taste of his Angouillette (sp?) which was pure intestines inside intestines…. It was handed to me where I promptly spat it out too… how could anyone eat that… We sequestered the rather large sausage looking (and very smelling offensive item) across all the plates and Kyra had some pot au feu as well (just as well it was huge)…
Off to a lovely rest (although fireworks did rock the bedroom some time during the night).
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