Hello La Loire A Vélo, Hello Sore Butts

So far David and I are enjoying our bike rides, though we are really starting to feel the amount of exercise that we have been putting in each day. In fact we are usually impressed with ourselves for making it back to our hotel at the end of each day. The worst part for me personally is the permanent bruising suffered by my bony butt, which has made it unbearable to sit on the darned bike seat. I ride everywhere with a towel planted on the seat for extra padding, and it helps just enough to keep me going. On the brighter side we are really enjoying seeing all the chateaux! And on the literally even brighter side, today was our first sunny day of biking! Unfortunately though it is really late here (already 1am!!) so I will just share a couple of photos with you before going to bed.

David and I with our tandem bike... yay!

This is when our chain fell off as we were shifting down for pedaling up a hill. I am surprised that the loss of the chain did not cause us to completely collide with some nearby object, but as it was I successfully got the chain back on and we continued on our way. Here you can see my blackened fingers before some of the wet grass and a sacrificed David sock (don't worry it had holes) helped me to clean up.

This is the Cathedral in Tours. It had quite an impressive collection of stained glass windows that told historic stories and such. Also, it was impressively large in comparison to most that we see.

This is David and I at the chateau Chenonceau that we saw today. It is one of the most famous chateaux of the Loire Valley because of its unique bridge architecture over the river. It was also quite well decorated on the inside and had very impressive kitchens!

This is another view of the chateau Chenonceau, with a view of a tower and facing back toward the gardens.

To show off how awesome our bike path is, this was our view as we were leaving Chenonceau and heading to the next city on our route, Amboise. The only bummer was that the path here was not paved so it was a bit bumpy for us on tandem, slightly hard to maneuver, but ultimately still nice I would say.

Here is a view of what our bike paths might typically look like. Although admittedly we often have a cloud covered sky and rain, there is still usually a river, some nice foliage, and a nearby field that we can admire as we bike along between towns and chateaux.

This is the Chateau La Chatonnière, which is most well known for its impressive gardens. We probably would have enjoyed them more if it hadn't been pouring rain all day yesterday, but oh well. On the other hand, because it had rained we had fun snail hunting all throughout our tour of the gardens. We found maybe 15 in total, most of which were quite large, carrying their little shells. I even picked one up and "glued" it to a post to see if it could adhere and keep climbing, which it did with ease. Very impressive.

This is the chateau d'Ussé, which is incredibly famous because Sleeping Beauty's castle is modeled after this one. Unfortunately without an airplane I cannot show you the better view of this chateau, but if you Google search it you will see why. However, due to the exorbitant entry fee (14E a person) we did not enter into this chateau, but rather admired it from afar. 

This is the chateau de Villandry, which so far is the favorite of David and I. It had phenomenal decorations and rooms on the inside (plus an informative hand-out) and some of the most amazing gardens we have seen yet! This garden is the "potager" or kitchen garden, meaning almost everything you see, all the way to the chateau, is edible. They mostly plant lettuce, for its colors I believe, but still it's very impressive!

Ok, 1:30am and I am off to bed! We have a long day ahead of us tomorrow, so I need my rest. Luckily I can tell you that my muscles are adjusting to the work and David and I are starting to be able to move a little easier. Though I do think we are walking a little strangely... haha. Good night!