day 2 Paris to Loire Valley

We left Paris in the bus and headed off on A10 towards the Loire Valley with Merryle on the microphone giving us the history of Napoleon and Josephine with special reference to Josephine as a gardener. Her gardening bills far exceeded her bills for clothing and jewellery, and Napoleon paid up, even after their divorce.













In no time at all we were at Le Jardin de Chantal & Alain at Sologne, near Orleans, a garden 11 years old, specialising in viburnums and hydrangeas ( or hortensias as they are called in France, after Josephine's daughter.) The garden is only about an acre but the paths wind in and out amongst the shrubs so that often there seemed to be no-one else there - except Mousseline the white cat. (Yes, they are rather fond of pink: inside the 100 year-old house there is a lot of pink also.)

They have 115 different viburnums and I didn't realise how attractive they are until I saw them all together like this - autumn is viburnum's prime time with all the berries. They have a nifty system of naming the plants by writing on little clay pots from the local pottery.

Lunch was a delicious picnic served from the bus and now I see why we lugged picnic gear from Australia: in a garden is much the nicest place to eat lunch.

After a 2 hour slog along the A10 we arrived at Le Chateau des Sept Tours (Chateau of Seven Towers) and took up residence for 4 night in the Orangerie, which is a modernised addition to the chateau with great beams across the ceiling, quite hazardous in the middle of the night but very luxurious. There is an 18-hole golf course and a swimming pool, which we're not going to have time to try.