Loire Valley - France - Day 11 - Chinon - Chatueau d'Azay-le-Rideau

Today we moved on from Blois to a little town called Veretz. It's not too far from Chinon (which I always thought was a large town but isn't) and planned to stay there for the day until our friends turned up later.

Chinon wasn't exactly on the way to Veretz but we had time to spare until our friends came.

We stopped at Chinon (population 8000) for the day before driving further to Veretz.We didn't do the fortress in Chinon
because we'd had enough of those for the moment. We went to the mediaeval part of the town, located right underneath the fortress. It was great seeing these very old houses. Hardly anything has changed for centuries. Chinon has been a UNESCO World Heritage Site since 2000.

Chinon was rebuilt and extended several times, especially under Henry II who was crowned King of England in 1154. Chinon has a long and interesting history and I recommend looking it up on the Internet.

Chinon - Panasonic TZ101

Chinon - Panasonic GX7 - Panasonic 12-32 f3.5-5.6

However, Chinon proved to be smaller than what I had imagined and after we had taken in all the sights we decided to meet our friends at a chateau that isn't too far away. Chateau d’Azay-le-Rideau, which is another of these lovely, well restored chateaux. Well worth a visit and one of the more popular ones.

As you can see d'Azey-le-Rideau was an the way back to Véretz

After finally meeting up at Château d'Azay-le-Rideau we decided to visit the Château immediately. Since it's quite a small Château we could do the visit in two to three hours. It sits on an island in the middle of the River Indre and is counted as one of the more popular of the Loire Valley Châteaux. Again, one with a rich history which can be found on-line. It became state property in 1905 and is now on the list of national monuments and is also part of the Loire Valley UNESCO World Heritage Site. Built between 1518 and 1527, this château is considered one of the foremost examples of early French renaissance architecture.