Once Upon a Time...

"Life itself is the most wonderful fairy tale of all." – Hans Christian Andersen

This weekend I went on an overnight trip to the Loire Valley with other students in my study abroad program. The Loire Valley is southwest of Paris, and it took us about three hours by bus to get to our destination to see beautiful châteaux! There are more than 300 châteaux in the Loire Valley, which, in my opinion, makes it one of the most wonderful places in France. My favorite kinds of books to read are historical fiction novels. Walking through these châteaux, I couldn’t help but wonder what it would have been like to live there or visit on a weekend hunting trip with French kings and nobility from long ago. 

 On our first day we traveled to the Château de Chenonceau, which was built on top of the River Cher. The chateau that remains today was built in 1515 under Thomas Bohier, the Chamberlain for King Charles VIII of France, but eventually the château was taken over by King Francis I of France. The castle was then passed down to Henry II, who scandalously left it to his mistress Diane de Poitiers after his death. The Queen, Catherine de’ Medici, was not happy about this, and forced Diane to exchange Chenonceau for another chateau. This was Catherine’s favorite home and she cared for it with great detail. Later that day we took a tour of the famous mushroom caves of Bourré, one of the last places in the world that grows mushrooms in a natural underground environment. Because of the farming methods used, these mushrooms have an incomparable flavor, with a high vitamin content. 

 On Saturday we were lucky to enjoy beautiful, 70-degree weather. It felt amazing! Unfortunately, our good luck wore off and Sunday was cold and rainy, but being from the Pacific Northwest, I’m always prepared for the rain. The first chateau we went to that day was Château d’Amboise, a favorite of the French kings. King Francis I was raised here, and he invited Leonardo da Vinci to Amboise to stay in a nearby mansion. Francis I was able to visit da Vinci whenever he pleased by using a secret, 500-meter long tunnel. In addition, King Henry II and Catherine de’ Medici decided to raise their children here at Amboise. For me, the coolest thing to see here is the tomb of Leonardo da Vinci inside St. Hubert Chapel.

 The highlight of my day was a trek through the rain with a few of my friends to Close Lucé. This is the mansion that Leonardo da Vinci moved into in 1516, where he spent the last three years of his life. Da Vinci brought three paintings with him to the Chateau de Cloux: the Mona Lisa, Saint Anne, and Saint John the Baptiste. While living here, da Vinci worked on his paintings and his invention designs. A large display in the basement holds forty models of the various machines and devices that da Vinci designed in his journals. Leonardo’s ideas were way beyond his time. Many of his models would not actually have been feasible, but in 2006, Italy’s Institute and Museum of the History of Science in Florence built a working model of Leonardo’s idea for a self-propelled car and surprisingly, it worked! After being thoroughly impressed by Leonardo’s genius, and then buying some gourmet chocolates in town, it was time to leave Amboise to visit one last château, the Château de Chambord.

 Chambord is the most recognizable chateaux in the world because of its size, and the distinct French Renaissance architecture. This is the castle that served as the inspiration for the Beast’s home in Disney’s Beauty and the Beast. It was built for King Francois I to be used as hunting lodge, but he only really spent seven weeks here total. Even though the chateau felt rather empty and cold, there were some beautifully decorated bedchambers and studies. The architectural highlight on the inside is, without a doubt, the double-helix staircase designed by da Vinci. He invented a spiral staircase that makes it so that a person going up the stairs will never cross paths with a person who is going down the stairs....a mind-boggling idea! Visiting this chateaux made me feel like Cinderella, and it was the perfect end to my fairytale weekend in the Loire Valley.