Europe On Ten Miles A Day Wayfarers Wander, Eat And Drink Their Way Through The Lior Valley Of France
Just north of that section of the Loire River where Renaissance kings caused their flamboyant chateaux to be erected, a small stream carves a parallel course through meadows and chalky hillsides.
Like a less favored sibling with unrealistic aspirations, it too calls itself the Loir, but drops the final “e,” perhaps in recognition that no amount of posturing will ever raise it to the heights of its illustrious kinsman.
But this is France, where second or even third best can be very, very good.
Along the lesser Loir are chateaux also, though not as many or as extravagant, as well as modest medieval churches with only one or two magnificent portals instead of dozens. At several villages, geraniums and clematis brighten still-inhabited houses carved centuries ago out of soft rock walls.
Anywhere else the Loir Valley would be a prime destination, overrun with one-hour film developing, fast food and “this way” billboards. Instead, it is a drive through on the way to, twice blessed by being both ignored and preserved.
How an English tour operator called The Wayfarers found it I don’t know. Until recently, their walking tours were conducted on home turf. But in the summer of ‘93, they inaugurated a series of strolls along the Loir waterway. It was my good fortune to have tagged along.
We met in the town of Vendome, the “we” being 15 Americans and one Canadian, aged 40’s to 70’s, and three younger British women, Claire, Malle and Alison, our stalwart walk leaders.
Immediately we were whisked through 45 minutes of French farmland to the Chateau de Rocheux, a stately home built in 1551 whose four stories were set in a 42-acre park. Here we would rest, decompress and spend the night before setting off on our trek.
The late August morning dawned bright and clear and cloudless and … cold! We gathered at 9:30 on the terrace of the chateau (by the moat and the two white swans), a warmly clad group. In an hour we had shed the outers and were down to T-shirts and shorts. The summer sun still packed a wallop, especially when we emerged from a small forest into open fields of sunflowers, petals shriveled and great discs bursting with seed.
We lunched at St. Firmin des Pres, opposite its 12th century church, where for the first of many times the question, “Where are the French?” was asked. We knew they disappeared between 12 and 2 for the midday meal, but even during the morning and afternoon there was hardly a soul to be seen.
This changed as we walked back to Vendome. Cars and motorbikes sped by at Gallic speeds when we entered and took rooms in our hotel.
Those of us who had energy remaining after our 10-mile walk discovered a town of such civility and charm that it seemed to exist in another dimension.
We met at 7 for drinks and had dinner in the hotel, where we sat at large round tables. Over a long meal we became better acquainted, the path made easier by liberal dispensations of wine. By 9:45 after cheese and dessert we were straggling off to bed. A routine had been established.
Which allowed for serendipitous occurrences. Such as the one next day when we stopped to admire a picture-perfect vegetable garden in the backyard of a flower-bedecked country cottage. Soon the lady of the house was standing in a bathrobe among the lettuce and endive identifying an unusual squash that climbed the fence between us. As we left, she dispatched her husband with a bag of tomatoes for our lunch.
Or the time I lagged behind in a tiny village at the garden of a quintessential French peasant, a simple, rough-hewn man of the soil.
When he heard my halting French he responded with great enthusiasm, asking where I was from. “New York,” I said, to which he casually commented that his son had just left for his first year at the University of Houston.
Before that humbling experience we had walked to Lavardin, a beautiful village which bore a striking resemblance to those in the Cotswolds. Except for the giant ruined tower that loomed over it, all that remained of an 11th century fortress. And except for the church of St. Genest, modest on the outside but a treasure within of ancient wall paintings, carved columns and naive statues still bearing traces of their original colors.
We were having lunch in Montoire sur le Loir when Edie from Boston said, “Are you going to write what Michelin said about Petain?”
It was in Montoire that the Marshall met Hitler and signed the infamous agreement that created Vichy France. The noted guidebook said nothing of that, instead declaring that, “On this occasion Hitler tried in vain to convince the Marshall to take up arms against Britain.” An interesting omission.
In Troo Malle had a surprise for us. Afternoon tea was served at a cave. A Mr. Lallemand lived with his family in a house that had marble floors, a large living room, several bedrooms, and all were carved out of the soft limestone and chalk “tufa” rock. Here we had a proper English tea by the side of a cliff which, except for doors and windows, gave no hint that 2,000 square feet of elegant living space existed inside.
Tea was only one of the elements that identified The Wayfarers as a British company. A constant reminder was our precious guides, the knowledgeable Malle, artistic Claire, and sunny Alison. When we marched into Troo, Alison was in the lead. “This way?” she called back, pointing to a shortcut up the hill.
“Absolutely,” Malle answered. “Spot on.”
As with tea in Troo, lunches popped up in the oddest places. One morning’s walk culminated at a farm where Claire had set up a buffet table laden with salads, cheeses, bread, fruit and wine in an outbuilding piled with round bales of hay. Sitting in a circle on white plastic chairs, we looked like extras on the set of an MGM musical.
A mock attack by a new litter of puppies gave Dave, a doctor from Iowa, the opportunity to share his expertise in dog training. “In order to socialize them to live with humans,” he said, “you have to reproduce what happens in the litter. Before they are 7 weeks old, you bite them gently on the nose. If they accept your dominance,” he claimed, “they will lick your face,” both of which activities some of us found disgusting.
“But does it work?” we wanted to know.
Dave’s wife, Gladdy, said that their dogs, 3 of them, were so socialized that “they sit on the couch and tell Dave which television programs to watch.”
A couple of hours after we had resumed our walk, we turned the corner of a cornfield and there was the white station wagon and, as Pete from New Jersey said, “the estimable Claire,” waiting with nourishment as she did every midmorning and afternoon. We clustered around the hood where she had laid out the goodies and refueled on fruit and drinks and, the ultimate evil, French pastries.
“For the rest of my life,” Alison remarked, “I’ll have a Pavlovian response whenever I see a white station wagon.”
While some may get the impression that we were more eaters and drinkers than walkers, that was far from the case. Each day we put in a good 10 miles, often on paved country roads abandoned by all traffic except for an occasional tractor, or rutted dirt lanes accessing plots of corn, wheat and sunflowers. After a full day outdoors and a leisurely, multi-coursed dinner, eyelids were at half mast long before our customary bedtimes.
“Can you carry my shorts until later when it’s warm?” Ceil, a psychotherapist from New York, asked one morning before our walk.
“Of course,” Claire answered. “Let me see. Oh yes, it’s biscuits before church.”
Which translated to, “I’ll be joining you in the station wagon for elevensies before we visit the chapel of St. Cecelia.”
A waiting bus shuttled us to our starting point, a village so picturesque that it cried out to be explored. But we were bent on sterner stuff, so we plunged into an orchard of trees hung with apples and pears. Canes of blackberries arched over our path, waiting to be plucked, the cows were in the meadows, the sun was in the heavens and we were on the move. Ah, the rough life.
On this day we cheated. After a mere six miles on foot, we lunched and hopped back in the bus which drove us - nappers and non-nappers alike - to Le Lude.
Madame la Comtesse Rene de Nicolay, Princess of OrleansBragance, was at home, as were her sons and grandchildren, but chose not to welcome us to her 10th century fortress-chateau.
From outside, the mammoth building was terribly austere. But then a charming young guide ushered us into the “Salle des fetes,” a long room dominated by a magnificent fireplace and richly ornamented with chandeliers and gold-leaf wallpaper.
“Behind you,” she said, “are portraits of ze family in ze nanteence century. I can tell you zat zey still use zeeze ruhms. In fact, ze children are upstairs waiting for six o’clock when zey can come down.”
The last day was rather sad. “Yesterday, I thought I’d had enough,” Ceil said. “But now that it’s almost over, I’m already feeling nostalgic.”
Our morning walk began in a heavy mist that transformed the 18th century chateau where we were staying into a romantic illusion. From the start it was apparent that the collective psychology had altered.
The rigor of the first days was abandoned and we dawdled at the slightest opportunity. We were winding down and resistance to leaving had set in.
At lunchtime tables were set up on a lawn next to the Loir with a meticulous vegetable garden on one side and the blocky steeple of the village church on another. As usual we helped ourselves to the buffet and sat wherever there was room.
Were we unusually compatible, someone wanted to know, or was it the effect of our common activity?
Connie thought that “like-minded people tend to get along well.”
“I like the idea of starting out as individuals and ending up with a group feeling,” Edie said.
“Actually,” Alison commented, “I find that most groups are quite nice.”
So we weren’t unique. But we felt special nonetheless. We had come together as strangers, had spent a week without a single dispute or clash of wills, and were parting as newly made friends.
Malle, Claire and Alison deserved much credit for this, of course, as did The Wayfarers for hiring them and designing our tour.
But we, too, I thought, could take a few bows. We were, as they say, people of good will. Our intention was to discover and to learn, to meet the French and to explore their countryside in the most basic way possible.
Perhaps more important than anything - we came to enjoy, and we did.
MEMO: This sidebar appeared with the story: If you go: Getting there: From Paris, the TGV (high-speed) train to Vendome takes 45 minutes. Returning from Le Mans, the train takes an hour. Several walkers chose to rent cars in Le Mans to extend their vacation by touring the wine country or the chateaux of the Loire. What to bring: The Wayfarers strongly advises wearing boots. Some of us wore sturdy sneakers, which were fine for the limited demands of the French walks. A day pack or fanny pack is necessary to carry a rain jacket or poncho, just in case. Hats and sunglasses are strongly recommended. Mornings can be cool, middays hot, so layering is advisable. Discards can be left in the van at snack breaks. Weather: Temperatures between May and October range from 50 to 90 degrees. Long periods of rain are rare, but weather is unpredictable. Fitness: Those in their 70’s had no difficulty on our walks. If they had, they could have hopped in the van. Non-walkers should exercise before coming, to assure their enjoyment. Hotels: Accommodations are the best available in the area and range from quite grand (ancient manor houses with modern beds and bathrooms) to charming but old-fashioned (soft mattresses and hand-held showers). Food: In France, expect the best. Other walks: In addition to walks in France, The Wayfarers lead walks in the most picturesque areas of England, Wales, Scotland, Ireland, Italy and Switzerland. Duration is 5 days and 6 nights. Cost in 1997 is $1,680 and $1,880. For more information, contact The Wayfarers, 172 Bellevue Avenue, Newport, RI 02840. Telephone 800 249-4620 or 401 849-5087; Website www.thewayfarers.com Other guide services offering walking tours of France include: Progressive Travels, (800) 245-2229; Butterfield & Robinson, (800) 678-1147; Europeds, (800) 321-9552; Country Walkers, (802) 244-1387; Van Gogh Tours, (800) 435-6192; and Backroads, (800) 462-2848.