Monday 28 April 2014

Chaumont Garden Festival 2014


The International Garden Festival at Chaumont-sur-Loire opened for business on Friday. The festival is an opportunity to view contemporary designs of gardens set to a different theme each year – this year’s theme is the ’7 deadly sins’ so there is no reason to suggest it will be any less interesting than previous years.

The designers will no doubt have fun attempting to show us how these ‘sins’ can be expressed in a garden design. Surely whoever has won the right to the sin of ‘Pride’- ‘excessive belief in one's own abilities’ - will have a lot to live up to.

‘Envy’- ‘the desire for others' traits, status, abilities, or situation’ – may be a garden that features Chameleons.
  
‘Gluttony’- ‘an inordinate desire to consume more than that which one require’ will no doubt see the designer spilling his garden over on to the area of other ‘sins’.

‘Lust’ – ‘an inordinate craving for the pleasures of the body’ already has me interested.

 ‘Anger’ – ‘manifested in the individual who spurns love and opts instead for fury’. Also known as Wrath, could be messy.

 ‘Greed’ – ‘the desire for material wealth or gain, ignoring the realm of the spiritual’. Also called Avarice or Covetousness might easily be represented by the excesses of Chambord but then the space is limited.

‘Sloth’ – ‘the avoidance of physical or spiritual work’ has already been done, in the 'Body and soul' festival of 2010 so it will be interesting to see a new ‘take’ on it!


Then again they may be nothing like this but this is the great thing about the garden festival…go visit.


Entrance ticket : 12,00 €
Children between 12 and 18 : 7,50 €
Children between 6 and 11 : 5,00 €
Free entrance for under 6’s

Wednesday 23 April 2014

Saturday 19 April 2014

Loches & cowboys...



This weekend Loches has decided to celebrate Easter with a Wild West theme!!!! should be interesting...

From 19 to 21 April 2014

"Loches Festival" takes you to the Wild West.
cowboys, horses, country, rodeo ... spend 3 days in a Western atmosphere!
 







Friday 18 April 2014

Weekend de Pâques (Easter in the Loire Valley)


This weekend (Easter) many of the major chateaux of the Loire Valley offer egg treasure hunts for children, of all ages! These include Chinon, Langeais, Rivau and Ussé. Rivau with its magical setting may just get our vote as the place to be.

Monday 14 April 2014

Brocanting, a popular French pastime...


Here in the Loire Valley, as the rest of France, summer weekends can be filled foraging around an organized -'vide grenier' (empty your attic) or 'brocante' (think car boot sale) where you can buy almost anything but the one we visited yesterday at Azay-le-Ferron surpassed itself as there was an opportunity to buy a car and a house!

Saturday 12 April 2014

Some Loire Valley wine links...


  • vinsvaldeloire.fr/en                        Official site on the wines of the Loire Valley

 
  • richardkelley.co.uk/                      Merchant and writer's guide to Loire Valley wines
 
 

  • www.thewinedoctor.com/                The 'winedoctor' will be featuring wines from the Central Vineyards during 2014
               

Friday 11 April 2014

Way back then...




An exhibition which translates as "Beasts of all trades" starting Saturday 12th April and running until 30th November at the Prehistory Museum in Le Grand Pressigny will show how Paleolithic man used animals not only for food but as a source for weapons, tools and clothing. The exhibition will be displayed over four spaces of the exhibition hall of the museum.