Chambord

The château de Chambord is in the middle of a walled park. The wall encloses 5440 hectares (over 13,000 acres or 21 square miles). That’s some wall! Not only is the park huge, the château is the largest in the Loire valley. And not only is it big, it’s incredibly elaborate.

Inside, the Christmas theme was fairy tales.

In the center of the structure is a double-helix staircase:

The rooms give a taste of how the château was decorated over the centuries. For instance, the Renaissance bedroom was totally empty!

For places like Chambord, where the king and courtiers didn’t stay very long, all of the furnishings were packed up and taken to the next residence. Yup, this huge château was really just a hunting lodge. (They did start adding permanent furnishings in the 1700s.)

An introductory film made a big deal about how the design of the main keep was very egalitarian: in each of the four towers around the central stair, the rooms were laid out exactly the same so no one got larger living spaces. It didn’t, however, mention that the king (Francis I) apparently wasn’t fully on board with that and an entire royal wing was later added. Human nature being what it is, some things never change…

The royal bedchamber, above, was definitely not a private space. While only a few select courtiers could approach the bed beyond the wall, business was conducted in the rest of the room.

Among the many pompous-looking royals, it was nice to see someone who looked more approachable, Marie Leszczynska, the wife of Louis XV:

Going up on the roof was definitely a highlight – the forest of towers is ridiculous!

The gardens “à la française” are too sterile for me:

Lunch at the château café was a surprising treat. The ‘burger’ was actually shredded pot roast formed into a burger and fried a little for crispy edges. Delicious! As was the café viennois (Viennese coffee, espresso with a healthy serving of whipped cream on top) at the end:

On the way home, just a short distance outside the walls, we saw a very different type of tower:

France got 67% of its electricity from nuclear power in 2024…