Bike Trip Loire - The Third Day - May 14.

Wednesday dawned beautifully – sun, lots of blue skies, gentle breezes. 

Our trail led over the pont canal, so at 9:30, while the rest of the crew finished organizing themselves, I biked up to the middle of the bridge to look at the view up and down the canal below.  Both ends of the bridge had elaborate cast-iron lions, shields, etc.  I went to the other end of the bridge to see where we were headed and to look more closely at the decorations.  In a few minutes the rest of the group crossed and we took time to take a few more pictures and admire the views.

Pont Canal with David, Roger, Gerard

 Then off we went, on trails through the woods away from the canal.  After an hour or so, the clouds began to cover the sky, a few drops fell, and we had a bit of wind in our faces.   Nothing serious as we wound through picturesque villages.

We wanted to stop at Sully-sur-Loire to see the fourteenth century château, and Roger, whose tire had gone flat Tuesday, wanted to have the bike shop there put on a new tire.  For those reasons, we cut off a loop of the trail and arrived in time for lunch.  Oddly, the three most prominent restaurants were two Italian and one British-type pub.  We picked one of the Italian ones and Tom, an Italian-American, pronounced the pizza good.  

After lunch, Tom and I went across the street to look at the château while Roger and Gerard got new tubes and tires on Roger’s bike.  There was a bit of a rain shower that Tom and I avoided by sheltering in the entrance to the château.  The château is spectacular, one of the iconic Loire châteaus almost completely surrounded by water.

The Château Sully-sur Loire

David at Sully

We finally left town at 3:50, stopping on the way to see a very old Basilica at Saint-Benoit-sur-Loire, parts of which date from the 11th century.  We then biked the remaining 6-8km to our stop for the night, a Pension in the outskirts of the small town of Germigny-des-Prés called ‘Cerviña’ that caters to bikers on the Loire trail.  Turned out to be our best stop of the trip.  Marie, our hostess, a typical vivacious Frenchwoman, of French-Spanish parentage, served us drinks and dinner family style, with her and her teenage son eating with us.  Her husband apparently did the grilling of the meat, there were potatoes, a never-ending supply of red wine, cheeses, rice pudding, and coffee.  The walls of the dining area were covered with song and poetry quotes, expertly lettered.  Madame Marie  regaled us with non-stop patter about the quotes on the walls, etc., and demanded to know our names and histories. 

D, R, and G with wall quotes at the Pension.

Pension in Germigny-des-Prés - Tom, Gerard, Roger's Room at Top of Stairs.

The next morning she provided a light breakfast and even phoned ahead to make reservations in a Gite [country inn] for that night.

Gerard found our accommodations each night and they always turned out well.  Took a lot of pressure off us knowing how far we had to go and that there would always be a bed waiting for us.  Covered 59km.