We leave the frightening campsite, cycle through Beaugency and to a certain castle not only rumored to have been designed with the help of DaVinci, not only on a grounds the size of Paris, not only just a major flex, but, perhaps, the most famous chateau in all of France.
#loirevalley
#frenchchateau
#chambord
We wake up unharmed somehow. The big bridge there. [music] And uh let’s cross over it, shall we? Back into Bugan Sea for a look around. Fantastic little medieval town. Nice little autumn scenes there. Nice little bakery. [music] Nice official building with a red door. Nice bell and a [music] big dramatic walk up to a big dramatic tower. Look at the size of that thing. That’s the Caesar Tower built in 1530 I believe. 36 m tall which is what 11819 ft. Just kind of built to keep watch over the town and especially that bridge. That’s why it was so high. We visit a church. We walk through a church. Look at those purple socks and sandals. And back out onto the road. This beautiful Euro Veilo. Every time you see that little barricade, that just means we’re on bike and walking only paths, which is nice. Nice raised cycling. Nice raised drone, huh? Getting your money’s worth across a bridge. And an hour later, there it is. Perhaps one of the most famous chateau in the world. >> Here we are. The Pestto Resistance. The Saklur Bonjour Casu Shamberg. Hard to film this way. I feel like we need a bigger intro. Some dramatic music. There you go. Welcome to Shamort. I said it was the most famous second only to Versailles when it comes to the most beautiful French chateau in the world. Built in the early 1500s for King Francois the first. We’ll get into that. Designed in the early French Renaissance style, possibly with help from Da Vinci. We’ll also get into that too, but it’s big. 440 rooms, 84 staircases, 365 fireplaces. We walk around to the back and are immediately greeted by the famed old double helix staircase rumored to have been designed by or at least inspired by Leonardo da Vinci. Back up top to the roof. I’ll walk around. There’s the double helix [music] staircase again. We turn around. Some serious serious views here of the grounds. But here’s the craziest thing. This was all just a major [music] flex. huge flex it was by King Francois as he designed the chateau to simply be [music] a hunting lodge which is why so many of the rooms are vacant just as they always have been and super vacant [music] and a lot of vacancy but surely he wanted to make it comfortable for his stays you cry his stays. King Francois stayed here less [music] than 50 times in his entire life. Major flex. But back to the castle tour. [music] Some nice regal red rooms. Chameleons. He was obsessed with chameleons for some reason. Little theater, nice clock, [music] nice rooms, more nice rooms. And we head back outside for [music] I mean, come on, look at this. And while it’s easy to think about the [music] 16th, 17th century when it comes to the chateau here, it actually played a vital role in [music] the 20th century dealing with hiding the world’s perhaps most famous artwork. [music] See, when the Nazis invaded France in 1940, much of the artwork at the Louvre was at risk [music] of being destroyed or at least stolen by the Germans. So pieces like the raft of the Medusa, Lady of the Unicorn, Lady Liberty Guiding the People, and some random portrait were all secretly hidden here at Shamort. Even when the Nazis did take over the chateau, they never found them. Back outside we go and a look at [music] the sprawling grounds. And if you talk sprawling, these are sprawling. Something else people don’t realize is that the grounds here massive. 5,440 hectacres of sprawling forest. In fact, making it the [music] largest enclosed park in all of Europe and actually making it slightly larger than the entire city of Paris. But it was time to [music] go. So we said a final goodbye to the absolute beauty of Shamort. Picked up the [music] bike, headed back out onto the Lir and to the countryside. [music] Popped into the tiny town of St. Dy for a look at their church. Nice churches. [music] Back out into the lower itself. Nearly camped in this little shelter, but too many mosquitoes. So, [music] we got a campsite. And see you tomorrow for more castles.