Saturday, September 14, 2019

Day 14 - Ballan-Miré



We have traveled south again, to the French countryside just outside Tours. The area is renowned for its many chateaus, big and small, and to our delight we even stayed a couple of days in one of them.

This is La Commanderie de Ballan an excellent hotel with wonderful hosts that really take pride in making all of their guests feel... well wonderful! We've never been upgraded before, but we got a really nice suite on the top floor. The breakfast was delicious with fresh eggs from the hotel hen house and homemade yoghurt. The pool had just the right temperature and... ekhem... sorry, now I'm starting to sound like a reviewer haha. I just love this place is all. It's hard not to sing its praises when you've had such a wonderful stay. We were only here for two nights, but this place really found its way into our hearts.

The upcoming days I'll share some pictures from the chateaus we visited in the area. We had planned to visit at least four of them, but it turned out we underestimated the time it would take to see them, and we wanted to take our time to enjoy the experience. We can always come back here after all, and now we'll know exactly where to stay too :).

/MrsHjort

12 comments:

  1. But now that they have you hooked, you'll have to keep going back in hopes of getting upgraded again - might even happen, oh about the tenth time (ha). ;-)

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    1. They definitely do. It's just a matter of time, some day we'll go back there and visit those castles that we didn't have the time to see :)

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  2. Lovely scene! I love those massive old buildings! :)

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  3. Not the average Disney castle but more real life once upon a time. It reminds me of a castle holiday with my parents in the Loire area.

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    1. No this was one of the smaller chateaus, but charming nonetheless :)

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  4. I am glad that they make you feel so welcome and special. I am sure that made the experience of being there double the treat. MadamMtnLion

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    1. It really did! I love places like that, that go above and beyond. That's why we prefer to stay at smaller places like this - the personal touch is so much nicer than the anonymity of a multi-flor mega hotel.

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  5. You can stay in those??? How wonderful! Your photo is a wonderful capture of a lovely building.

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    1. You definitely can. This area of France has many, many chateaus, ranging from smaller ones like this to huge castles. The ones you can stay in are usually the smaller ones, since the bigger ones are usually tourist attractions :)

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  6. What a beautiful old building, and it looks like you've got lovely weather for your stay!

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    1. We really did! It car about 30-35 degrees C and sunny. I was very thankful for the pool :D

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