Rogny-les-Sept-Écluses to Saint-Benoît-sur-Loire, through Gien

June 28, 2023 - Rogny-les-Sept-Écluses to Gien

It was chilly overnight, good thing we had the heater, but even with that it was a little bit cold.

This morning I got up and put quite a bit of effort into tidying the tent, sweeping up the floor, folding up the bed linens, etc., because they took a 250 euro deposit and I wanted to get it all back. Turned out to be not a problem. We then biked down the road a little bit to the bakery, got some bread and some pastries (fruit tart) for breakfast since it's Peter's 16th birthday! We stopped at the bottom of the locks and had breakfast.

Today's biking started out over to the top of the watershed, and then after that all the locks went downhill. There were some very long quiet stretches, with nothing to see, so I ended up spending a lot of time sitting on that bike seat without breaks, which gets painful after a while, there were 2 spots on my bottom that felt like they were bone-on-seat. Breaks are really quite necessary.

Some photos from the canal on the way to Briare

Old roof tiles, also a sign for an old walking path, no longer maintained

I took a LOT of this type of photo - Peter, ahead of me on the trail.

Briare was very nice, there was a very friendly tourist office, a beautiful church with very interesting mosaics, and also what a miracle, Peter found a piano restoration workshop, and the owner let him play on one of the pianos that was in the process of being restored! We had a long conversation, apparently he has more than 200 antique pianos that he hopes to restore.

The piano restorer's workshop

And then finally we saw the Loire! It's very impressive how wide it is, after the narrow little canals. We biked over the canal bridge. It didn't really sink in until we were halfway across, that it is specifically to bring the canal to the other side, over the river. And boats go across it, to get to the canal system on the other side. Amazing. I wonder how many of that kind of bridge exist in the world.

The high levees along the Loire. Often the bike trail was built on them.

Hauling our bikes up to get on the bridge

The "Pont Canal" (canal bridge, in other words, a bridge for the canal to go over the Loire)

This gives you a good sense that it's actually a bridge for a canal

The first Loire a Velo sign

Lots of old wells like this

Getting close to Gien

So now we're on a different bike trail system entirely, the Loire a Velo. It's older, and has less dedicated bike paths so far.

In Gien we're in a not very highly rated hotel, but it's quiet and convenient, and they let you in at 1, which is very early for France. We're only here one night, so it's fine. We hung out a bit at the hotel and then walked into town, up to the cathedral where Peter got to play the organ! There was a couple at the cathedral when we arrived, working on tuning up the organ, apparently they need to be tuned quite frequently in hot damp weather. They were very friendly and welcoming.

Later on in the evening after a lot of research on restaurants, we just went down the main road by the river, and stopped at the first restaurant that had some other clients and looked reasonable. Peter and I both had ground horse meat steaks, with an egg on top, and salad. It was quite tasty.

The big excitement of the evening was that a car with four teens in it went by spraying people with a water gun, they got me twice. The owner of the restaurant ran out and yelled at them and called the police, though the police didn't come.

Later on we went to the large supermarket on the edge of town. It was a little sketchy and and run-down looking, with people long-term parking in the parking lot. Peter stayed out in the parking lot to watch the bikes, even though they were locked, since it seemed like a sketchy area. Then he came in, worried that I was taking too long.

Peter got to play an organ

Rooftops of Gien, from the cathedral plaza

June 29, 2023 - Gien to Saint-Benoît-sur-Loire

The breakfast buffet was a little skimpy this morning, but I made it work. Peter had a hard time getting up, and I thought he was actually a little bit sick. He stayed behind me for much of the morning, when normally he's ahead of me, and only occasionally checking to make sure that I'm following him. But then he perked up later on in the day. I think it's just because of the early morning rising. Maybe tomorrow he can sleep in till at least 9:00 or so.

The first part of the day was, honestly, a little bit boring. Long straight roads, lots of farmland. Wheat harvesting is ongoing. But then we stopped at the Chateau de Sully for a picnic, and also took the tour. Quite impressive.

The most interesting part of the day was the Abby of Saint-Benoît-sur-Loire. It's an active Benedictine monastery, fascinating. We've been to two services so far today, they happen every few hours. There are mostly monks, but there's also some nuns as well. Interesting that the nuns seem to all be dressed in different garb, different colors, different lengths, different types of hair coverings. It would have been great to have a photo of the monks, but it didn't seem respectful.

There were also quite a few men who seemed like they were not yet monks, they didn't have the robes, although they wore a shirt that was very much like the top half of a robe.

There's only one restaurant in town that's open tonight, and it's a super fancy expensive one, so we just bought some things from the bakery, and some fruit from the epicerie, and will make dinner from that. Tomorrow we're heading to an apartment in Orlean, I look forward to actually cooking a little bit. Something very simple like scrambled eggs would be great.

The hotel is very quiet, not busy at all, and far away from any traffic. It feels very peaceful and calming. Probably also because of the abby. We were on the first floor, Peter always jumped out of the window instead of going in and out through the front door. We also biked around town a bit, just doing some loops around town. Overall I had a very good impression of the place.

Nuclear power plant

Cell tower for Kenny

Long straight stretches of trail, on top of the levees

We watched this tractor lay a hay egg

Chateau Sully

There were lots of park grounds, good for a picnic

Lots of bikers stayed in campgrounds. They had to haul a lot more gear than we did.

Inside the castle

I couldn't figure out what these boxes are for

This new-looking trail pavement is probably missing some layer that prevents the weeds from coming through

Our standard lunch - baguette, cheese, tomatoes. The guy behind us had a solar panel laid out on his handlebar bag, for charging his phone on the way.

We saw this canoeist a couple time on the Loire over the next 2 days

Our room in Saint-Benoît-sur-Loire. One of my favorite spots

At the Abby

The remains of Saint Benedict of Nursia

Muskrat