The Lovely Loire
The Loire is such a lovely part of the country. By now, we've been to many parts of France and I have to say that the Loire is my favorite. This is our fourth trip to the area and I can envision returning a few more times. I am totally fascinated with the caves. When we visited the Dordogne a few years ago, we came across caves that were high up on the cliffs, seemingly difficult to reach. They were at that point just empty holes in the rock, carved out by ancient people called Troglodytes (literally, "cave dwellers"). I had a hard time figuring out just who those people were, when they lived, etc. Then a couple of years ago, we went to a town in Italy called Mattera that is famous for its caves -- a whole ancient town of cave houses, churches and probably markets as well. So, one draw for me in Amboise, our apartment town, is the caves. In my last post, I showed this photo of modern cave houses, which from their front porches look just like any other houses