Back on the Loire trail today. We began with an early trip to the railway station in Saumur. First to say goodbye to Olivia who was heading back to London and then to take a short hop ourselves (plus bikes) to Angers (where we’d begun our ride UP the Loire over a week ago), from where we are now riding DOWN the Loire to Nantes.

If you’ve been following this holiday from the start you will realise that our plans have changed significantly from what we had set out to do (a clockwise loop down from the Loire to La Rochelle and then back up the Atlantic coast and the Loire).

But we’d also planned to book accommodation only one day ahead at a time, to allow for weather and how we were feeling on any given day.

By the end of the holiday we will have ridden the Loire, one way or another, from Nantes to Amboise, with a few side shoots along the way.

Our original plans changed due to three main factors:

1/ lack of accommodation on some of the non-touristy areas of the Velo Francette route. Our short ventures onto bits of the VF soon revealed almost all services to be closed or closing for winter.

2/ the French rail network which is brilliant in some areas and sparse and poorly joined up in others. We soon realised that the Atlantic coast, in particular, is poorly served and, as it would have been the likely starting point for a final rail trip back to our ferry (in Caen), we realised that we might have faced a very long and difficult journey at the end of the holiday.

3/ the magic of the Loire. We’ve holidayed in the area before but never explored it by bike. And it’s brilliantly set up for bike travel and with towns and chateaux every few miles, all linked by bike routes and supported by a rich choice of accommodation and culinary options. In short, we realised that we’d only scratched the surface of the area on previous visits and that there was plenty more to see whilst enjoying some of the best touring cycling infrastructure in Europe.

Back to today and there was a real chill in the air as we exited Angers’ St Laud station. We quickly dived into a cafe for coffee and cake.

We then picked up bread and cheese for lunch and headed out of the city. Bizarrely, we’d just joined the cycle route alongside the river Maine when we found a fully packed cycle pannier lying in the trail. Happily the owner was found a couple of minutes down the path and she was soon reunited with her luggage. She and her sister kept re-appearing along the route during the day. They too are ultimately heading for Nantes on a similar schedule to ourselves.

We stopped for lunch on the island of Behuard which we did a loop around.

The sun had come out by this point and we began to feel warm for the first time in the day.

We also noted the differences in the landscape and agriculture as we left the classic wine districts of the Loire behind. The farming was suddenly less intensive and organised: beef herds intermingled with mixed cereal crops and a good number of unkempt fields which seemed to be out of use.

There is much talk (in promotional literature) about the Loire being Europe’s last wild or untamed river. We even met a local today who solemnly told us this exact “fact”.

In most towns on the river are detailed markers showing the levels of various historic floods. And these dates seem to be celebrated rather than viewed as disasters.

The Loire is certainly impressive. It splits into form islands very frequently and it is littered with sandbanks and rapids.

One can certainly understand why it is termed wild: bridges spanning it often extend across many hundreds of metres of low lying land on either side of the water, indicating the potential width of the flow in flood conditions.

We have seen it during one of its benign spells. It is tempting to come back to see it in flood.

And it’s a bridge-lover’s paradise –

Tonight we finished in the small riverside town of Chalonnes-sur-Loire. It was a slow day, a cold day and a day when we stopped for almost any excuse.

Bird Report: another non-bird. A common lizard basking on a wall.

Airbnb Review: we spent two nights in a pristine fourth floor apartment for two nights in Saumur. The equipment levels were outstanding as were decor and design. And it was two minutes from the town centre. Reached by a winding wooden staircase, it was one of the best we’ve experienced so far.

Julie: today I came unstuck from my bike by forgetting the bag on the back when getting off at our morning break in Angers. I ended up on the floor and entangled with my bike!! It gave us both a good giggle!