After a breakfast of fresh baked rolls and coffee, we rented a car to go to the Loire Valley, with the intention of getting a
B & B in the countryside.Gorgeous chateaus and quaint towns scattered amid vast fields of mustard plants and other crops make the Loire Valley a wonderful region.
We enjoyed many sites such as the castle at Chambord and the cathedral in Blois.
The kids loved Versailles so much, however, that they convinced us to return there for the night, and we checked back into the Hotel Ibis.
That evening, we attended a performance of Mozart's "Requiem" at Cathedrale Saint-Louis de Versailles, which was built by King Louis X1V as a place for the townspeople to worship.
With hundreds of singers and a large orchestra performin in honor of Mozart's 250th birthday in a 200 year old cathedral, it was quite impressive, especially for a free concert.
While Versailles is certainly a terrific place to visit in its own right, with charming boulangeries, bistros, walking paths and shops, its proximity to Paris by rail makes it a wonderful place to stay while visiting the monuments in the City of Lights.Julie and I had stayed at this same Hotel Ibis about ten years prior and found it totally unimpressive, but Ibis obviously spent a lot of euros improving all interior aspects of this hotel, taking better advantage of its great location.
