After coffee and breakfast in the vineyard, day 3 finally brings some culture into the holidays. The castle of Saumur overlooks the city and the Loire, majestic and a bit braggy with a huge golden symbol right on top.

The architecture is a wild mixture of different eras. I like this mixed-up style and even though I forget most of what I learned about it almost instantly, there obviously has been a long history of sovereigns, fights and gravity. The west wing does not even exist in these days, but it is all but well-adjusted by the inner treasures of the castle.

A large hall in the inner castle is decoreated with a tapestry of the least talented artist I have ever seen. Or the most ironic one. Look at the guy a bit left from the centre: walking to the left, he turns his head a full 180° and looks at the lady behind his back. Plus, most of the women are gifted with naked breasts that seem to be drawn (more true: stitched) on top of their clothing. Standing right in front of the massive oeuvre, I am sort of overwhelmed.

I get back to reality with a coffee in the “Orangerie” and once more change my plans (stay around here for one more day? More castles? More clouds??) and directly head for Sarlat.

Huge castle? Or Hector? …, sure!

TomTom is in one of his best moods today, hence the navigation leads me on tiny roads through the Forêt d’Amboise and more or less straight south.

In the late afternoon I do find Sarlat, but not the campsite I had in mind. So what, a hot shower is all I need for this evening while tomorrow I will have plenty of time to go and see the medieval town of Sarlat. At least, this is the plan.

Calm. Very Calm. And outside of Sarlat

P.S.: Ah, finally I did learn what is about my fridge on gas cooling: It is just that it does not like to cooperate with the stove! When turning on the gas for morning coffee, the fridge reacts with blink-blink-out-of-order-blink-blink and the systems goes on error-mode. Even though it indicates that we have run out of gas, in fact it is no more than a coincidence. Solution: Switch off all gas functions. Turn down the gas pipe. Then re-open the gas pipe, leave the fridge out, turn on the gas for the stove and here you go: all fine, all working. After coffee, switch off the gas for the stove and on the gas for the fridge and everything works fine.