We woke up quite early this day and took a walk around the neighbourhood. There was an old tower, a small river and bridges behind our chambre d'hote and it was absolutely quiet and beautiful on a sunday morning. There was a church just right outside the place we stayed.

We had breakfast at 9am and again our host made us some very nice home made cakes. They were so delicious that we packed all leftovers away!

We left for Château d'Ussé (Château de La Belle au Bois dormant Ussé) at around 10am. Enroute we saw a beautiful castle with a drawbridge at the entrance and we stopped to visit. It's called Château de Langeais. The château was originally built as a fortress in the 10th century. Located on a cliff overlooking the Loire River, the Château appears dark and ominous, but the interior rooms are richly decorated.

We eventually did not go in. Took a few pictures and then prepared to leave. Walked around the street and found a Sunday market. The strawberries on the left was called Mara des Bois, a French farmer trying to explain to us in English and me & Ju bought a box which costed 2.7€. Not very sweet but tasted very well anyway. Was about to go back to buy another box and then 'someone' rushed up to me and said to go back as 'someone' had left the mobile on the bedside table. 3 of us went back, it's around 20 minutes from Closerie laFontaine. The rest of group continued to walk around the market and wait for us.

There were a lot of these hay rolls in the fields which made the already very beautiful sceneries even prettier. We stopped mid-way and Alan tried his best to jump on to one but without success. We went back and luckily our hosts the Lamoureux's were still there.

We met the group at the chateau and then headed on continuously to the Sleeping Beauty Castle. We drove along La Loire (Loire river) and it was so beautiful that we had to stop again to satisfy our photo-thirst.

We arrived at Château d'Ussé at noon. The stronghold at the edge of the Chinon forest overlooking the Indre Valley was first fortified in the eleventh century. It inspired Perrault to write his famous stories, one of which the Sleeping Beauty, and it remains a symbol of the medieval fairytale castle inhabited by brave lords, beautiful ladies and poets. We paid 12 € to visit the chateau and spent around 2 hours there.

Our next stop was Chinon, one of the wine regions in Loire Valley. We stopped by a couple of wineries using the GPS. Because it was a sunday, all the ones we visited were closed! We finally stopped by a couple and done a couple of white and red tasting. I bought 3 bottles of white, quite sweet ones and I like them.

It was around 4pm and thought we had to head for the place we would stay that night. We arrived at La Roseraie at around 6pm. It was beginning of Summer in France and it wouldn't get dark until 9-10pm at night. So it's still quite a day for us. Apperitif and dinner was set for 7pm so we took the time to walk around the lovely farm of Irene & Sidney, an English couple who runs B&B business in France.

They have a lot of animals on the farm, cats, hens, sheep... I saw even a peacock! While Alan was busy MSN'ng (as the place has got wifi), I went exploring the place myself. The cats were all so adorable. They almost posted for me when I was taking pictures for them!

La Roseraie is a lovely place. It's a 1850 farmhouse! We slept in a 160 years old farmhouse! Though it has a pool but it was too cold to swim but nevertheless you would not get bored in the farm. Just there were so many things to keep you busy if you would pay attention to them.

At 7pm, we had had our apperitif. Sidney offered some French liqueor which I had now forgot. It tasted quite sweet and a bit too strong for me. I thought I took a glass of white or sparkling wine, I forgot! We met Barbara, friend of the couple who came to help out with our dinner.

We enjoyed the meal and the wine and all. Jetlag was bothering me and I felt very sleepy. Nevertheless, most of us stayed up until around 10pm and some of us went to bed and Ju and a couple more went out with Irene to check out her barns and got a lot of her stories of her animals.

It was still not dark yet at the time I got to bed!