The shutters are closed

This is the only photo I took inside the castle that day. Like I said, I got out of there after about ten minutes. People milling about in enclosed spaces make me nervous. Many of the castle's windows are made this way, and most of them are not shuttered so you can look out through them.

The window is attached to metal rods that are bolted to the casings on either side, providing added stability.

It looks to me like the precisely cut bits of glass are held together by strips of lead, constructed in much the same way that a stained glass window is.

On Wednesday night, we watched one of my favorite television programs. It's called Des racines et des ailes. I call it Roots and Wings. The program is a documentary that celebrates cultural, artistic, and architectural heritage, most often French, but from time to time they go abroad. The last show I saw was dedicated to the recent renovation of the Musée d'Orsay in Paris.

This week's edition profiled artisans involved in other recent restorations that included the Presidential palace, the Crillon Hotel, and Versailles, as well as a story about a man here in the Loire valley who makes wallpaper (by hand) and recreates vintage wallpapers, most recently in the rooms of the Pasteur Institute in Paris, and yet another story about a glass and crystal manufactory in Alsace.

At one point there was a brief fly-over of the Château de Chenonceau and a mention of the stonework restoration that was going on there. I thought that was pretty cool, since I've been talking about it here for past few days.

Stacked stone

This is a shot looking directly up at one of the corbelled supports under a balcony (I think) on the front of the Chenonceau castle. It looks to me that it's been recently cleaned, if not repaired. A fancy bit of stone work, to be sure.

This is one of a pair, the other is to the right.

This is one of the few photos of the castle that I took on this day. Like I said, I spent most of the time outside looking at the construction work that was going on and at the people coming and going.

At one point, two women who saw me taking pictures asked me to help them with their camera. I don't remember what the problem was, but they had some setting wrong and I was able to fix it. They were very nice and very grateful.

Tote that barge, lift that bale

And hoist a few of those big stones up here, while you're at it. These are some of the stones that were cut to replace the older crumbling stones in the façade of the Chenonceau castle. You may be able to see that they're slightly curved; they were intended for one of the round corner towers on the building.

Expertly cut blocks of tuffeau stone, numbered and ready to be installed.

I assume that the stone is the local tuffeau, the nearly white limestone that was and is quarried in our region for building many of the châteaux. The stone is soft enough to be easily carved, but it's also quite susceptible to acid rain. I've seen quite a lot of ravaged stonework around the area.

I'm glad they have a life-preserver on hand in case of an accident.

The guys I could see on the scaffolding were busy loading the stones so they could be lifted up and put in place. Keep in mind that they're working on platforms built on scaffolding that's sitting in the river. One false step... The part of the castle that is being worked on is hidden behind a big sheet of some kind of material that is printed with a photo of the castle. It doesn't fool anybody, but it certainly looks a lot nicer to the visitors than the raw scaffolding it's hiding.

The underground quarries in the Loire region, left after the stone was depleted, were often converted into wine caves. One rather large one near us, which I understand provided a lot of stone for the Chambord castle, is used for growing mushrooms on a commercial scale.

Castle construction

The Château de Chenonceau is undergoing the final stages of a multi-year restoration project. Parts of the building have been covered in scaffolding while repairs are made to the exterior stonework. From what I've read, the work is almost done and the scaffolding should be down soon.

Les échaffaudages dans l'eau (scaffolding in the water).

Since the castle is built over a river, I'll bet that the placement of scaffolding is pretty tricky. But these folks must know what they're doing. I was intrigued by this bunch of scaffolding set directly in the water.

Periodic Puppy Pics

It's been a long time. I took this picture in the middle of September when I was trimming the hedge. And trimming the hedge this year is what gave me this pain thing that I'm still dealing with. Apparently, I pulled some muscles in my chest the wrong way, and they're pressing on the nerve that goes into my left arm. Ugh. You know all about it.

Callie poses out by the hydrangea. Which reminds me, I have to trim that back.

As is my wont, I took photos of the progress on the hedge trimming. Callie, as is her wont, was out cheering me on. So I took her picture, too.

We're still working on preparing the yard for winter. My shoulder/neck/back thing is much better and I can get out and do light yard work. Using the lawnmower, for example, is not a problem because it's tractée (self-propelled). Tractée is in the feminine form because une tondeuse (a lawnmower) is feminine. Hey! I can cut my grass in two languages!

On the castle grounds

Back in early September, after I got back from the Paris trip, we enjoyed the company of two of Ken's friends from back in his grad school days. Well, Bob was from grad school, Norma became his wife soon after. Ken participated in their wedding back in the (gasp) 1970s.

A planter on one of the terraces outside the castle, overlooking the Cher River.

One of the things we did during Bob and Norma's fun but all-too-brief stay was to visit the Château de Chenonceau. It's the castle that spans the Cher River and it's all of a twenty minute drive from our house. Ken and I have been to this castle numerous times over the years. It's a must-see on the château circuit. And, as such, is often very, very crowded.

On this day the crowds were not as bad as I've seen them, but I still got antsy inside the smaller rooms of the place. Since I tend to get a bit claustrophobic in enclosed spaces with a lot of people (or even a few), I ditched Ken and Bob and Norma and went outside to wander while they enjoyed the castle's rooms.

The red cat

Le Beaujolais Nouveau est arrivé !

That's the phrase that's all over the media and in the stores on the third Thursday of November in France (and elsewhere around the world). The release of the new (young) wine from the Beaujolais region was a marketing event invented around sixty years ago when an exception to a decree allowed certain wines to be released prior to the official release date of December 15.

A recently consumed bottle of Beaujolais-Villages Nouveau.

The fad waxes and wanes from year to year, but it's definitely fun to taste the new wines when they come out. It's become one of those traditions that marks the season, and for us Americans it comes along just in time for the Thanksgiving holiday.

We've already tasted some local primeur wines in addition to a couple of Beaujolais. I think the Beaujolais that we've tasted so far is better than our local "new" wine. The Beaujolais region is not too far away from us, and the grape is the same gamay that's grown here. I'm sure we'll try a few more bottles in the next week or so.

On the wine producer's web site, I found this. The Legend of the Red Cat:

Les toits de nos maisons, en France, sont souvent habités par des chats qui sautent de toit en toit et se font entendre la nuit. Après une bonne soirée entre amis, et quelques verres, il se peut que vous les entendiez aussi. Ne soyez pas effrayé s'ils vous apparaissent « rouges », il peut s’agir du reflet de la lune sur leur pelage… ou de quelques verres de vin qui auront mis de la couleur dans votre vie !

The roofs of our houses in France are often inhabited by cats who leap from roof to roof and make themselves heard at night. After an enjoyable evening among friends, and several glasses of wine, you might just hear them, too. Don't be frightened if they appear "red," it could be the reflection of the moon on their coats... or it could be that those several glasses of wine have put color in your life!