Thursday 17th July, Angers to Ingrandes

Leisurely start to the day. packed up and on our way at 8:45 and the tent was dry. Retraced our cycle from yesterday back to Bouchemaine then headed down the Loire. Our first stop for the day was a detour out to an island to see a church built on a rock on the orders of Louis XI to thank the heavens for being saved from a shipwreck. This island in the Loire receives flood waters at least every decade of  between 4 and 6 meters. They had historical photos of the town under water on display.

Heading back to the main route we stopped to have morning tea and Catriona got a flat tire. What exceptional timing and a great view to change a flat from.

Unfortunately the cafe was not serving! We were not the only ones to get turned away, and we have come across this quite a lot during our visit! We had our water and some nuts and set off on our way. We stopped at the next main town to buy some salad for lunch and had a lovely picnic and local bottle of wine down by the river. 

This was our view, not doing too well with the exposure today. In the shopping centre they had a thermometer that read 32 degrees. Luckily our picnic spot by the river was under the trees with a cool breeze coming off the river. After lunch we headed off toward Montjean sur Loire and came across a cafe we had to stop in at. It was Le Lenin Cafe and was full of Lenin and soviet memorabilia. It was in an old stone farm house and was lovely and cool inside.

After our cool drink it was back on the road. We decided to go past our planned overnight spot of Montjean sur Loire and made it another 4 km down the road to a lovely quiet Municipal campground.