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Chambord contents
Chambord, history and
anecdotes
Chambord castle visit |
Let’s do like 800.000
visitors do each a year, visit the chateau de Chambord (the domain 
1.500.000).
When you walk towards Chambord you have a view on the northwest façade, with
the dungeon in the middle. It is a masterwork of the Renaissance style, but the
architecture still reminds the feudal era. The central dungeon and its four
towers are the best example. You
have to enter through the Porte Royale, pass a “cour d’honneur”
(honour courtyard) to access that dungeon, flanked by a chapel on the left and
the royal apartments on the right. The major part of the furniture disappeared
during the revolution, but the “chambre royale” (royal room) of Louis XIV,
at the first floor of the dungeon, shows magnificent wainscoting of the 18th
century coming from Versailles and tapestries from the Gobelins. Walls and bed
are covered with red velvet. In one of the windows, following maxim is engraved:
“Souvent femme varie,  bien fol est qui s’y fie….” A very wise advice
probably from the king himself: “Nothing is more versatile as a woman, the one
who trusts her is completely crazy….”
At the centre of the dungeon you have the famous double revolution grand
staircase or double ramp, around an empty newel. Its two concentric spirals are
entangled in such a way that two persons, one going up and the other going down,
can’t see each other—an essential artifice for outside conjugal adventures
in the Renaissance period--- In former times, lovers liked to play hide and seek
before meeting finally at the attic-windows. The chateau has 440 rooms: you can
avoid traffic accidents;-)
Arriving upstairs from the grand staircase, you come out on the roof terrace,
other jewel of the castle. It offers a unique spectacle on this admirable
roofing where you can admire the rich ornamentation of the chimneys, domes,
turrets, lanterns, attic-windows and secondary stairways.
Notice that every day, from May to end September, there is an equestrian
spectacle, in full Renaissance and Louis XIV costumes. For info call: 0254203101
What else can you do around the castle? Here a few suggestions for the nature
lovers.
--an equestrian centre near the chateau offers you the opportunity to make some
walks on horse. You ride in a Renaissance carriage in the parc national de
Chambord.
--boat promenades on the Cosson, to discover the chateau from another point of
view. From March to November, with or without a guide. Tel, 0254876876
Bibliography
Guide
du Patrimoine, Centre, Val de Loire , by Perouse de Montclos (ed.Hachette
1992)—Het dal van de Loire, by A.Sperber (Brussels, ed.Harenberg 1992)—Par
les champs et par les greves, by G.Flaubert (1885)—Guide du Routard 1998 (ed.Hachette)—de
kastelen van Frankrijk, by L.P.Boon (1956)
-Chambord, magnificence et abandon, une histoire, by.H.Plakiewicz (ed.Bourdais
1991)-Visite du château Chambord (brochure)
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