Early on the second day of our trip we awoke in Iceland and headed to the airport where we continued the rest of our journey to France. We flew into Paris and took the train into the city. Our train wasn’t supposed to be for a few hours but I saw an earlier train that I didn’t think we’d be able to catch. We did manage to get our tickets changed right before the train left and I was happy to be heading out hours ahead of schedule. This also meant we would arrive before dark which is always nice in a new place. It was only the beginning of the trip but I was already loving my time on the train. It was so nice to just doze off and get a short nap or read one of the e-books I downloaded on my phone. We arrived at the train station in Amboise and headed to our airbnb. Our hosts were out of town but the neighbors showed us around and got us settled in. We were also the only guests so it was kind of cool having the whole place to ourselves. On our first night we pretty much just walked around and got dinner before settling in for the night. Travel days take a lot out of me plus we were still adjusting to the new time-I think we were 9 hours off from Seattle.

The next day we decided to stick close to town and explore. We started out at the castle in town and got to see some pretty cool views of Amboise. We had a lot of fun just taking it all in and enjoying the history and beauty around us. We didn’t do a ton of research before the trip so we were both pretty surprised to find out that Leonardo Da Vinci is buried in the chapel inside the castle. Uh, what?! Pretty crazy.





After our morning at the castle we did a little wine tasting before getting food for lunch. We picked up a baguette before stopping at the cheese shop (something I had been so excited to do). We got a local goat cheese and some salami and then had a picnic lunch at our place. We took a short rest and then decided to check out Chateau du Clos Luce which is the last place Da Vinci lived. We toured the house then strolled around the grounds. It was really beautiful there especially with the leaves beginning to turn. On the way back we took our time taking pictures of the streets and the timbered houses. It was really lovely. We rested up until 7 when most places open for dinner but the few places we wanted to go to were closed. We weren’t having a lot of luck with restaurants. We ended up getting kabobs and eating them at our place while watching The Terminator. Not quite what I would have guessed but I really enjoyed it.