North to Vermeer

We had a nice mosey through France. Poor Belgium always gets the short shrift as we zip through to places further north.

From the time we left Santiago in mid-April, we really only had two hard dates that dictated our travels before catching the ferry to Ireland from Scotland in late June. First, we had reservations at a campground near Paris for a week starting May 17. Second, we had tickets to see the Johannes Vermeer exhibition in Amsterdam on May 30th. In between those obligations we were free to move about as we pleased.

In spite of having been in France multiple times, we had yet to visit any of the famous chateaus that dot the landscape, save for Versailles which we visited in 2017. Since we were heading north toward Paris and we had the time, we figured why not swing by a couple and see what all the fuss was about?

Château de Chambord, Loire Valley

Wow, what a stunner this place is! We arrived late and parked up in the designated motorhome parking area on the grounds. We could see the towers through the trees and walked the short distance to take a look. Château de Chambord is breathtaking! We only saw the exterior until the following day, but it was plenty impressive. Towers! Moats! Beautiful gardens! Spectacular architecture!

I’ve said it before, France is the most motorhome friendly country we’ve ever experienced. Nearly all the tourist sites have parking, or there is an aire close by. We are never lacking for places to overnight.
Our first view of Château de Chambord.
Scaffolding is a part of many sights during the off-season.

The next morning we were first in line when it opened. Fortunately it wasn’t crowded, so we got to take our time and go from room to room at our own leisurely pace. There are 440 of them but of course not all are open to see. There are also 282 fireplaces and 84 staircases, including the famous double-spiral staircase designed by Leonardo da Vinci. Steven and I ascended at the same time, never crossing paths.

Many of these large structures throughout Europe were built for defense. Not so with Château de Chambord. This place was a hunting lodge, built to impress and as a display of wealth.
As I walked around the chateau, I tried to calculate how many full time people it would take to keep it clean and light all those fireplaces. And can you imagine if you left your cell phone by your bedside and you were already downstairs for breakfast? It would take about 20 minutes to fetch it. Or, it would take someone on your staff 20 minutes to fetch it. Or maybe you have one in every room? IDK, but I think about things like this.
Ascending the double staircase. There were openings every so often , so we could look across at each other. But we did not cross paths directly!
There was a view from nearly every window of the gardens and outdoor features.
There were multiple salons on each floor. Some are used today for private events, all are quite large and hold hundreds of people.
Typical chateau bedrooms and sitting area. All the ones we saw had fabulous views out to the grounds.
More bedroom decor and copper pots in the kitchen. It was amazing to me that for all the grandeur of the salons and bedrooms, the kitchen was not so opulent. I guess, in the areas used mostly by staff, functionality was more important than style.

Château de Fontainebleau, France

Five centuries before Versailles there was Fontainebleau, the palace of Kings. It dwarfs Chambord, but the architecture is not as cohesive. With 34 kings and two emperors making Fontainebleau their own, from the Middle Ages to the 19th Century, each ruler (and his architect) put their own touches on the structure. As styles changed, so too did Fontainebleau. The last of its residents was Emperor Napoleon III.

That road has been traveled by kings and members of their court, and now, Bijou. It was super bumpy, and I wonder how those coaches traveled on it without losing a wheel, or making the occupants ill. But how thrilling must it have been to arrive by carriage to this spectacular place!

The chateau boasts 1,500 rooms, but we didn’t get to see any of them. We were able to park right outside the grounds so we spent a good deal of time walking around. Unfortunately, we arrived too late in the day to go inside, and the chateau was closed on the next. Bad timing on our part, but we have vowed to return next year if we are in the area to complete our visit. The grounds, however, are stunning.

The grounds were extensive and quite beautiful. Gardens, water features, flowers, you name it. Fontainebleau has it all.
It is difficult to get the entire structure into a photo, but here you can see how different styles.
I could swan here. 🙂
I am looking forward to walking through some of the 1500 rooms in this place! One room was made ready for Marie-Antoinette but it was apparently not to her liking, so she had it redone.
Sometimes I imagine what it would be like to live at court, and it always starts off fun with pretty dresses, strolls in the park and lawn games, day drinking and getting lost in the maze of rooms. But then I think, ew, no. Lack of hygiene, blood “pudding”, palace intrigue and so on. I think I’d be a ball of anxiety.
This is the official entrance, which is on the other side from where we parked. That staircase is where Napoleon Bonaparte bid farewell to his Old Guard after he was forced to abdicate in 1814 after his failed invasion of Russia and defeat by the Allies.
This is the view from the staircase toward the town of Fontainebleau.
More grounds in between some of the structures.
A landscape architect with a sense of humor.

Paris

We left Château de Fontainebleau and returned to Camping des Rives near Paris, the same campground where we stayed last fall for five weeks. We were really happy there and figured it was a good place to catch up on chores, laundry and shopping. Plus, we know the area pretty well and could get in some good walking along the river and canal.

What a difference a season makes! Springtime in Paris has to be my favorite! The trees are leafed out, gardens and landscapes are bursting with color, the skies were sunny and the temperatures were absolutely perfect. What a joy!

The campground was almost unrecognizable from when we were there last fall! We thought they had done a ton of new landscaping, but it was just everything leafing out and coming to life that made it look so different.
Enjoying moules et frites a la Cafe Fifi along the river Marne. This little cafe is a guinguette, a popular type of tavern in the suburbs of Paris where people gather to eat, drink and dance the night away!

Another reason to be in Paris is Steven’s love of the Musee d’Orsay. He is continuing with his art studies and visiting there is always time well spent. I didn’t even go into the city on this trip, I enjoyed staying home, cooking, cleaning and generally preparing for the continuation of our trip north and then to Ireland.

You can imagine the crowds at the Louvre in Paris on a beautiful spring day. Steven walked by, but didn’t visit this time.
Steven attended the Monet/Degas exhibit at the Musée D’Orsay and, although crowded, he did manage to see most of what was on view. In addition to the paintings in the exhibit, he also joined the crowds visiting the Van Gogh offerings.

Cappy

About 125 kilometers north of Paris is a little commune called Cappy, population 512. It is a serene place located along the Somme river and popular with the boating community as a great place to tie up for a few days and roam about the area. We parked up in the nearby aire and explored the area on our bikes.

A lovely place to swan, and ride bikes! This area has several popular bike routes so we had plenty of dedicated lanes to travel on.

We came across two of the most beautiful cemeteries created as the final resting place for soldiers who lost their lives in World War II. Most were British, but a few other nationalities also. We were really mesmerized by how lovely they are, so elegantly designed and well kept. Amazingly, we found headstones matching both our last names, Gray and Dempsey, as well as the married name I still go by, Davey.

These cemeteries are literally carved into a corner of some farmer’s field and they look so compact. But upon further inspection, there are hundreds of gravesites in each one. All beautifully kept thanks to a trust formed by the British government.
Gray is my maiden name, Davey my previous married name which I kept because of my kids. Sometimes I go by Dempsey, or both, or all of them, it depends on who’s asking. 🙂

We spent four blissful days in Cappy, long enough to find a favorite bike route and bakery along the way. We could have stayed longer, but Johannes Vermeer was calling.

We peddled by the church on our way to the bakery. The almond croissants were our favorite!
After securing our croissants, we made our way to the lovely picnic area on the way to the military cemeteries. What a great stay we had in Cappy!

Amsterdam

At the beginning of the year, we were parked up in the south of France freezing our butts off and making plans to head south. It was so cold, there were days we never left Bijou. It was during this time that I read an article about the Johannes Vermeer exhibition at the Rijksmuseum in Amsterdam. With 28 of 37 known paintings in existence scheduled to be at the show, it was being hailed as the definitive, once-in-a-lifetime exhibition of this Dutch master.

Steven made a new friend at the campsite in Amsterdam. If he had been able to entice that kitty to come inside, he might still be traveling with us today.

Given that it was only January and our plans were changing with every passing cold and wet day, we did our best to nail down a time we could be in Amsterdam. We decided on May 30th. Steven went online and bought our tickets. We were nervous about buying them so early when our plans were still shifting, but as it turns out, the show sold out by February 11th, so we were glad we had our tickets secured!

We were excited to finally see the Vermeer exhibit and what a gorgeous day we had on the day we attended.
This volume of people was pretty typical for most of the paintings on display, but it was well-thought out and with a little patience, it was possible to get up close and personal. Each painting was given lots of room, so as we got further into the exhibit, the crowds seemed to lessen.
“Girl Reading a Letter at an Open Window”. I don’t know who named these paintings, but they are all quite on the nose. This one shows a painting within a painting, the little Cherub above the girl’s head. This is how Vermeer painted it, but at some point the painting was altered and the Cherub painting was blank. It was only discovered in 2017 during a restoration. I love the colors, the lead squares of the window and the girl’s reflection.
The Milkmaid. I did a lot of reading about Vermeer and the paintings on display at the exhibition and it really helped me see them in a completely different way. Or at least, I understood them better than if I had just rocked up and looked at them with no context whatsoever. For instance, despite the title, the milkmaid is not a milkmaid, she’s actually a housemaid and she is making bread pudding. That little box on the floor is a foot warmer.
I love the colors in Vermeer’s paintings. He painted several ladies wearing a yellow jacket and he loved the salmon and blue colors. Back in the day, these pigments were expensive! And look how he sticks everyone in a corner! The window embellishments are different, and the floor, too, but nearly everyone is in a corner.

There is a lot going on in these paintings that I learned about and found it so interesting! I especially enjoyed seeing this exhibition with Steven, who looks at these things with a completely different eye than a normal human being 🙂 We had a lot of fun and animated chats about the paintings which really made the whole experience so enjoyable. I learned a lot from him, too.

While in Amsterdam, Steven took the opportunity to visit the Van Gogh museum. Although sold out for the day, when he was there the galleries were almost empty!

In addition to the museum visits, we also took a couple of trips into the city just to roam around and eat French fries and Sroopwafels. On one occasion when we stopped to eat some fries, Steven managed to smash his head into an iron bar while going up some stairs to the bathroom. When he returned to our table, I saw blood dripping down his face. Uh, what happened, I asked casually. The proprietor ran over to give us a big wad of paper towels. It took us a while to get the bleeding under control, but once it stopped, we could tell no stitches were needed. He had a pretty good scrape on the top of his head but it healed, eventually.

The nearby train station was super convenient into the city although much more expensive than the ferry (which is free but requires a half an hour’s walk to get to it from our campground).
A student artist outside the Rijksmuseum painting a copy of a Vermeer, Van Gogh posters on the street and a heron waits impatiently for his hotel room to be ready.
Scenes from Amsterdam. We tried to get Stroopwafels here but the line never seemed to move, so we went to another place. Delicious.
If you are a fan of Ted Lasso, you will remember the scene where Rebecca falls into the canal with her phone during a team visit to Amsterdam. We tried to recreate it, but I wasn’t keen on going into the water. This semi–same scene was the best I could do.
Rebecca’s love interest in the episode lived on this boat!
We thought the name of this place was cute. Fun fact, this is also where Steven got his massive head wound.
I think this was taken before Steven’s meeting with the big iron bar on his head.

The day we were to leave Amsterdam we were scheduled to catch an afternoon ferry from the Hook of Holland to Harwich, England. But the day before, I mentioned to Steven that I was feeling a little NDR (not doing right), like maybe I had a kidney stone. Nothing strikes fear in me more than possibly having a kidney stone, except perhaps the possibility of having it while being on a ferry in the middle of a channel in the North Sea. With that in mind, off we went to the hospital.

We had to sit outside and wait for the GP’s office at the hospital to open, since this was not an emergency. After the office visit, I went to the pharmacy to get the “just in case” prescription.

If this was the U.S. I would have spent thousands of dollars on the ER visit and imaging and whatever else (ask me how I know) but in The Netherlands, the doctor was like, eh, probably just a UTI. Take some antibiotics. But if I’m wrong, here’s some meds to manage the pain until it passes. Goodbye! I paid €186 for the appointment, which was reimbursed by our travel insurance. And so far, no stone. I got on the ferry and made the trip just fine!

And finally, if you enjoyed the Vermeers, you will also enjoy a drawing from my in-house artist. This is a pencil drawing Steven did of one of his favorite musicians, Kate Bush. If you would like to see more, you can keep up with what he’s doing by following his Facebook art page here or on Instagram here.


Up next: A cool and wet Irish summer.


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16 Comments

    1. 2chouters

      I know you all have big air conditioners, but what happens when the grid goes down? That would be my fear for my family! Not a worry for myself, because I don’t plan to live there, lol, even with A/C I could not handle the heat!

  3. Catherine Wolfe

    Again, thanks for the armchair tour! It sounds and looks like y’all had a lovely time. I, too, get stuck with my fascination with architecture and art! The more stark downstairs or belowstairs, show how the classes were still going strong in society. As no one had the “open concept”, there was no need to go beyond functional. Steven, I’m so glad you’ve recovered from your wound.

    1. 2chouters

      Lots of open concept at Chambord with salons on every floor, but you are right. Downstairs where function is more important than form, it was more cramped, less opulent and fewer views. My, how things have changed! 🙂

  4. bonnie barnes

    Wonderful pictures great blog. That was a cute kitty. Ofcourse I am partial to Amsterdam glad to hear both of you are okay.I could almost taste the patat frites looking at the picture of all those fries.

  5. Liz

    Always glad to see a new post from you! Your photos and descriptions do a great job of transporting me to these beautiful places. Thank you.
    When visiting France several decades ago, I too was struck by the beautiful British WWII cemeteries. What a treat to see all the Vermeer paintings. Crowded galleries are difficult for me, but for Vermeer, I would do it.

    1. 2chouters

      We have not spent a great deal of time in northern France, so we made a point to visit these cemeteries. We didn’t expect to be so drawn to them. They were so beautiful and serene. The Vermeer exhibition was crowded, but not as bad as I thought it would be. People were very respectful and allowed everyone to get up close and personal. My only regret was that “The Girl With The Pearl Earring” had already been removed from the exhibit and returned to her home at The Mauritshuis in The Hague, so we didn’t get to see her. Bummer!

      1. Liz

        What a shame you didn’t get to see her! Seems odd that a painting would be removed before the end of the exhibit. Guess you will just have to visit her in her hometown!

        1. 2chouters

          I know! She was in Amsterdam for the first part of the exhibit, but she couldn’t stay for the whole thing! It was quite a feat to gather all these paintings in the first place, so I guess they took whatever they could get!

  6. Debbie McCormack

    The size of those estates is insane! Did they even live long enough to get to live in them? Lovely exhibits. Glad neither you or Stephen had a repeat episode! Kidney Stones are the worst!

    1. 2chouters

      These places were not lived in consistently. Most have fallen into disrepair time and again and then some one with money would come along and bring it back to life. Such history! My fingers are still crossed that a stone does not raise its ugly head!!!

  7. Jodee Gravel

    Those places make the mansions in Rhode Island look like cottages! It’s nearly impossible to wrap my head around the overall size, amount of furniture, time just for decorating, and of course keeping them clean! Love that header shot. The post-COVID summer crowds are sure a lot bigger! Cappy looks like the perfect breather after all the “big” places 🙂 What a treat to see the incredible Vermeer exhibit – sometimes those advance plans really do work out! I’d have loved to be a fly on your shoulder (maybe a butterfly instead) for the discussions you two shared at the showing.

    1. 2chouters

      I loved those homes in Rhode Island! We toured a few of them and I did the same thing, trying to figure out how many staff it would take for upkeep. 🙂

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