Pierrefonds, the castle

Our lovely Belgian friend, Winnie, whom we met on our Mediterranean cruise last year, had let us know she was going to take her granddaughter to the Chateau de Pierrefonds in August. We had never heard of Pierrefonds and just thought that was a nice thing for Winnie and her granddaughter to do. When we arrived in Compiegne, we went to the Tourist Information Office to find out what was of interest to see and do, and lo and behold, Pierrefonds Castle was 15km away! We think we missed them by four days! What a shame – but we probably couldn't have made it to Compiegne in time even if we had known. Thank goodness we will catch up with Winnie and Regnier next month when we leave the boat in Antwerp.!

We decided to cycle to Le Chateau Pierrefonds taking a cycle path through the forest. The weather has continued to be 'iffy' so we went prepared with our rain jackets as well as our sunglasses because we usually need both. There were a couple of kilometres to ride through town first, some of it over the dreaded ancient cobblestones (dire on bicycles), and then 11.8km through the forest. It was flat to gently undulating most of the way and a very enjoyable ride. It is such a treat to be able to ride safely without any motorised traffic to worry about.

Quite suddenly we were out of the forest and there was this very impressive castle of the 'fairytale' variety, absolutely huge and completely OTT but definitely magnificent. There is a TV series called Merlin which uses the castle as its setting. We don't know if this programme is screening in NZ, but it is a perfect choice for that programme.


The lady at the Tourist Information Office more or less told us there was not a lot to see inside, just magnificent rooms but nothing in the way of furniture etc. We decided to walk around the grounds and spend a bit of time in the little shop, which sells all manner of books about the castle and other knick knacks. It is impossible to take a useful photo of such a huge structure so we bought an aerial photo/postcard (see above) but we quite like our own photo too (see below) Just as we were leaving the castle, it started to drizzle so we repaired to a recommended lunch stop and enjoyed very good hot chips (our first chips in months!), salad and steak (J) or duck (C). The steakwas the better choice. Just the right way to sit out a long and at times very heavy shower of rain. We had a pleasant, rain-free ride back to the boat having cycled at least 28km, although our bottoms and girly bits were a bit sore by the time we got back. Our thanks to Winnie for a great day out!