Le Ruault gîtes

Enjoy life in the slow lane in the Loire Valley. Wine-tasting, châteaux or chilling - your choice!
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Two well-appointed self-catering holiday cottages sleeping up to 14 people with a heated outdoor swimming pool and plenty of space to relax. Explore our extensive grounds with a lake, orchard and a variety of spots to sit and watch the world go by. If you want to be active, we have table tennis, badminton and archery. Or discover the local area by car or bike (we have a dozen for all ages).

11/11/2024

*** Lest we forget ***

We went to the main cemetery in Thouars for the commemoration of the Armistice this morning. In France the celebrations are always on 11 November itself, regardless of the day of the week.

The cemetery looked very colourful on account of the chrysanthemums placed on graves for Toussaints (All Saints’ Day) on 1 November.

We had live musicians (smaller villages often rely on an amplifier and recordings of La Marseillaise), a parade of soldiers, protection civile and the sapeurs-pompiers (fire brigade) and wreath-laying.

Wandering through the war graves themselves was as sobering as ever, not least the memorial to 30 Polish firemen killed in a bombardment in Thouars itself on 18 June 1940.

31/10/2024

Lovely view of Thouars market which occurs every Friday (with a smaller version on Tuesdays).

Voted 6th best market in France, you can buy fresh meat, fish, veg and fruit, as well as chickens ready to lay, clothes, plants or some dim sum for lunch.

Not only that, but there’s a stall for getting your chainsaw sharpened, your basket weave chair repaired and your sewing machine mended.

We love a wander round followed by a coffee in Café à la Paix just soaking up the atmosphere.

24/09/2024

With the international karting circuit (Circuit du Val d'Argenton) just 12 minutes away, it’s been great fun hosting karting and drift teams and fans this year. Especially when it’s the winner of the Drift PRO Championship which concluded there this last weekend.

The Swiss pilot (Séverin Stoeckli) and his team turned up on Thursday to stay in Poplar House. Some drift super fans rented Orchard Cottage from Friday - their eyes were on stalks when I told them who was also staying on site.

I’d tracked that Séverin was in pole position for the final race on Sunday but didn’t see him on the podium. Turns out he won enough points to win the overall championship, even if his car took a bit of a bashing! 🏆🍾

No wonder they didn’t get back here until 3am and there were a few sore heads as they left on Monday morning for the 9-hour drive back to Lausanne.

01/09/2024

Another wonderful Montgolfiade - definitely a fixture in our calendar and a fitting end to the summer holidays.

Once the pilot briefing has taken place and the green flag is hoisted to say it’s safe to fly, there’s a race to see which balloon will inflate fastest and take off.

Last night there were at least 30 balloons. Some just did a short flight and then returned to the hippodrome as night fell to set up for the ‘night glow’ (which we’d not seen before). There were even little tethered balloons with small baskets that children could put their soft toys/teddies in for a flight as well.

The ‘night glow’ involved the teams blasting their burners in time to music…sort of.

It was all magical!

08/08/2024

It’s sunflower time. Talk about lifting your spirits!

05/08/2024

A fabulous piano concert last night - part of the Festival Au Fil du Thouet - with sisters Chiara and Fiona Alaimo playing with both 2 and 4 hands on one piano. Mendelssohn, Brahms, Liszt, Debussy and Chopin - all from memory 🤪

They also performed compositions by modern composers, one of whom was there in person.

Sitting outside at the Château de Marsay was enchanting especially when the bats came out as darkness fell.

01/08/2024

We’re very pleased with the new sign at our entrance. Hopefully guests will find the last bit of their journey easy!

Nous sommes très satisfaits de notre nouveau panneau à notre entrée. J'espère que les invités trouveront la dernière partie de leur voyage facile !

31/07/2024

The first sunflower round us. Seems the fields were planted slightly later than elsewhere. But this will soon be awash with yellow. Can’t wait!

28/07/2024

Our annual visit to the Grand Prix Retro. Fabulous to soak up the sounds and smells of all manner of cars and bikes!

26/07/2024

Our Vitruvian Boy on our dog walking circuit. Lots of straw bales ready to come in.

But a question, hive mind: why is this field filled with round bales like these and the neighbouring one has more traditional, square bales?

23/06/2024

A promising crop of peaches this year. Hopefully the warmer weather this week will ripen them.

09/06/2024

Had a lovely time today at La Petite Ferme d'Alpagas Sanzay learning about alpacas and helping to sort the wool from Rohini (one of their ladies) so it can go off to be washed and spun before being knitted by Will Kaplaahh Hargreaves and Sophie Hargreaves.

They also offer visitors the chance to go for a walk with alpacas and various workshops.

There were crafters there promoting and selling their wares, too.

Ranulph was particularly keen on adding to the community mosaic of Clove (grey alpaca) created by Sarah Berry of Berry Creatif Designs.

08/06/2024

We encouraged this rose to climb up this tree about six years ago - looks like it’s happy 🥰

26/05/2024

It’s Mother’s Day here in France so I’ve had the day off…sort of.

We went to the mediaeval fair at Mauléon - lots of stalls, a fascinating bird show and various folk in costume. Great fun!

19/05/2024

Well, what a treat! A quick skim of the local paper this morning meant I found out about Banba Fiesta - a music festival in Nueil les Aubiers (about 25 minutes from here).

There was a great vibe and some brilliant bands including Feel The Steel from Portugal on tour around France.

Certainly got our feet tapping!

08/05/2024

Humbled to attend the VE Day ceremony in Thouars this morning in glorious sunshine (at last!).

Ranulph got his citizenship passport signed by the mayor and there was a guard of honour into the Orangerie of the château for a verre d’amitié (glass of friendship).

Lest we forget.

30/04/2024

We finally made it to Le Musée de Moteur (https://www.museedumoteur.fr/) for a fascinating look at all sorts of engines, although mainly of the internal combustion variety.

Arguably, they’ll be antiques within a generation but being able to see the development from simple engines via agricultural engines to rockets was educational.

08/11/2023

Not sure what’s going on with our chooks. The egg on the right is a normal sized egg like we usually get from them. The one on the left is teeny tiny - no camera trickery involved, I assure you.

I’m curious to find out if there’s just a teeny tiny yolk inside too. Watch this space!

Adresse

97 Lieu-dit Le Ruault
Bouillé-Loretz
79290

Site Web

http://www.le-ruault.co.uk/

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Vidéos

Well, what a treat! A quick skim of the local paper this morning meant I found out about Banba Fiesta - a music festival in Nueil les Aubiers (about 25 minutes from here). There was a great vibe and some brilliant bands including Feel The Steel from Portugal on tour around France. Certainly got our feet tapping!

It’s the annual blues festival here in Thouars this weekend. We went to one of the pop-up gigs at V&B for a beer…or two before dinner. Fab! These guys put a smile on everyone’s faces.

Our annual trip to the blues gig - part of the 2023 Au fil du Thouet festival. This year the guest soloist was Jose Ramirez from Costa Rica. He’s the first ever Latin-American artist to sign with the renowned Delmark record company in its 69 year history. Great voice, great playing and fab at getting the crowd going. We took a picnic and sat by the river below the château to chill. I love being able to hear such a range of live music (blues, classical, jazz, choral) - even in rural France!

The annual pilgrimage to the Retro at Le Puy Notre Dame with our guests who arrived yesterday. It’s a fab circuit round the village for bikes, bikes with sidecars, three-wheelers and four-wheelers plus the customary wander round the paddock for a good nosey round.