Tours is the last town we stayed in before heading back to Paris.  We were a bit road-weary by this time and were less interested in site-seeing and more interested in resting our weary bones in a plaza with a cold libation.

But we were getting better at driving in more populated areas and managed to find the heart of town, secure a reasonably-priced hotel room by the train station and drop off the rental car in some obscure area behind the train station without acrimony - all in under two hours.

We were sad to see the Renault go.  It had been our trusty companion through three countries and we were becoming quite comfortable in the little doodle bug.  But part we did, and after freshening up in the spare but adequate hotel room, we hit the town.

Tours was a taste of reality after living in a medieval fairy tale for two and a half weeks.  It is a university town with historic elements, but there are also signs of modernity that were less appealing than the quaint hamlets we had been visiting.

Strings of pharmacies lined vast boulevards filled with working-class folks, bums and maybe a prostitute or two.  City buses choked the streets and cars honked in desperation at crowded traffic signals.  The rumpled train station was overflowing with hippie youth and it was clear that we were entering into an urban portion of our journey.

But we did weave in threads of the past by visiting the historic Cathedrale St-Gatien, peeping through the gates of the Musee des Beaux Arts, walking past the Eglise St-Julien and the Hotel Gouin and wandering through the half-timbered facades around the Tour Charlemagne. After checking out the place St-Pierre-le-Puellier, a square with sunken Gallo-Roman remains we finally plunked down in the crowded, boisterous place Plumereau for cold beers and the ever-mesmerizing people watching.

After lubricating ourselves in the square we also decided to eat dinner there and ended up at a table across from three older French couples who all ordered steak and were very particular about the preparation and presentation of each one.  The men were especially voracious in appetite and dialogue, and it was quite amusing to see them orchestrate each moment of their evening like a lively operetta.

When we finally wandered back to the hotel, the night sky passed through several magnificent shades of blue.  We tried our best to capture some of the local architecture against this dramatic backdrop.  Check out the results (Dome, Tower).  Sometimes focusing the camera is the biggest hurdle.

The Dome is Illuminated

A Very Dark Tower