Chateau de Nazelles: Our Home Was Our Castle
In order to ignore the fact that it is dang cold out, I’d say it’s time for some more reminiscences from our September trip to France. After Chartres we spent several days in the Loire Valley. We stayed at a bed and breakfast called Chateau de Nazelles, a castle built in 1518, and less than two miles from the town of Amboise.
Aside from being a nice place to stay, we found Chateau de Nazelles (an officially designated historic monument) to be a worthwhile destination in itself. The owners, Olivier and Veronique Fructus, told us that restoring the sprawling Chateau has been a work in progress for the last thirty years.
Chateau de Nazelles is built near the top of a hill overlooking the valley. I suppose this was to make the castle easier to defend, but today the location makes for some really nice views.
There are also extensive gardens, filled with hedges, flowers, and comfortable nooks. The Fructus family grow fresh flowers for the Chateau from their own cutting garden.
You can easily spend a couple of hours exploring the grounds, which are filled with mysterious stairways and archways. The walls are covered with many vines, including Wisteria, Trumpet Creeper, and Boston Ivy.
Here is the entrance to the breakfast room. They provide a delicious breakfast, featuring local bread, cheese, fruit, and yogurt. At breakfast the owners make an effort to talk to you about your plans and offer helpful suggestions. Chateau de Nazelles is very well situated to be a base for exploring the Loire.
For the few days we stayed there, Judy and I could honestly say that our home was our castle.
gardeninacity 
Beautiful! Thanks for giving us a tour. 🙂
You’re welcome. Gave me an excuse to peruse and sigh over the photographs.
Oh my goodness!!!! Is this gorgeous! I have no words except for I want to be there…instead of here!!! Such a magical looking place! I am bookmarking this for the future! Thanks Jason!
I hope you and your husband get to go. Judy and I found this to be the kind of trip you go on after the kids are done with high school.
Nice place to stay. Beautiful views all around.
It was beautiful.
Wow, so charming! I will have to jot down the name. thanks for the tour.
You’re welcome.
AWESOME! Need I say more?
I guess that sums it up.
This looks wonderful. So lush and green and typically french. I wouldn´t mind staying there.
The whole area was really great, our first time there.
You have make beautiful photos!
Greetings from Holland, RW & SK
Thank you!
What a lovely place to stay, I’m bookmarking this as we’re thinking of going to France next year for a holiday and this looks a great base.
Definitely a good base if you want to visit the other Chateaus on the Loire.
Lovely castle you have there! The gardens look quite lush. I have been in Amboise once as a teenager (many years ago) and only remember the Chateau -kind of. Perhaps it is time to return.
It seems like an enchanted place. You must have enjoyed your stay there.
Yes, we definitely did.
Heavenly. I needed something beautiful to meditate upon this morning. Thank you!
Glad you enjoyed it.
What a lovely place to stay – perfect for a gardener! Lovely pictures too.
We saw lots of gardens in the area.
What an amazingly beautiful place, I just loved all those hedges, how wonderful it must be to actually live there.xxxx
Don’t think I didn’t fantasize about that all the time.
What a treat! Thank you for the photo tour! 🙂
Thanks!
What a beautiful place. I suppose if you own a place like this you probably don’t trim your own hedges, but I wouldn’t want the job.
They probably have some help in the garden but do a lot themselves. They did not seem like wealthy people, and the chateau is still something of a fixer upper (did you see the roof?). Which did detract from our stay.
What an exquisite spot! You have lots of wonderful pix of this castle, thanks for sharing them (and transporting yourself back to warmer weather at the same time).
I expect to be doing a lot of that in the coming months.
Oh this is so beautiful Jason, how lucky you were to be able to visit. I can just imagine myself living here. Simply gorgeous house and grounds. Thankyou for sharing your wonderful photos.
We did feel very lucky to be able to make this trip.
Beautiful house and castle, Jason! I’d like to live high on a hill and see this valley, so large and pretty. I love the view from your room window and I think this castle is a right place to stay and to visit Loire castles!
Hi Nadezda. Yes, it’s hard to be there without fantasizing about living there.
Not too shabby!
Exactly!
30 year work in progress? What a relief! I still have about 25 years to bring my own chateau up to par….. unfortunately at my pace I may fall short in the end. Beautiful place and a great spot to start and end your day from, thanks for the tour!
While the place is comfortable, the restoration has a way to go. Did you notice the moss-covered roof?
hmmm. I thought that was “ambiance”
I would love to live in an actual castle with majestic furnishings and lush gardens. This is beautiful – I wish I was there!
The castle was pretty grand but, the furnishings inside I’d say were just comfortable and surprisingly modern (wifi and all).
Oh this is heaven…I really love this castle and the garden. Reminds me of the movie An Enchanted April (even though that was in Italy).