* The famous French writer Honore de Balzac, fleeing from creditors, Paris noise, stress and daily work, came to his native Tour and walked 20 versts to the Sachet castle, where his good friends lived. There, working in a small room that looked like a hermit's cell, he conceived "Father Goriot" and other pages of the "Human Comedy." As a vacation, he took walks around the neighborhood. And then one day, like a "diamond set in emeralds" reflected in the lazy greenish waters of the Indre, the Aze-le-Rideau castle opened to his gaze. Small and compact, with a beautiful staircase and richly decorated roof gables, at first glance it captured the writer's heart – Balzac uses it as a decoration for "Lilies in the Valley." This castle does not leave modern visitors indifferent either. A little further north, Villandry Castle has its famous gardens in the valley of the Cher, another "vassal" of the Loire. For Joaquim Carvallo and his wife, recreating the stalls of Renaissance gardens becomes their life's work. We will begin our acquaintance with them by going inside the castle, remembering one important and, at the same time, a simple rule: gardens, first of all, are created in order to admire them from the many windows of the manor. The last in a series of these lovely, livable castles will be on our Langeais tour. We return to the Loire, the signor and his beautiful lady are waiting for us. Everything in their castle is ready for a royal secret wedding: in a large hall, with a very small number of witnesses, King Charles of France and the last Duchess of Brittany, Anne, are married. We will take a walk along the sentinel way, look at the plots of an interesting and rich collection of tapestries, find out why Langeais is two castles in one and who is Fulke Nerra? Well, the current drawbridge is already closing behind us, the evening sun is softly illuminating the river landscape, our sightseeing day is ending. And there will be more and more discoveries of the Loire Valley ahead.