Normandy to Loire help

leewishon,
I haven't been myself, but many posters here highly recommend Le Mans, and it really sounds worth a stop. Also, when we drove from Brittany to the Loire, we stayed overnight in Saumur, another nice town with wine tasting options and mushroom caves you can visit. A bit out of the way after the Mont is Villedieu-la-Poele, a small town known for bell-making and lace-making (tours may be available). Not too far (about 40 minutes northeast) from MSM, then to Amboise from there it is about 3 1/2-4 hours.
Take a look at a map of the area (I like the paper Michelin maps for this) to see what routes call to you.
Bonne chance!

I am a notoriously long responder on travel forums but on this forum I have a limited amount of characters so let me first start by saying that you will be doing the right thing by buying Michelin maps for wherever you explore in France. I'll break my info up into a couple of posts because this forum won't allow me to give you the advice you're looking for in one post.

Here is some general advice about how to research a vacation in France. The important info is about tourist office websites, Michelin maps and visiting tourist offices in person for any city/town/village you might visit:

Get your hands on the Michelin maps. These are a crucial resource for researching scenic drives and finding interesting towns/villages/sites to visit. The maps have nothing to do with using google maps (or similar) to get driving directions from point A to point B (though you can use them for that in non-congested, rural areas). You want the ones of the scale 1:200,000 (regional maps) or 1:150,000 (departmental maps, more detailed, cover slightly less area) for whatever regions you visit. The Michelin maps have icons for all kinds of historically/touristically interesting things such as châteaux, ruins, churches, abbeys, scenic view points, caves, Roman sites, megaliths, designated scenic roads (highlighted in green) and many other things. A nice feature of the 1:150,000 maps is they show the starred attractions in the corresponding Michelin Green guidebooks.

Usually when I'm exploring various regions in France I just look at the map and I am able to plan interesting and scenic drives just reading the map. For instance, I usually look for a designated scenic road, which are highlighted in green, and I especially look for towns with the historic church and/or château icon as well as the other icons I mentioned and try to string all these things together. With the departmental maps also look for towns/sites/attractions that have been given one or more Michelin stars. I also try to make sure the route goes through as many small villages as possible. Usually putting all these things together I find interesting and scenic drives without even knowing where I am going and with no assistance from a guide book. Often these places are never mentioned in guidebooks and remain completely unknown to many tourists. You can buy the Michelin maps from their website.

https://editions.michelin.com/cartes-routieres/

As a side note, when you are researching your Michelin maps you'll note that there are two icons for châteaux. One is easy to identify as it is in bold, black color and indicates a château designated as a historic monument. However, you'll have to look closely at your map for the tiny, rectangular white château icon. These are usually private châteaux and many can only be viewed from the exterior (some may be open to the public) but they are nice to view from the exterior.

And speaking of Michelin, you can go to the website viamichelin.com and get info on drive times and distances, toll and fuel costs and suggested routes (i.e. scenic routes). The drive times given do not consider stops (fuel, food, bathrooms) nor do they consider bad weather and bad traffic. I find the drive times very accurate when these factors are accounted for. The time estimates can break down when you are driving in congested urban areas, like in or near Paris, due to the unpredictability of heavy traffic or traffic jams. They can also be affected on peak travel days, specifically on autoroutes leading to/from popular destinations.

Some other general advice for you. You can google the tourist office websites for any region, département, city, town or village you may want to visit. France is divided into several regions and each of these regions is divided into departments. You will find loads of info on these websites including hotel/accommodation and restaurant info as well as what to see and do in the area. Occasionally the websites have English versions. In doing a google search enter the words "office de tourisme" followed by the name of your region, département, city, town or village and this will bring that place to the top of your search. If you don't know in which region or département a city/town/village might be located then just go to wikipedia and enter the name of that city/town/village and it will mention in which region and département that city/town/village is located.

https://community.ricksteves.com/travel-forum/france/normandy-brittany-thoughts

leewishon,
Ditto to everything that Mystique said. We love the Michelin paper maps for the very same reasons in planning our drives anywhere in France. What we also do is trace our routes on the maps and voila! a souvenir of our trip, an aide-menmoir, so to speak. We have maps from 1974 showing our long holiday in Europe back then. And yes to the comments about viamichelin.com. When given an option of different routes (fastest, most economical, most scenic, etc.) we usually choose the most scenic, adding an hour or so to the site's times. Our go-to lodging search is gites-de-france.com, and we have never been disappointed with our choices. Some have been for only 2-3 night stays, some for 10-14 days. It antedates BandB.com and is really well-run. I haven't ever heard complaints like I have with VRBO and BandB.com. And another yes to the tourist office websites (and actual offices if they exist) for lots more detailed info than can be found on general travel websites.
You might check out Villedieu-la-poele on your way to Amboise. I will let you look it up for things to see there. Also, Saumur and Le Mans are good options.
Amusez-vous bien!

leewishon,
Just fyi here are the Michelin maps you might be interested in: #513...Normandie; #517,,,Pays de la Loire; #2025...,France Nord-Ouest (includes Loire and Normandy, plus other areas). Amazon may have them as well as Michelin website. I used to find them at Barnes and Noble, but no more, alas!

There are 3 maps you need for this journey. Michelin map #309 Côtes d'Armor, Ille-et-Vilaine, #310 Mayenne, Orne, Sarthe, and #317 Indre-et-Loire, Maine-et-Loire. . You could also just buy the Michelin atlas for all of France and have all of France in one book. I like having the huge fold-out maps so I can see a large area at a glance but that's just me.

If you use viamichelin.com you'll see a couple of possible options for the journey between MSM and Amboise and the fastest non-stop route takes about less than 4 hours. I'm only going to cover a few places out of many where you could stop along the way. You can use all of my above advice to research your vacation once in the Loire, where there are many more châteaux worth visiting besides Chenonceau, Blois, Chambord, Amboise, Langeais, Villandry, Azay-le-Rideau, Loches, Chinon, etc. Just google "loire châteaux" or similar phrases and there are loads of results. I actually do know of several lesser known châteaux that I still haven't visited that are pretty amazing but that's a different can of worms.

I've never been to Le Mans and I know it has a lovely medieval downtown but I would give it a pass even though it's on your route. However, that's for you to decide. On your route is Fougères:

https://www.ille-et-vilaine-tourism.com/plan-your-weekend-or-holiday/tourist-offices/destination-fougeres-office-de-tourisme-fougeres-en-2728814/

There's a lot of pretty bland landscapes on the way between Fougères and Le Mans but a pretty little town on the way just off the A81 between Laval and Le Mans is Sainte-Suzanne: https://www.coevrons-tourisme.com/en/

The landscape scenery improves after you get south of Le Mans on the A28 and this is where you can use my Michelin map advice if you want to be creative. There's an exit off the A28 (#26) near Château-du-Loir and if you wanted to do something that I've always wanted to do and that no other tourist has ever done (OK, maybe a few forum posters have done this, but not many) from what I've seen of all my years of being on various travel forums then look at the map and note the designated scenic roads such as the D305 and a bunch of towns near places like Troo, and especially east of Troo. Basically between Château-du-Loir and Vendôme. You will note on the map a huge concentration of scenic roads, but even better, a huge concentration of châteaux that have been given the designation of "Historic Monument", which also means they will be impressive even if you just drive by and view them from the outside. Like I said, I've never been to this region but I live in France and I am an expert on vacationing in France and this is an area that I've been targeting for a long time and have never been to. It might be too much for just a detour on your way from MSM to Amboise but you can look into it: https://troo.fr/troo-tourisme/ https://www.vendome-tourisme.fr/en/offers/montoire-tourist-office-montoire-sur-le-loir-en-2570481/

If you wanted to make a detour to visit a château then one out of a plethora of options might be the the Château du Lude, which pretty much no one on any travel forum I participate in has ever visited but it is someplace I'll visit one day: https://www.lelude.com/en/ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HniLd7PKNoA

I'm pretty much done for now but if you've got any other questions I'll see if I can provide answers.

Thank you, everyone, for your helpful responses. Planning this trip has been overwhelming-but exciting! The advice you've shared has been most helpful. Thank you again!

Here's a portion of my response to a similar, recent question:

As for your trip south to the Loire Valley, I would suggest stopping in Le Mans. It has a nice old town center (Cité Plantagenêt) with remnants of Gallo-Roman walls and interesting structures. On summer evenings La Nuit des Chimères involves music and colorful light shows projected on the walls of buildings. On the tip of an island in La Sarthe, the river flowing south through Le Mans, is a statue to the Wright Brothers that your son may like to learn about. In 1908, Wilbur Wright demonstrated the Wright Flyer to incredulous Europeans at the Hunaudières race course outside Le Mans. Maybe have him check out a copy of The Wright Brothers by David McCullough from the King County Library to learn about what a big deal that was.

And of course there's le Musée des 24 Heures du Mans if you guys are interested in auto racing. Not my interest, but some people like it.

Fougères is nice for a stop and a look, but there's not much to do there, in my opinion.