Nicola BOBELDIJK's selection of French property for sale

About my area

I live in the Loir et Cher, department 41 in a small village 40km east of the city of Tours, and 2.5 hours from Paris. We are ideally situated in the beautiful Loire Valley for visiting all the chateaux of this historic area. The countryside has hills and fields covered in vines & sunflowers - these are complemented with the river Loire and the river Cher (my favourite) running through them. There are countless troglodyte dwellings many still inhabited ,and hundreds of kilometres of underground passages in the hills from where they used to quarry the limestone (tuffeau) to build all the famous chateaux. We are 10 minutes from St Aignan which has the largest zoo in europe, Zoo Beauval. 10 minutes the other direction is the town of Montrichard where we go to spend time on the beach by the river Cher. There we can sit and relax at the bar looking out at views of the castle across the river. The temperature can be cold in the winter depending on the year but we do tend to have warmer temperatures than Paris and the north of France. I love this region for it's scenery, relaxed atmosphere, friendly people and abundance of things to do.............and I hope that you will too!

About me

I moved to this wonderful area in 2007 with my husband (we were married in the village) and my 2 children who were 8 & 11 at the time. We spent 2 years full time renovating our property in order to open our B&B....it was the usual story you see on TV; hard work, blood sweat and many tears (always your own), running out of money, frustration with the famous beaurocracy..... until finally the property still is not finished! Our B&B opened in 2009 but we didn't finished most of the work on our house (including a new roof) until 2011. My 2 children started in the state French schools from the first day and have now chosen different pathways but are still within the education system here which I highly recommend........it isn't perfect but it definitely suited my 2 children even though they are both very different people, and they now have that advantage of being truly bi-lingual. If you want to find a property in this region please have a look at my portfolio - If I don't currently have your dream home, let me know your requirements & I will do my best to help you find it!