La Flèche and St.Germain du Val

Wandered round area, found watermill and Choir, looked as if there was a gite as we saw men come and the proprietress showed him the house. There was a camp site there as well, camping à la ferne, we think Chalou it’s called, east of Durtal. Ended up after fruitless search for Châteaux, (either not there or not accessible - probably got the wrong road) at La Flèche, after calling in to St.Germain du Val where Léo Delibes was born (wrote Copélia, Lakmé, etc). There’s a plaque on the wall outside the church to him. Went inside, a lady was there doing the flowers, she told us that the church of St.Thomas out La Flèche was the place where Richard Coeur de Lion’s grandmother was buried there - we didn’t find her, but Henry IV’s statue was in the square, and we reasoned that the very huge college with H’s on the door must be a naval college, as Henry IV was Henry the UNREADABLE (Pyranetée Militaire I think it was called). Bill went fishing in the evening, someone caught an eel.

ST.GERMAIN-du-VAL (Sarthe) L’Église (where Léo Delibes was born at Le Paiulion (farm))