Set high above town, Saumur's airy, gleaming white fantasy of a Château (daily: June–Aug 9.30am–6pm; Sept–May 10am–1pm & 2–5.30pm; closed Tues Nov–March & Mon in Jan; €2, €6 with entry to museums), may seem oddly familiar, but then its famous depiction in Les Très Riches Heures du Duc de Berry, the most celebrated of all the medieval Books of Hours, is reproduced all over the region. It was built in the fourteenth century and turned into a much more decorative and comfortable residence by Duke René of Anjou in the fifteenth. Its serenely impregnable image took a knock in April 2001, when a huge chunk of the star-shaped fortifications added during the Wars of Religion – when Saumur was a Protestant stronghold – collapsed. The Château itself is built on more solid ground.You can climb down to the dungeons and up into the watchtower on the cheaper ticket, but it's worth paying the extra to enter the former royal apartments, which are given over to a pair of museums. The Musée des Arts Décoratifs houses an impressive collection of European china, as well as some superb fifteenth-century tapestries, including a series telling the story of the local saint St-Florent, a converted Roman soldier who worked miracles in the fourth century. But it's the Musée du Cheval, in the attic of the Château, that's the real treat. Progressing from a horse skeleton through the evolution of bridles and stirrups over the centuries, you finally reach an amazing and diverse saddlery collection, with elaborately, lovingly worked pieces from Tibet, Morocco, Mexico and all over the world. Down by the public gardens south of the Château, Saumur's oldest church, Notre-Dame de Nantilly (9am–6pm), houses a large tapestry collection in its Romanesque nave. The original Gothic church of St Pierre, in the centre of the old town (9am–noon & 2–5pm), hides behind a Counter-Reformation facade built as part of the church's efforts to overawe its persistently Protestant population – Louise de Bourbon, abbess of Fontevraud called the town a "second Geneva", horrified at the thought that Saumur might become a similarly radical Calvinist power-base. Meanwhile, the theological college at Notre-Dame des Ardilliers, down by the river on the eastern edge of town (daily 8am–noon & 2–6.30pm) is dominated by the tremendous dome of its Classical rotunda, rebuilt after bombing in June 1940. For relief from military and ecclesiastical history, try a glass of the famous Saumurméthode champenoise wines at the Maison du Vin on quai Lucien Gautier (April–Sept Mon 2–7pm, Tues–Sat 9.30am–1pm & 2–7pm, Sun 9.30am–1pm; Oct–March Tues–Sat 10am–1pm & 3–6.30pm; www.interloire.com), which can also provide addresses of wine-growers and caves that you can visit. Alternatively, make for the Caves Coopératives at St-Cyr-en-Bourg (tel 02.41.53.06.08), a short train hop south of Saumur and near the station, where there are kilometres of cellars.
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