| SULLY-SUR-LOIRE lies on the south bank of the Loire, 7km east of St-Benoît and accessible by bus from Orléans. The grand Château here is pure fantasy (daily: April–Sept 10am–6pm; Oct–March 10am–noon & 2–5pm; closed Jan; €3.40; guided visits only), despite savage wartime bombing that twice destroyed the nearby Loire bridge and caused incidental damage to the Château itself. From the outside, rising massively out of its gigantic moat, the Château has all the picture-book requirements of pointed towers, machicolations and drawbridge. Whether sunlit or floodlit, it's a real treat. The interior is slowly being refurnished by its owners – the department of the Loiret – but it's still quite bare, though the Great Hall is adorned with a beautiful series of sixteenth-century tapestries, and the rebuilt Louis XV wing has rooms decorated in seventeenth-century style. The castle originally belonged to one of Charles VII's favourites, Georges de la Trémoïlle, who infuriated Joan of Arc by encouraging the Dauphin to devote himself to idle hunting in the forests around Sully, and by pursuing a pacifying, diplomatic solution to the wars. After Joan's failure to liberate Paris in 1430, de la Trémoïlle virtually imprisoned her in the castle. She escaped, but was captured less than two months later at the disastrous battle of Compiègne. The castle changed hands in 1602, this time being snapped up by Henri IV's minister, the Duke of Sully, who added the moat and park, and pushed out the river bank to protect his glorious creation from the vagaries of the Loire. After Henri's death, the arrogant minister was forced into retirement, which he spent writing in his castle. In the eighteenth century young Voltaire, exiled from Paris for libellous political verse, also spent time at the Château, sharpening his wit in the company of enlightened thinkers with whom the Duke of Sully of the time liked to surround himself. Sully's International Music Festival (www.festival-sully.com) runs right through June, featuring classical concerts held in a huge marquee in the grounds of the Château. The train station, on the Bourges–Etampes line, is ten minutes' walk from the centre of the village, where the tourist office can be found on place de Gaulle (May–Sept Mon–Sat 9.30am–12.30pm & 2–7pm, Sun 10.30am–1pm; Oct–April Mon–Sat 9.30am–12.30pm & 2.30–6.30; tel 02.38.36.23.70). Bikes are a good way to explore and can be rented from Cycles et Motocycles Venon on rue du Marechal Foch (tel 02.38.36.24.78). Two decent hotels stand around the central marketplace: the Hostellerie du Grand Sully, 10 bd du Champ-de-Foire (tel 02.38.36.27.56, fax 02.38.36.44.54; €40–55; closed Sun eve & Mon) is a reliable choice with a good restaurant (menus from €25); while the large, rambling Le Pont de Sologne 21 rue Porte de Sologne (tel 02.38.36.26.34, fax 02.38.36.37.86; €30–55) has a choice of attractive, newly refurbished rooms or cheaper tatty ones. The municipal campsite (tel 02.38.36.23.93; closed Nov–April) has a great riverside location, practically in the grounds of the Château. For eating out, Côtes et Jardin, at 8 rue du Grand Sully (tel 02.38.36.35.89; closed Tues eve, Wed & last 2 weeks in Sept), on the Château side of the village, is a distinctly classy affair, with an exceptionally good-value lunchtime menu for €11.
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