Stage Angerville - Artenay

Crossing the Beauce is one of the most characteristic experiences of the Via Turonensis. Between Angerville and Artenay the way traverses from north to south the so-called granary of France, a plain of fertile loam where the horizon is a straight line and the sky fills much of the view. The stage is long and completely flat, and its difficulty comes not from the terrain but from exposure to sun and wind.

The route follows farm tracks and local roads parallel to the old line of communication between Paris and Orléans, the same one taken by the Roman road and the medieval pilgrims' way. Fields of wheat, barley, rapeseed and sugar beet succeed one another without hedges or trees, and the villages, compact and several kilometres apart, announce themselves from afar by their bell towers and silos.

Halfway through the day comes Toury, the main intermediate town, already in the Eure-et-Loir department. Its church of Saint-Denis preserves a thirteenth-century stone porch-gallery, unusual in the region, and the town offers shops and cafés in which to replenish water and energy. It is the natural stop on a stage with hardly any shade or fountains between villages.

The last stretch enters the Loiret and keeps the same character of open plain as far as Artenay. The town, which grew up beside the old royal road, preserves a restored stone windmill, a symbol of the many that once dotted the Beauce, and has enough services for a night's rest. After a day of solitude and wide open spaces, the Loire valley is now only one stage away.