Must-SeeMont-Saint-Michel
Normandy
About 124 miles away
A medieval abbey rising from a tidal bay on the Normandy coast.
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Fontevraud Abbey
A vast medieval abbey holding the painted tombs of Eleanor of Aquitaine, Henry II and Richard the Lionheart.
- Open
- Every day; shorter hours in winter
- Price
- Paid
- Time Needed
- 2 hours
- Address
- Abbaye Royale, 49590 Fontevraud-l'AbbayeDirections
- Getting There
- About 20 minutes by car southeast of Saumur, or 25 minutes west of Chinon.
Why Go
Founded in 1101, Fontevraud was a double monastery of monks and nuns ruled by an abbess. In its great Romanesque church lie the stone effigies of the English Plantagenet kings and queens. Later a prison until 1963, it now holds a museum of modern art, and its kitchen, with chimneys like a cluster of rockets, is a rare survival.
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