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Chez-nous: Retreats for two in rural France, with the Benvies. Winter.


  • Les Saumais 58250 France (map)

Seven nights, GBP 2000 (introductory offer, normally GBP 2250).

A NEW SORT OF RETREAT WITH FOOD AND PHOTOGRAPHY RETREATS.

The full Retreat experience, but with just two of you, at our place in rural France.

The same care. The same great food. The same helpful tuition. But with your own space, working to your own schedule, with your own photographic focus.

When it comes to the photography part of your holiday, it’s an à la carte menu. If you want to shoot from dawn to dusk, we’ll do that. Or just at dawn and dusk, if you prefer. We can fill all day, every day for you but maybe you’d prefer to spend some time exploring our library of photography (and cookery) books. Or getting some lessons from Niall. Or just walking the quiet lanes through the traditional bocage landscape that surrounds our house and meadow. You, or your travel companion, may even want to pass an hour or two with Charlotte in her kitchen, learning chocolate or patisserie skills - indeed any dish you’d like help to master.

We have two hides (blinds) overlooking well-stocked feeding stations (including one for making white background photographs). Jays, great spotted woodpeckers, nuthatches and goldfinches visit regularly, while there more occasional appearances by hawfinch and brambling. Keep your ears open, too, for cranes flying overhead on their way to and from the Loire, just 20 minutes away.

On chilly nights (and we might get snow!) we like to light the fire pit in the meadow and enjoy the very dark skies we have here. If you’ve never photographed the Milky Way properly, you have a good chance of doing so here.

Going a little further afield, we can take you to mediaeval villages, spooky abandoned châteaux, the UNESCO World Heritage sites of Hospice de Beaune and Vezelay and into the enchanting forests our region is known for.

So, the choices are yours. We will have a chat before your visit so that we can create a programme and discuss menus, just as you want them- to make a Retreat to remember.

DOWNLOAD THE BROCHURE HERE.