This is not the bold, brash climate of summer, nor the stark landscape of winter, but rather a quiet, subtle season. Whizzing through the countryside in a car defeats the purpose. Walking is arguably the best way to soak up the scenery, but bicycling offers a more efficient means for intimate contact with the land. With this in mind, I signed up for a five-day visit to

Le Vieux Moulin, a picturesque mill house specializing in walking and bicycling tours - as it turns out I did a bit of both.

I was just settling into my room and starting to unpack when there was a knock at the door. My friend Louise, who had arrived in Patinges a few hours earlier, stood outside with a baleful look on her face. "What have you gotten us into?" she demanded accusingly.

"What's the matter?" I asked.

"Well, the first thing I saw when I arrived was a beautiful blonde building a bike. She brought it with her from the States, and she was putting it together like a kid playing with Legos."

"She brought her bike with her?" I sputtered. "Were we supposed to also?"

I was alarmed. Not only did I not own a bicycle, I hadn't even ridden one since I was 12 years old. That was...well, it was so many years ago that I wasn't sure I even remembered how to ride one.

As it turned out, Le Vieux Moulin supplies bikes (and helmets) - unless, like Dee, the blonde, you prefer to bring your own. It also turns out that riding a bicycle is, indeed, something one really never forgets.

Frank Pettee, a wiry Boston native who sold his business in the United States to buy and restore this mill house, gave me a refresher course in cycling basics before we set off the following morning.

The mill house lies 15 miles from Nevers on the banks of the tiny Berry Canal. The path along the canal provided a straight and obstacle-free course for a trial ride, the only potential hazard being the temptation to take one's eyes off the path to soak up the pastoral landscape. This is the Berry region, at the geographic center of France. In the centuries before the railroad era, it was the heart of the country's communications system because of the three rivers that cut through it (the Loire, the Aubois and the Allier). Today it is a tranquil land of fertile farms, chestnut forests and country villages - a singularly beautiful place amazingly uncompromised by commercial development. Chenonceaux and the other famous châteaux are far enough away to dissuade tourists from wandering down to this eastern corner of the Loire, where the hotels are modest, the chefs don't have press agents and the castles are inhabited by real families.

Day One:

After breakfast, we piled into the van, and Frank drove us a few miles to the village of Feux. There were seven of us staying at Le Vieux Moulin that week - an eclectic group which, besides myself, included an actress, an airline pilot, two nurses, a microbiologist and Dee, a bicycle racer. Our level of cycling skills ranged from Dee to me, with everyone in between possessing a variety of strengths and abilities.

We unloaded the bikes in Feux and headed off toward Sancerre. Frank led the pack, while Phil Hurley, a young Englishman who works for him while on university holidays, brought up the rear. The blue skies were patched with pearly-gray clouds. Taking deep breaths of the earthy, sweet autumnal air, I cycled merrily along, marveling at how easily I had regained my seat.

Then we came to the first hill.

Le Vieux Moulin's brochure mentions "gently rolling terrain," but what I saw looming up ahead looked more like Mount Everest. Gentle? Hardly.

Shifting down, I began pumping. Within seconds my thighs were screaming, and my lungs were on fire. There was only one solution: dismount and walk. And this is how the rest of the day went, with me trudging up one side of the hill and riding down the other, wild-eyed with fear of falling. Still, I was stubborn enough to refuse Frank's offer to ride along in the van.

By the time we sped past the village of Thauvenay and its handsome château, the gray skies had begun to drip. We coasted into Ménétrol Sous Sancerre and rode for a couple of miles along a canal lined with barges overflowing with vacationing natives and tourists. We were in the southernmost section of the Sancerrois, where from virtually every vantage point the famous wine village can be seen atop its vine-covered hill. The viticultural area includes Pouilly-Fumé and Pouilly-Sur-Loire, as well as Sancerre, and is the fifth-largest wine region in terms of productivity.

By midday, under a steady drizzle, we'd made the steep climb up to Chavignol, a tiny town with a giant reputation for producing incomparable goat cheese. We left our bikes outside La Bonne Auberge, an unpretentious and inexpensive eaterie with a simple menu of salads, omelets and various interpretations of crottin de Chavignol cheese. Green salad topped with an aromatic round of warm crottin cheese, plus crusty baguettes from the village bakery and a glass of Sancerre rosé helped take my mind off the fact that the rain was now coming down in buckets.

After lunch, we dashed across the street through the downpour for a quick visit to the fromagerie. Then it was time to re-evaluate the day's options: Should we pursue the original plan of cycling up to Sancerre? "The whole point of going up there is to look down over the beautiful landscape," Frank explained. "When it's overcast like this, we just have to bike up a steep hill for nothing." This persuaded us all to vote in favor of postponing the trip to Sancerre for a few days. Instead, we'd regroup back in Feux, then drive home to Le Vieux Moulin. About halfway to Feux, however, I was so soaked, exhausted and tired of hoofing it uphill with bike in tow that - vowing never to get on a bicycle again - I accepted a lift in the van. But after a hot shower, a couple of glasses of Sancerre in front of Le Vieux Moulin's fireplace and a delicious dinner of lapin à la moutarde (rabbit in mustard sauce), my body and soul were restored enough to contemplate the possibility of climbing back in the saddle the next day.

Day Two:

The morning dawned cool and clear. I trailed along behind the others under the watchful eye of Hurley, our rear guard. It was an easy ride to Domaine de Maltaverne, a nearby Pouilly-Fumé producer where we stopped for a taste of flinty, palate-awakening wine. Pouilly-Fumé is 100 percent sauvignon blanc, while nearby Pouilly-Sur-Loire makes a blended white from sauvignon blanc and chasselas. Pouilly-Fumé soils produce fuller, more fragrant wines.

Heading toward Donzy, we threaded our way along quiet rural roads. Sancerre was almost always visible in the distance, as was St. Andelain, one of the region's most important communes (along with Tracy and Les Loges), in the other direction. Arriving at noon in Donzy, we piled into Le Grand Monarque. It's not surprising that this has long been a popular lunch stop for French travelers, for here one finds the sort of simple, yet imaginative, carefully prepared and expertly served fare that is the glory of French cuisine. The terrine de fruits de mer was a delicate ode to shellfish. The veal scallop was impeccable. The soupe de pêches de vignes - diminutive, wild peaches bathing in a pool of red wine - was sweet and invigorating. We drank Gamay from the Coteaux du Giennois, a relatively new AOC region covering both banks of the Loire north of Pouilly-Fumé (it encompasses 74 acres of sauvignon blanc and 145 acres of gamay and pinot noir).

On the way out of town, we took a look at Huilerie A. Rameau, a walnut oil mill set on a picturesque canal. Then it was back into the countryside, where I was again challenged by a few more "gentle" hills. By now, however, I could actually pedal almost halfway up most of them. At the top of the steepest slope, I caught up with the rest of the group standing in awe of a magnificent château surrounded by neatly manicured vines. It was one of the prettiest vineyards imaginable. It was no surprise to learn that Château du Nozet, home of the famed La Doucette wines, was the prize of Pouilly-Fumé. We were more than happy to belly up for a sampling of the aromatic, crisp vin blanc in the château's tasting room.

The evening air had turned chilly as we wearily pedaled up the path for home. Some of us soaked our chilled and stiff muscles in the outdoor whirlpool before gathering for apéritifs in front of the fire. Dinner that night - fish fillets with ratatouille sauce followed by Guinea hens with prunes, then salad, cheese and floating island (meringue in custard sauce) for dessert - was typical of the traditional fare served at Le Vieux Moulin. A far cry from chichi eats or fusion food, this was simply honest, delicious fare - the type enjoyed by millions of French people every day.

Marcel, a 77-year-old local, and an avid cyclist, joined us for dinner. "Bicycling is the best medicine," he announced, sipping a digestif at the end of the meal. "A little cycling, a little wine - it's better than Viagra!"

Day Three:

With its typical round, gray slate towers rising in the misty morning light, Château de Thaumiers looks more like a children's book illustration than a real castle. But real it is, and inhabited by the same family that has owned the place for several generations. Seeing us gawking at the iron gate, one of the owners wandered out dressed in jeans and high rubber boots. Was he going to shoo us away? No, he was merely eager to talk to us about "l'affaire Clinton."

The truth is, there are few Americans - or any other tourists for that matter - for him to chat with in this out-of-the-way region. (When we stopped for lunch at l'Auberge du Pont d'Y in Le Pondy, for example, the other guests in this simple, but top-notch restaurant were all French.)

Our new friend had trouble understanding Americans' preoccupation with presidential indiscretions. We were reminded of France's past experience with high-level improprieties later that afternoon when we wheeled up to the gates of the Château de Bannegon, built by the Ducs de Berry. King Charles VII had an affair with the woman who lived here, and when they had a falling-out he rallied his troops and laid siege to her castle. She held him at bay for six weeks, but he eventually captured her and had her sequestered. No need for tapes, subpoenas or independent prosecutors.

Day Four:

"Go, girl," Dee called out from the top of the hill.

"Lookin' good," the airline pilot shouted as he flew by. I have the emotional integrity of a golden retriever: Pat me on the head, mutter a few encouraging words, and I'll pedal all the way up the hill. I wasn't fast but, by golly, I finally rode all the way up those hills, and learned to enjoy the thrill of soaring down the other side. The hills in the Sancerre region range from 600 feet or so to 900 feet, inducing breathlessness in novice bikers, but providing excellent drainage for vines.

On this day, we visited no vineyards, cycling instead to Âpremont-sur-Allier, a charming village about 30 miles south of Sancerre on the Allier River. Here, we divided into two groups: the hotshot bikers who raced off with young Hurley to add more miles to their belts, and the pedal-poopers, myself chief among them, who opted to visit Âpremont. This stunning medieval village and its château has been passed down through the women of the de Brissac family since 1722. In the 1930s, a wealthy steel mill owner married one of the daughters and began restoring the village to its present splendor.

We could have spent an entire day exploring the beautiful gardens and castle (still inhabited by the de Brissac family), and we could have had lunch in one of the village bistros, but we had a more tempting offer. We were to reconvene down by the river where Frank had arrived with the van packed with all manner of pâté, cheese, bread, smoked salmon and fresh fruit. The lavish tailgate picnic included, not surprisingly, several bottles of Sancerre.

Day Five:

A day of reckoning: Do we go to Sancerre? "We'd have to backtrack through countryside we've already seen," Frank warned. "And that hill is very steep. Very, very steep." That convinced me, and I added my vote to all the others who preferred a visit to La Charité-sur-Loire. The ride there, past fields of sunflowers, through little villages and along canals, is wonderfully scenic. A hot, autumnal sun blazed down on us as we bounced over the bridge into La Charité. The Loire splits here, so there are actually two bridges leading into La Charité, one resting on ten great arches. La Charité is a famous market town, where we wiled away many hours checking out the open-air market, the architectural delights, the shops and the imposing cathedral.

At the end of the day, some of us pedaled leisurely back to the old mill house, stopping along the way at the 15th-century fortified tower in Mentou-Couture. Others took the long way back, adding about 20 miles to the day's total.

We never made it to the village of Sancerre, but that evening, the pure, zesty character of its wine was the perfect foil for Le Vieux Moulin's duck with black currant sauce. And I know that one of these days I will get up that hill to Sancerre - pedaling all the way, of course.

If You Go:

Prices begin at $880 per person for a five-day, four-night tour and range up to $1,695 per person for a seven-day, six-night stay, excluding airfare. Package prices include lodging, breakfast and dinner (exclusive of wine) at Le Vieux Moulin. Individuals pay for their own lunch, ordering according to taste, appetite and budget (while the food was invariably delicious, all the restaurants we dined at were inexpensive to moderately priced). Each day's cycling excursion ranges from 20 to 35 miles. - MT

Le Vieux Moulin
Patinges 18320, Jouet sur-l'Aubois
Phone 02.48.76.07.21; fax 02.48.76.07.43
Web site: www.lvmoulin.com
E-mail: info@lvmoulin.com
or in the U.S.: Phone (800) 368-4234
P.O. Box 4454, Vail, CO 81658

Travel Editor Marguerite Thomas writes on wine, food and wine country travel for The Wine News.