The best traffic-free bike rides around Choue

We went by very quickly

very pleasant walk

one of the most beautiful villages in France

Ranked among the most beautiful villages in France, Lavardin is a very pretty little town, where medieval, Renaissance and troglodyte styles mix. The Saint-Genest church is particularly beautiful, with its colorful paintings. Concerts take place there in summer. Just opposite you will find a café-bakery, carved into the stone, which serves delicious ice cream. You won't be able to miss the remains of the castle and its 26 meter high tower. Note that it is possible to pitch your tent on the banks of the Loir, at the bottom of the village. The spot is very pleasant.

The church has a very pretty Renaissance-style choir entrance. Certain stained glass windows, the woodwork of the choir, the altarpieces and the font are classified. The current church, rectangular in plan, replaced a 12th century building. The flat bedside and the north wall, equipped with Romanesque windows and slightly projecting buttresses, date from this period. It was rebuilt and probably enlarged in the first half of the 16th century. It was then covered with beautiful paneling, the beams of which bear the arms of the Vove, lords of Saint-Agil. The church is also flanked to the south by a seignorial chapel of two bays opening onto the nave with two molded semi-circular arches: its ribbed vaults, with eight ribs leading to the four peaks of a central diamond, are each decorated with four sculpted pendant keys, one of which also bears the arms of the Vove; the date 1547 can be read on its door. The church is currently preceded by a bell tower built in 1886 by Mr. Travaillard, an architect in Saint-Calais. A window to the south of the choir has preserved a partly restored 16th century stained glass window, representing Saint-Agil and Saint-Fiacre, and one of the windows of the seigneurial chapel has another, representing the Nativity, the Adoration of the Shepherds and the Adoration of the Magi; the other window of this chapel has a modern stained glass window retaining some old fragments in the speckles. The choir was decorated with woodwork including an entrance arcade surmounted by a crucifix, stalls, a communion table and an altarpiece, the latter dated 1734. We can also point out a font decorated with balusters and of a skull (1552), the poetic epitaph of Catherine-Geneviève de Verthamont (1740), a painting representing a martyr (17th century), a Louis XV console and a Venetian glass chandelier.”

It houses stained glass windows from the 16th century and a statue of a woman from the 17th century, works classified as historical monuments.

The old village church was partly destroyed by fire in 1720; it was rebuilt in the 1780s but without decoration. All of the painted decorations were executed between 1863 and 1865: the scenes and figures by Dubois and the ornamental decoration by Goislard under the direction of Louis Bodin, Count of Galembert. This vast program was sponsored by the allied families of Vanssay and Galembert and the priest Toizard; the factory participated for 5448F. The church was consecrated by Monseigneur Fillion, bishop of Le Mans, on September 5, 1865. (inventory of the heritage of the Pays de la Loire region) A black marble plaque engraved with the names of 30 soldiers per year was inserted into the wall paintings of this church, under the Crucifixion.

It was Saint Thuribe in the 5th century who dedicated the oratory that preceded the current church to Saint Pierr. Tradition reports that Saint Thuribe, Bishop of Le Mans, ordained on September 30, 490, came to preach Christianity in the region of Saint-Calais where he dedicated other oratories to Saint Peter. In Berofacium (Berfay), he would have "gone down" to a certain Gaïanus, holder of property or exercising military command. The roussard stone buttresses and the walled semi-circular bay bear witness to 11th or 12th century architecture. The Saint Pierre church was originally supposed to consist of a simple nave extended by a straight apse. Like many churches in the surrounding area, it was redeveloped in the 16th century (addition of the north side aisle) and restored around 1876, with the addition of the south side aisle. The work was carried out thanks to a bequest from Mrs. Mercent to the factory, an organization responsible at the time for managing the church's property. The exterior walls were re-coated in 1924.