The Château of Ranton is located in the small village of Ranton, France, in the Vienne Department. Ranton can be found on Google Maps or any other map app. It is about equidistant between the towns of Loudun and Thouars; 30 minutes south of the Royal Abbey of Fontevraud; 40 minutes south of Saumur; and 1 hour and 10 minutes from the cities of Angers and Tours.

You can get from Paris to Ranton by car alone or by a combination of train and car. Car alone is easiest for those traveling with substantial luggage. By car, Ranton is approximately four hours from Paris or four and a half hours from Charles de Gaulle airport. Cars can be rented throughout Paris and at the airport. Note that you will need to pay tolls on the French autoroute using a credit card.

Most locals and those with less luggage would travel between Paris and Ranton by high-speed train (TGV) and car, which cuts the overall travel time by at least an hour and is particularly convenient to and from Charles de Gaulle airport (because there is a TGV station inside the airport). If choosing this option, you would take the TGV from the airport (located in Terminal 2D) or Paris (Gare Montparnasse) to either Angers or Tours and rent a car at the TGV station at Angers (called St Laud) or Tours (called St Pierre des Corps; do not use the central Tours station). After your stay in the Ranton area, you would return the rental car to the agency at the TGV station in Angers (St Laud) or Tours (St Pierre des Corps) and then simply hop on the TGV back to Paris or the airport.

If you are traveling on Air France, you can purchase a ticket all the way to Angers or Tours. Air France has a code sharing arrangement with the SNCF, the French train network. If you are not traveling on Air France, you can purchase TGV tickets on the SNCF’s website or on the website “thetrainline.com”. Note that if you are traveling on United, you will arrive in Charles de Gaulle’s old terminal (Terminal 1) and need to take the inter-terminal train at CDG (called the CDGVAL) to get to Terminal 2 and the TGV station.

The address of the château is 7 Allee du Château, 86200 Ranton. You can park in the parking lot next to the church, which is adjacent to the château and abuts the moat.

For those staying in or near Ranton, Loudun is the nearest town with grocery stores, pharmacies, banks/ATMs, etc. Super U is Loudun’s largest grocery store and is located on the Ranton side of Loudun.

Loudun has a tiny hospital (more of a very well-equipped ambulance station) that can handle basic medical situations. In the event of a real emergency, dial “112,” which is the European equivalent of “911.” As this is a pan-European emergency number, you can ask to be connected to an English-speaking operator.

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