Thoughts on Tours as a base for touring LV for 3 nights with car? The old town area looks very appealing and from what I've read it's lively and has good restaurants. Also very central - we want to visit chateaux both to the east and to the west. Downside appears to be traffic congestion. Can this be avoided by smart timing of entering/leaving the city or does it just stay busy? We'd want to stay central in old center area.

If Tours is absolutely not recommended, how is Chinon? It appeals to me more than Amboise but we only have one day visiting west LV sights versus day and a half visiting east LV sights so isn't quite as good logistically. We'd be staying the first weekend in October.

If you want to stay in the city, then why not Tours? It's a great university town.

Chinon is a bit smaller (by a 120,000 or so), and may appeal more to you if you want to stay somewhere a little more laid back.

I almost always stay in Tours when I visit this area. The restaurants, cafés, and shopping are all excellent. Only consider the area of Old Tours, which you have noted. Other areas of Tours are not really interesting for tourists.

We stayed in Old Town Tours for a week in the Loire Valley a couple of years ago, and it was an excellent choice. Full details here: http://www.fodors.com/community/euro...ire-valley.cfm

Just another vote for Tours as a good, central and pleasant stay for the old town as for the near by Chateaux, etc.

I do think that trying to avoid the most trafficked rush hours - in and out of the city - would be good; but it's not NYC or LA or Paris traffic.

Chinon is also great -not huge not small but yes for cities Tours is rather nice - a student town with a nice Old Town area - only negative if driving is oft horrendous traffic IME but just avoid rush hours - weekends are fine.

I really enjoyed Tours and definitely think you're right to choose it over Amboise. Amboise felt a bit like Disneyland to me, since it's so small and so touristed. Tours felt like a real town, where people lived and worked, with a good choice of restaurants and shops.

Thank you very much for affirming Tours as a good base. On Monday, we plan to head west for the day to see Azay-le-Rideau and Chinon. Since traffic will be busier that day, are there particular roads to avoid departing from the old town area? What time frame is rush hour?

If you leave after 9 or so it should not be too bad -just speaking of experiences in many large French cities.