Loire Valley Markets: Days, Hours and What to Buy

Every town in the valley has a market morning, and each keeps to its own day. Put the right one in your week and lunch is sorted. Browsing Loire Valley excursions? Here are the market days, straight from each town hall.

Market days by town, from each town hall

Each row below comes from the town's own website, read in September 2026. Markets move for holidays and roadworks, so check the town's page the week you travel.

Amboise market: Friday and Sunday mornings on the riverbank

The Amboise market sets up on the banks of the Loire every Friday and Sunday, all year, from 08:00 to 14:00. Friday is the smaller one, with about 90 traders, mostly selling food. Sunday is the big day: more than 200 stalls of flowers, fish, bread, charcuterie and vegetables, and the town calls it one of the largest markets in the region.

You will also find wines of the Touraine-Amboise appellation among the stalls. Go early on a Sunday, before the car parks fill, and walk up to the royal château afterwards.

What to buy: cheese, rillettes, fruit and wine

You do not need a list. Look for what the stalls around you all sell, because that is what the area makes.

Building a picnic for a vineyard or château day

A market picnic costs a fraction of a château café lunch and tastes of where you are. Ask at the château ticket desk where picnics are allowed before you unpack.

1. Buy bread last. A baguette bought at 8 am is dry by lunchtime.
2. Pick one soft and one hard cheese. Ask the stallholder which travel well in a warm car.
3. Add rillettes or charcuterie. Rillettes spread straight onto bread with no knife skills.
4. Buy fruit you can eat whole. Cherries, apricots or apples, depending on the month.
5. Bring a knife, a cloth and water. Markets sell food, not picnic kit.

Tours: Les Halles and the Wednesday and Saturday markets

In Tours, Les Halles is the covered food hall, and a producers' market sets up beside it on Wednesday and Saturday mornings. Boulevard Béranger holds a flower market on the same two days. Both suit a morning before an afternoon wine tasting from the tourist office.

Blois: Saturday on Place Louis XII

Blois fills Place Louis XII on Saturday mornings with 100 to 130 traders, from 08:30 to 12:45. Tuesday's market there is tiny, with four to six stalls. If you are staying in Blois for Château de Chambord, go to the market first and take the shuttle bus after lunch.

Chinon and Saumur: Thursday and Saturday

Chinon's main market is Thursday, spread across Place Jeanne d'Arc, Place Mirabeau and the streets between. In Saumur, the Saturday food market runs from 07:00 to 13:00 on Place Saint-Pierre, with flowers and goods until 18:00.

Markets and tours on the same day

Most shared château days leave Tours at 9:00 and Amboise at 9:30 and return in the evening, so they rule out a market that morning. Plan the market for a day without a tour, or pair it with an afternoon wine tasting that starts after lunch.

In Amboise, a Sunday market fits before a one-hour Segway ride or an evening balloon flight. In Chinon, a Thursday market fits before a bike day only if the ride starts late; check its start time on the card.

Beyond the markets: tastings that include the food

If you would rather have someone else do the shopping, some wine days put the food on the table for you. The Vouvray morning from Tours pairs its wines with cheese and charcuterie, and the picnic near Chinon sets out a basket on the estate. See the options on Loire Valley wine tasting.