Guided tours

The unguided tour

The unguided tour allows you to enter the gardens, the main courtyard, the former kitchens and the cellar. Models, drawings / maps, interpretation panels and a permanent exhibition, L’Énigme Sphinx, Voyage d’un Gardien Intemporel (The Sphinx Riddle, the Journey of a Timeless Guard) help you to explore the history of the château and its gardens at your own pace. There is a tour booklet available at the site's reception which can tell you more about the place you are visiting.

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Guided tours

Explore the history of the château and its gardens with a cultural tour guide[1]. This tour gives access to the state rooms, the grotto and the chapel.

1. The conventional tour :

   Accompanied by a cultural tour guide, you can explore the château’s various rooms and find out about its history as you go, from the stronghold to its conversion into a Renaissance home, and enjoy its collections of art and furniture.

   There is one tour which starts in the morning.
   Time : 90 min
   Booking is advisable.

2. The exploration tour :

   This shorter tour allows you to walk around the château and see its collection of art and furniture, the rock-work grotto and the chapel, and explore the history of the site and its founder, Claude d’Urfé.

   Tours start two to three times during the afternoon (depending on the time of year)
   Time : 1 hour
   Booking is advisable.

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The interactive audio adventure

A new kind of immersive game, custom-made for the Château de la Bâtie d’Urfé, which will take you straight to the heart of the Renaissance. Working as a team, with a headset and a smartphone, you will lead the investigation to discover the dark secret of Gaspard, the château’s gardener… Will you take up the challenge ?
Time : 90 min

No pets are allowed on the heritage site. Only guide dogs are permitted.

Booking is required.

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The group tariff is applicable from ten paying tickets upwards.

Travel agencies, tourist offices, coach operators, associations, families or groups of friends, come and explore La Bâtie d’Urfé, its history, architecture and collections on a guided tour (90 min.)

Tours can be adapted for specific groups (retirement homes, associations and social and medical and social centres, prisons, etc.) Group leaders (educators, hosts) are asked to get directly in touch with the château’s tour guides so that we can get things ready and offer the best possible tour (content and practicalities).

Group tours must be booked in advance with the site’s reception. Plan and book your tour either by filling in the PDF form or by getting directly in touch with the château by telephone or right here on the site. A tour guide will come to see you to organise things when you come.

If there is a large number of participants (more than thirty people), the group may be split into two.

On the day of your tour, we ask you to arrive fifteen minutes before the tour’s start time (the booking time is the time that the tour starts) - this is for your own convenience. If you are late, the tour will be shortened by the relevant amount of time. The tour may be cancelled if the group arrives more than quarter of an hour after the tour’s start time.

For guided tours in foreign languages, you must contact the château in advance in order to finalise the conditions for the tour.

Booking is required.

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Individual young people and families

Workshops/tours and events lasting from one to two hours are available for younger groups and families during the school holidays in order to take a look at heritage and local history in a way that is both unusual and fun.

Booking is required.

See the schedule

Leisure activities

On an unguided or guided tour, or via educational workshops, a tour of La Bâtie d’Urfé helps to fire children’s imaginations as they explore many of the facets of this historic heritage site.

Booking is required.

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Tours and workshops have been designed and put together by tour guides trained in welcoming disabled visitors, and these have been tested many times.

Individual visitors

Please introduce yourselves at reception - if possible before booking the guided tour, as that will help us to take your disability or disabilities into account when your tour takes place (travel, loans of tour aids, appropriate language, etc.).

For people with reduced mobility

Although there are no reserved parking spaces, it is possible to park temporarily in front of the gate so that a person with reduced mobility can gain access to the site, and then go and park the vehicle.

You can walk right into the garden, which is completely accessible, although only the paths in the front courtyard have a stabilised covering. The ground in the courtyard and the garden paths is gravel and not as smooth.

In order to get up to the first floor of the château on the guided tour, you have to use a historic ramp with a 30% gradient (the ramp is currently being restored, access by scaffolding only). During the guided tour, there are some isolated steps (a manual wheelchair can be tipped up, although some electric models are unable to get over them).

For people who have difficulties remaining on their feet, we can offer the loan of a folding chair for the tour (the number of regular seated places in the château is limited). Please ask at reception.

For people with a visual impairment

Tour aids are available - simply ask at reception. For the unguided tour, there is an audio guide providing an audio description and a sketch book in Braille and another in contrasting colours and large characters to help you to take a walk around the garden.

A second sketch book is available for the guided tour and the inside of the château.

These tour aids have been set up with the help of Accessens (formerly Braille et Culture).

For people with mental or psychological disabilities

Please introduce yourselves at reception if you have any special needs in terms of adapting the guided tour.

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Groups

For people with reduced mobility

We ask accompanying personnel to mention any special features of the group when booking, so that we can offer you "tailor-made" tours.

Please note that there will need to be two able-bodied people to allow a manual wheelchair to get up the ramp (30%) in order to get to the first floor (ramp currently being restored, so this is impossible).

For people with visual impairments

The route is suitable for anyone with a visual impairment and the works described have been chosen to help you get the best possible grasp of the château’s history, architecture and works of art.

There are aids available throughout the tour to help you understand the site’s history, e.g. a tactile model, tour aid booklets in Braille or large characters and contrasting colours, works that can be touched.

These tour aids have been set up with the help of Accessens.

For people with mental or psychological disabilities

We ask specialist educators and hosts to mention any special features of the group when booking, so that we can offer you "tailor-made" tours.

Appropriate guided tours of the château and the garden (45 to 60 min., depending on the group) and creative workshops (1 hour, including a 15 min. tour) can be offered.

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Themed tours

You can explore La Bâtie d’Urfé all the year round based on regularly changing topics (collections and major decorations, architecture, archaeology of buildings, gardens, Renaissance arts, etc.) Please see the diary for more information.

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See the schedule