Today we turned south. With all of the repairs (fingers crossed) completed on François we are heading south. Our next stop is Sens to get our Control Technique done. We were tempted to try to make the leap but we have two major cities to navigate -Antwerp and Paris and I didn’t want to take them both on in one day.
The drive south was busy and Antwerp did not let us down as we were stuck in traffic there for 15 or 20 minutes. Most of the drive today was really busy from Delft until we hit the first toll way in France. Once again we drove across Belgium without stopping. Belgium deserves more love than we give it.
I picked a campground about an hour north of Paris and it is a charming place next to the Chateau in the picture. Sorel has a population of about 180 according to Wikipedia, but a nice campground and a pretty chateau.
Today was a busy day for us, but not a particularly compelling one. We have had a check engine light intermittently since we arrived. Our day started with an early appointment at a garage in Delft to get that taken care of. We did not know what the cause of the light was and the dealer had warned us it could take a while to troubleshoot the problem. Ton and I had packed to spend hours in the waiting area of the dealer. Fortunately the problem was obvious, a failed part in the diesel exhaust system, and the repair was done and we were on our way by 9 am.
Part of the park next to the campground. The high winds the last two days had downed a lot of branches and leaves.
With time on our hands for the rest of the day we decided to take on a couple of minor problems. So we spent the next several hours going to hardware stores and RV part supply stores. After about three hours of running around Delft and Rotterdam we had the parts we were looking for.
With more time on my hands I decided to try to repair our old power cord but I needed a better screw driver set. There is an Ikea walking distance from the campground so I headed over there, it took me 45 minutes to find the screw drivers they had, only to discover they would not work for what I had in mind.
The canal at the entrance to the campground.
It has been extremely windy and rainy the last two days so when we had a little break in the evening we went on a walk thru the woods only to find the trail we were on terminated at Ikea. Ton remembered she needed a soap dish so we went back in for another 45 minutes of searching only to leave Ikea empty handed again. We may be the only ones in history to make two forays into an Ikea in one day and leave without purchasing anything.
We shifted about an hour south today to Delft. Delft is a nice town that has become our unofficial hometown in the Netherlands. Tomorrow we have an appointment at the local Fiat repair garage to hopefully get our check engine light resolved.
In route we stopped at an Albert Hein to stock up on some food to get us thru the next few days until we get to France where food is cheaper. When we arrived at the campground we did some expensive laundry. It would have been €12.50 if the dryer was efficient, but because we had to run it twice it ended up costing €16.50. The building at the top is the laundry, dish washing, and shower building for the campground.
We hit another place on our to do list for the Netherlands. We had been told that Haarlem is a nice town and worth a visit so we decided to take advantage of the window of good weather we had today to visit it. Haarlem is about 20 minutes by train south of Amsterdam.
This cool old building was surrounded by modern buildings near the train station. It was one of the most memorable buildings in Haarlem for us. Unfortunately the first floor had been graffitied pretty heavily.
Haarlem is a mid-size city and like most Dutch cities easy to walk. Part of the reason it is so easy to walk in the Netherlands is because everything is so flat. Today my watch tells me we walked 6.6 miles and only climbed the equivalent of 5 flights of stairs. That is flat.
Besides showing off a cool still working windmill this picture gives you a sense of how flat the Dutch countryside is.
We made a quick pass thru town and hit some of the highlights. The town hall was open to visitors. The most interesting thing for me was the painting in the room that was used for jury deliberations. It contained a large picture of a judge having his eye gouged out for not being just in his verdicts. Quite a warning for potential jurists.
A nice historic street. On the left is a guest house associated with a nearby hospital. The building on the right was a museum.
We visited the church in the town square. It began life as a Catholic Cathedral, but during the reformation had become a Protestant Church. While it is a working church it seems that it has also become something of a community concert hall. One of the side chapels inside the church had even been converted to a coffee shop-something I have never seen anywhere else in Europe. So I guess you can listen to Sunday service while sipping a latte in the coffee corner.
The organ in the church is famous.
The church organ is well renown for its sound. Mozart is said to have played the organ on his travels. We were hoping to see a concert there, but unfortunately the timing didn’t allow for it.
An interior column. Note the ceiling is unadorned wood. I wonder if the Catholic images that are normally there in plaster were removed as part of the reformation.
We criss-crossed the town a couple of times to look at different interesting buildings. The town had a solid feel to it and the people were fun to watch as always. We have even gotten better about staying out of the way of the bicycles as they zoom past. I think we got thru the day without having a bell rung at us in annoyance by a bicyclist, (even though we did almost get run over by a city bus).
Jopen Brewery.
Our final stop in Haarlem was at another old church. This church had been converted to a brewery. Jopen brewery felt more like a brewery from Portland than the traditional places we usually go to. In fact their specialties seemed to tilt heavily towards IPA’s with Cascade hops that are grown in Washington and Oregon. The beer was good.
Art and Architecture.
On the train back we discussed a stop in Amsterdam for another walk, but instead Ton remembered a good chicken joint one stop from the campground. So we had fried chicken to go in François to end our day.
Our first stop of the day was the Katten Kabinet museum. It is a museum dedicated to cat art and cats. We don’t own a cat and neither of us have ever had a cat as a pet, but we are now cat people because of Dylan our sons cat Dottie. We have the privilege of cat sitting for Dottie a few times a year and she has converted us to the kind of people who pay large sums to go to cat museums.
Dottie the cat and her favorite possession. The inspiration for today’s visit to Amsterdam.
The Katten Kabinet was inspired by the property owners cat JP Morgan. The museum is in a large 18th century house overlooking one of Amsterdam’s canals and supposedly hosted John Adams when he was ambassador to the Netherlands..
The drawings on this wall are by Picasso.
The house itself is worth a visit, but it is also filled with art about cats by famous artists including Picasso, Toulouse-Lautrec, and Rembrandt. It is mostly a kitschy salute to cats that any cat lover will enjoy.
The garden mostly featuring advertisements that used cats.
There was a nice corner where people could leave dedications to their cats.
Dedications and drawings of peoples cats.
After our time visiting the Katten Kabinet we headed towards the city center. Although we have purchased a three day transit pass we ended up walking everywhere today. Amsterdam is one of the great cities to walk in. The center is pretty compact, the canals make for a dynamic backdrop, and the architecture is interesting and mostly original as it was not heavily bombed in WWII.
This was one of the most colorful houses on our walk. The modern looking homes in the foreground are actually canal boats or canal homes.
Ton proposed we visit a shop that was supposed to have the best apple pie in Amsterdam so I of course agreed. When we arrived the threatening weather finally delivered on the threat. We were fortunate to find a table. The restaurant had been in business for over 100 years and the interior felt like it was little changed since they opened.
The interior of Het Papeneiland, serving the best apple pie in Amsterdam.
We nursed our shared slice of apple pie and coffees thru a big down pour. As soon as the rain ended we moved to our next stop which was even older than the Het Papenland.
The In’t Aepjen or monkey bar. A dive bar that began operating in the 15th century.
The In’t Aepjen began operating in the 15th century and has been in business since then. It survived two major fires in 1450 and 1477 that burned down large parts of Amsterdam. It got its name the Monkey Bar because supposedly two sailors returning from a voyage to Sumatra in the 1500’s didn’t have money to pay their tab and instead traded the owners a monkey they had brought back.
The interior of the Monkey Bar.
The place was really cool. It is one of about 20 bars in Amsterdam that are collectively called brown bars because of the mahogany used in the interior. We discussed going on a bit of a brown bar crawl, but our better judgment got in the way of a good time.
Beurs passage.
Our last stop was Beurs passage a walkway between two roads that has been decorated as an aquarium. We had sprinted by it yesterday during a rainstorm and Ton wanted to go back and take a look at it.
Fish art on the wall of Beurs passage.
While the walk way has been in place for centuries, the passage as you see it today is a recent development. After that we headed back to François just ahead of the next rain storm passing thru Amsterdam.
The Van Gogh museum has been on our to do list for Amsterdam since the first trip. Each time we have looked at going there were no spots available. We finally landed a spot today.
Walking to the museum Ton got this nice picture of one of the famous canals.
We got caught in one pretty good down pour on the way to the museum but otherwise enjoyed our walk. The city seemed a lot less crowded than our previous visits which was nice, we weren’t sure if this was a function of the weather (pretty wet) or the time of the year.
My favorite painting at the museum.
We arrived at the museum about noon, but our ticket was for 1:15. They had a couple of people in front of the museum so I asked one of the young ladies what time we should get in line for the 1:15 entrance-she said it is not too busy today so if you come back at 12:45 we will let you in. So we headed over to the museum of modern art next door to avoid another squall and hung out in the atrium until we could enter the museum.
His favorite flower was sunflowers because they are robust flowers like the peasants he preffered to pain when he began as an artist.
The museum follows his career from his early days as an artist until his death by suicide. His career as an artist only lasted 10 years from roughly his 27th birthday until he died at age 37. While he was not commercially successful during his life time he was well known within art circles and admired. After his death a lot of his paintings went to his sister in law who eventually donated them to the museum.
A painting by Van Gogh of Gauguin’s chair in his studio.
Van Gogh had a contentious relationship with Gauguin. It was during the aftermath of a fight with Gauguin that Van Gogh famously amputated his own ear.
The famous painting of a wheat field.
We were pleased with the museum. It was small enough to be easy to navigate, but had an extensive collection of his paintings representing his entire short (but prolific) career. It was not so crowded that you could not get a good look at all of the paintings, even the famous ones.
His final painting.
The Van Gogh museum is considered one of the must see places in Amsterdam. And now that we have visited it we are glad we did.
Albert Cuyp Market Street.
When we came out of the market the skies had opened up, and there was some blue between the big cumulus clouds. We headed down to the Albert Cuyp market which takes up several blocks of Albert Cuyp street. We were near the end of the day but still enjoyed the walk. We stopped in an old restaurant and got two famous Dutch foods. Bitterballen, and Apple pie. Apple Pie is self explanatory but Dutch apple pie is very good. Bitterballen is a fried ball of dough with a meat puree like filling. I think we liked the apple pie better but we can now say we have had bitterballen.
We spent the rainy day hanging around François getting over jet lag and planning for our unexpected extended stay in Amsterdam. We have been trying to go to the Van Gogh museum here, but were never able to get tickets. Today we were able to get tickets for tomorrow so we are off to Amsterdam to tick off one of our bucket list items for the Netherlands. Ton has come up with some other good ideas for the weekend so we will be busy being tourists the next few days.
Our optimism yesterday crashed this morning. When we started François the check engine light was on again, so we began our day by reaching out to the Fiat dealer nearby. During the drive over the light went out so some optimism returned, but in the end we decided we needed to be sure the engine is ok before we head to Morocco. The earliest appointment for a full appointment to do the diagnosis was Tuesday, that was a little later than we hoped, so we contacted the dealer in Delft that did the work on our airbag computer, but their earliest appointment was also Tuesday. So we are now here until Tuesday instead of Friday. Bummer.
Lake Westeinderplassen near Alsmeer.
Since we were already out and the weather was nice Ton suggested we go to Alsmeer for the day. It was reported as a pretty town on a large lake. Since it was pretty close I agreed. The drive over was easy and we parked up about a kilometer out of the main town.
Windmill being rebuilt in Alsmeer.
We had driven along the lake and it was pretty, but as we headed into town the lake disappeared behind houses and never appeared again. The downtown was nice but not exciting. We saw signs for old town Alsmeer and headed towards it. The entrance was promising with a nice canal bridge and a couple of interesting buildings. As we got to the end of the walkway we came on a ticket office and had all but decided to turn around when a nice old gentleman came up to greet us. In the end neither of us could tell him we didn’t want to spend the entrance fee so we went in.
Ton liked the gnarly roots on these plants.
There were a couple of workshops and hot houses with flowers, But after the beginning it turned into a garden with different themes. The gardens were nice, and if you were really into gardening interesting because it included a lot of plants that are no longer in style, so rare. There was no sign of an old town, so we did a quick turn thru the gardens and headed back to François.
The gardens with the windmill in the background.
When we started François the check engine light was back. So our decision to stay seems like the right one.
Our neighbors are American. Nearly every trip we come across an American couple in one of the campgrounds. It’s funny how your ear is drawn to your own accent. When I went outside I heard them talking to each other inside their van. They are here on a trial run with a rental van to see if they want to buy one for future use. We had a nice chat and they asked some questions about our experience over here. It was fun to be able to share our experience with them.
As I said yesterday we have a check engine light that needs to be diagnosed. Luckily there is a Fiat dealer only 5 kilometers away, so once we got going we headed over there. Again luckily, they were able to squeeze us in to their schedule today. We had to wait a couple of hours in their nice customer waiting area. Ton used the time and their WiFi to download some shows onto her iPad.
Again luckily, the check engine light was caused by a one time event with our diesel exhaust system so all they had to do was reset the computer and we were on our way. The rest of the day was spent grocery shopping at the giant Asian grocery near by, and at a Lidl for meats and vegetables. All in all it was a productive day.
We are back in Europe for our next trip. The flight over was uneventful once we got out of Portland. There was a little misadventure at the beginning when one of us forgot their carry on bag at home which resulted in a mad dash back home from the airport. In the end we made the flight with minutes to spare and it all ended well. Thanks Rebecca for your help and patience.
Part of the storage that had burned with 180 travel trailers in side it.
After arriving we headed over to the storage we use, to pick up François the motorhome. He was sitting in his usual spot waiting for us, but we noticed that one of the storage buildings that they use had burned to the ground. The building was huge, nearly 100 yards long. The owner said the fire had happened about two weeks ago. Not only was the building destroyed but 180 travel trailers (caravans) had also been destroyed. He said that he has been spending a lot of time talking to insurance companies, but he thought everything would be ok in the end.
We had been hoping to move François to indoor storage when we returned, but now we are going to be happy with outside storage.
The only other issue was that we have a check engine light to deal with, so tomorrow in addition to going grocery shopping we are going to have to find a mechanic to see what is going on with our engine.
Today was about preparing to leave. Our airbag computer had failed while François was in storage over the winter. When we arrived in March we took him in to try to get it fixed but the parts took 4 to 6 weeks to arrive so instead we made an appointment for today to get it fixed. In addition we needed our regular maintenance including an oil change. Our morning was devoted to getting that taken care of. Everything was done efficiently and we were back at the campground by 1pm. Ton spent the rest of the day packing and I did a few minor things around the outside of François while she worked. We finished most of the food in the refrigerator for dinner.
We spent the morning starting to organize François for storage, that is, Ton organized François for storage and I stayed out of the way and helped a couple of times to lift things that needed lifting. We are pretty much surrounded by British so I spent most of the morning in conversation with our neighbors.
Ton has taken a photo from this point now in the Spring, the Summer, and the Fall. I don’t think we are going to get one in the winter.
After lunch Ton was ready for a break so we walked into Delft. Delft is a lovely town, and could not be more Dutch. Clean sturdy looking homes, canals everywhere and lots of bikes. It is a nice city to walk in and has thoroughly charmed all of English neighbors in the campground as well as us.
The town hall in Delft.
After strolling around for a while we went to a pub that specialized in Belgian beers. Ton ordered a Leffe to make up for the one we didn’t get in Dinan the other day. When it came a Dutch gentleman next to us told her that if she liked dark beers she should order the one he was drinking. We struck up a nice conversation mostly centered around beer with him and his wife. They also gave us some tips on places to visit when we return in the fall. We really enjoyed the conversation and ended up spending about an hour there.
Our first round of Belgian beer. Ton has the Leffe that we couldn’t get from its hometown in Dinant. Mine is from Ghent and the translation of the name is “hangmans rope”.
After a couple of beers we returned to François and continued to work on cleaning the last of the food out of the refrigerator. Not an exciting day, but in the end a satisfactory one.
A photo from yesterday as today we spent the whole day driving to our final stop on the trip. We started in Delft and are ending the trip in Delft. We have three nights here where we will clean up François and prepare him for storage.
We are in a corridor full of British so have heard a lot of English. The van across from us is an English/American couple so we are not the only Americans in the neighborhood.
We had a decision to make, our plan was to visit Dinant which was about an hour from our newly formed town at Benelux Campground. Last night it was pretty noisy until about midnight. Nothing malicious or rowdy, just a lot of people moving around and having conversations. About 1 am everyone finally went to sleep and stopped using their devices and ours all woke and started sending us alerts about all of the stuff that happened while we had no bandwidth. But by the time we were moving around about 8am the network had been overwhelmed again and we had no wifi. We decided we were going to move on.
Dinant with its cool Cathedral that seems to come out of the cliff and the Citadel on top of the cliff.
It was about an hour drive on pretty good roads to Dinant and we went to investigate the campground I had found on line. We were a little concerned about availability based on our experience yesterday but when we pulled up there were only 3 other RV’s parked on a meadow. There didn’t appear to be anyone in charge but fortunately one of the RV’s had UK plates so I went over asked him what the deal was. He said park up where you like and someone will come by in the evening and collect the money.
The Leffe Brewery. Not a bad place to make beer.
Since it appeared empty we drove on down into town and to my surprise found a good place to park with no real effort. Dinant has been fought over many times and was the site of a major battle in WWI between the French and the Germans. Charles de Gaulle then a Lieutenant was wounded here. After Dinant was captured by the Germans they executed 674 of the towns inhabitants for being partisans.
The Charles de Gaulle bridge over the river Meuse.
The city is confined to two narrow banks along the Meuse river. It is a really spectacular site with the bluffs on each side of the river dominating the town. A lot of the buildings are made from the same granite that forms the cliffs above the town so the town seems to blend into the hillside.
A glass saxophone.
Dinant is also the birthplace of Adolphe Sax who was born here and lived here until the ripe old age of 6 months. Nevertheless Dinant claims him and plays up his invention of the saxophone which he did in Paris. Everywhere you look in town are statues of saxophones, and it is the host of a prestigious competition for young saxophonists every year.
A saxophone dedicated to the United States and especially New Orleans.
It is also the home of Leffe brewery which is one of the biggest brewers in Belgium. The brewery itself is impressive and looks down on the city from on top of one of the bluffs.
The Cathedral.
After walking around for an hour or so we decided we would give a Leffe a try and have a proper lunch. After a thorough examination of the restaurants of Dinant we picked one that was located along the waterfront. We sat down but could not get the waiters attention. After sitting at a dirty table for about 20 minutes we finally got someone to bring us a menu, we didn’t want to lose him so we placed our order while he was still there. He took our order but didn’t clean the dirty plates off the table. About 10 minutes later he came by and cleaned the plates but didn’t wipe the table, and more importantly did not deliver our beer. Another 15 minutes went by and we managed to snare another waiter and asked for our beers to be delivered, and to check on our order. After another 15 minutes went by without our beers, never mind any food we were pretty annoyed. Meanwhile tables that arrived well after us had their beer and their food. So we did something we have never done in our lives. We got up and walked out of a restaurant. Down the street we found a nice kebab place that served us in about 10 minutes with a smile and delivered another huge plate of fries with our kebab.
The Meuse River.
We headed back to the campground and found that the population of the campground had grown to about 6 campers. By the end of the day there are about 20 here, but it is still pretty laid back compared to yesterday.
Adolphe Sax.
Our foray into the Ardennes has been a bit of a disappointment. Everything seems a bit overwhelmed and chaotic, not at all what we expected when we decided to come here. Ton commented that we are going to have to pay more attention to the holiday schedules of countries we visit in the future.
This post is a day late because last night we were unable to access wifi. As I mentioned yesterday when we arrived at what we expected to be a quiet campground in a quiet part of Belgium we found the place teeming with people because of a 4 day weekend. Our plan was to use the campground as the base to take day trips in the area. So we took our first day trip to the cute town of Durbuy and we returned to find that what we thought was a full campground could get even fuller. My guess was that there were close to 3000 people on the campsite. As a result the local cell tower was overwhelmed and we could not get enough bandwidth to open any programs or apps on the internet. So instead we settled in and watched the commotion around us with a little bit of annoyance.
François is hidden in there somewhere.
But enough complaining. Ton had starred three towns that she wanted to visit in her list of Belgian towns so today we headed off to Durbuy. It was a short drive of about 50 kilometers from the campground, but this time Google decided to test my driving skills by sending us over the top of a mountain on 11/2 lane roads. To increase the driving test Belgians and Dutch on holiday like to ride bikes around the mountains so we had to deal with passing bicyclists safely on these narrow roads.
Bicyclists everywhere.
After about an hour we arrived in Durbuy and it is every bit as pretty as its reputation. It is also located on the L’Oisle River with cliffs on both sides that give it a rugged beauty.
This imposing building overlooked the whole town from a perch on a granite hilltop.
The town itself is not large and you can walk thru the entire town twice in about 90 minutes as we did. It is totally devoted to tourism these days but it is one of those towns that gets tourism right. They had a nice mix of upscale artists galleries and designer clothes with places to get your magnet or whatever souvenir of choice you collect. The store fronts are dignified so you do not feel like you are in a tourist trap.
A nice statue in front of a well developed plant. The shop in the building was a high end tourist store.
There were multiple restaurants to pick from again covering the gamut from Michelin to Kebab shops. We decided we only wanted a beer and a cup of hot chocolate. I added a plate of fries to the order to give us something to snack on. The beer and chocolate were normal sized but the plate of fries was immense, much more than a snack. They do like fries here and the Belgians claim they are the inventor of the French Fry, not the French.
Ton loved the name of this store. I can’t remember what they sold.
Our drive back was much quicker as google decided us to keep us on the main road running along the river all of the way which saved us about 20 minutes of driving and 100 or more gear shifts.
Ton liked this statue of a pig looking into a butchers shop. It is both cute and sad.
We had picked out La-Roche-en-Ardennes as our next stop as it is central to a region we wanted to explore. After a wet but easy drive we arrived around 1pm at a large campground. When I went to check in and asked for 2 days I was asked if I had a reservation. The campground has over 200 spots, but once again we have blundered into a 4 day weekend we did not know about. Tomorrow is Assumption Day which is a holiday here and since it falls on a Thursday they are also given a “bank” holiday on Friday. So instead of a quiet campground where can come and go from easily we are in a campground that is completely full. We were thinking of staying here Friday also, but right now we are on a waiting list!
La Roche is located on a u-shaped bend of the L’Orthe River.
Last year we had visited Bastogne which is only about 25 kilometers from here to tour the WWII battlefield. La Roche was also fought over during the Battle of the Bulge. It was overrun in the initial attack by the Germans and then re-taken about a month later by a combined American and British force. During the battle the town was pretty much leveled.
The church in town was one of the few buildings that survived the Battle of the Bulge mostly intact.
It is a nice town clearly geared towards tourism. The main street is restaurants and souvenir shops. At one time there must have been a lot of American tourists as there is even an “American Store” in town. But today we appeared to be the only Americans in town.
A German Hertzer Tank Destroyer on display in front of the Battle of Ardennes Museum.
While we were setting up and walking to town 4 Belgian Air Force F-16’s put on a little airshow at low altitude for us criss crossing the valley several times doing simulated bomb runs. We were also lucky because we got a little break in the weather for our stroll. It had rained most of the way to the campground and as soon as we got back it rained again.
The bridge over the L’Ourthe with storm clouds gathering in the background.
Once the rain began we hunkered down in François and watched the village that is the Benelux campground grow around us. Watching people move in and set up their homes is always cheap entertainment in any campground in the world.
We needed to stop by François’ hometown to check on our mail, and see if we could schedule an appointment for some minor repairs to prepare for our second “controle technique” or safety inspection when we return in the fall. So our day pretty much consisted of fueling up, hitting a grocery, and then driving 300 kilometers to Sens to see the folks at Eurocampingcars.
The lake at our campground tonight.
With the work done in Sens we then drove on for another hour to a campground near Troyes where we settled in for the night. We are going to spend the next few days giving Belgium some more time. We always feel bad because we have frequently driven thru the entire country without stopping going from the Netherlands to France. We hope to rectify that the next few days.
I selected Vichy for todays visit because of its association with World War II. Today and historically Vichy was famous as a spa town with hot springs and naturally carbonated water. Unfortunately for about 3 years of WWII it served as the capital of the puppet French government under Nazi Germany. For me that is always what I will remember it for. When the US and British invaded North Africa early in WWII the initial resistance to the landing was not from the Germans or Italians, but from French troops fighting for Vichy.
Fishing in the l’Allier River.
We both slept well last night (Ton said I slept very well, meaning I snored), so we both woke early (Ton said her early rise was not entirely voluntary but related to how well I slept.) We were underway early and I was hopeful of arriving at the campground in Vichy before the customary 90 to 120 minute lunch. I respect that the French need two hours for lunch, but my one request be that they get together and agree on which two hours. Some campgrounds break noon to two, some 12:30 to 2:30 and some from 1 to 3. We were on track for a 12:30 arrival, but missed by a couple of minutes, and the barrier to the campground was down meaning lunch was on. There were already two other campers waiting, but the good news was this campground only takes a 90 minute lunch from noon, so we had a little less than an hour to wait. So we also had our lunch.
Downtown Vichy.
We headed into town around 2:15 and crossed the bridge to the Avenue of the United States. Running parallel to the Avenue of the US was a lovely park full of trees imported from around the world including an iffy looking Sequoia which still dwarfed all of the other trees.
This Sequoia looks like it has seen better days, but it still dwarfed all of the other trees in the park.
We turned onto Avenue Franklin Roosevelt (there are more roads named after Americans in France than in any other country in Europe) to visit the old Spa hotels. The road and the park that were integral to the old spa are getting a major upgrade, so we were dodging construction sites and equipment.
The Opera House is also getting a major upgrade.
The spa concept was a major tourism draw in the 1800’s and up to WWII in Europe. The concept of going to take the waters was touted as both medically beneficial as well as restful. There was a structured routine that included baths in the thermals, prescribed outdoor walks, healthful meals, and evening relaxation.
One of the halls containing thermal springs. The taps in the foreground are available to fill containers for free.
This led to quite a large industry with luxury hotels to support it. In Vichy the infrastructure that was built in the 1800’s is still largely in place, including large parks with covered walkways around the outside of them in case of inclement weather. These covered walks are impressive as they are made of cast iron and stretch for quite a distance around the exterior edge of the park. There is a large building in the middle of the park that contains an opera hall and casino for evening entertainment, and luxury hotels along one side of the park housed those that had the money to spend time here.
Another part of the thermal building.
There are 11 Spa cities still functioning in Europe though they are not as popular as they once were. Vichy was celebrating that it along with the other 10 cities throughout Europe had been declared UNESCO cultural sites.
An advertisement from the era touting the sparkling water from Vichy. It is still for sale today.
Vichy is also know for a kind of candy called Pastilles. This year they are celebrating the 200th anniversary of the invention of Pastilles. We decided that this would be a good gift for friends so we spent the rest of the afternoon searching for Pastilles to take home. After visiting three stores we are now well stocked with this delicacy.
Some canoes near our campground.
While walking around town we saw many references to Vichy as a spa town, and as a source for Pastilles, but only one mention of its role during WWII. I guess I am not surprised as one story is much more pleasant than the other.
We are going to spend the next few days traveling slowly thru central France. This rugged region is full of river valleys and steep hills. There are over a 1000 castles and ruins in the region, but they tend to be on a smaller scale than the big castles in the Loire Valley and around Paris. It is also one of the least visited parts of France by foreign tourists.
The bridge entering Cahors.
Cahors is located on a U-turn on the Lot river and was originally founded by the Celts. It has been around for a lot of history, but nothing particularly interesting has happened here during history.
This landscape of a river running thru steep hills will be common for the next couple of days.
It was a short drive down from Toulouse, but we left early because today was market day in Cahors and we wanted to arrive while the market was in full swing. We quickly checked in and set up François before walking the 2 kilometers back to town.
The market was going in full force around the Cathedral in town.
As we got closer to town we passed more and more people with baskets of groceries and fresh flowers. The market was quite large and the products on sale were very diverse. The regional specialty is duck and geese with all of the different things you can get from those animals including Foie Gras. We are not big fans of it, but we did get talked into taking a sample and I have to admit it was delicious, though we won’t be buying any.
Near the end of the market with the doors of the Cathedral in the background.
These markets are always a lot of fun. In addition to being a good source of fresh foods that support the local farmers, it is always a big social event. We were really lucky as they were also having a festival celebrating the local bicycle clubs so in addition to the good food there were some other interesting displays as well as live jazz all day. While we were wandering around town at least 4 different jazz bands played. It seems these days jazz is more popular in Europe than in the US.
An interesting statue near the cathedral.
The biggest attraction in Cahors is the Valentre bridge over the Lot. It is a medieval bridge with three towers. Many bridges of this era had towers on them, partially for defense, and partially to collect tolls for their use. These days very few of the towers survive.
The three towers plus our favorite plant.
The bridge was quite a construction project for its age. There is a local story that the architect of the bridge was falling behind so he pledged his soul to the devil if the bridge was completed on time. So the devil intervened and the bridge was completed on time, but the architect reneged on the deal and kept his soul. This caused the devil to put a curse on his family. To honor this story a small statue of the devil is located high up on one of the towers.
One of the towers with the stairs leading to the tower.
While Ton was shooting pictures I was doing my normal gazing at people and things when a very dapper French couple in their 80’s asked me to take their picture. I was happy to oblige and they were very grateful. While I was taking their picture Ton had found a very nice place to pose, and she convinced them to pose for her to take their picture. When she showed them the picture they exclaimed Superb which in French sounds even better than English. Unfortunately she used their camera so we don’t have the picture for our use. We passed them several times and they would show us more pictures they had taken. They were a fun and very cute encounter today.
One more view of the bridge.
We finished off the day with a wine tasting at the visitors center. We were given five tastings of local wine for free. The region is know for Malbec which is most famously produced in Argentina. Ton has never been a fan of Malbec, but I was hoping French Malbec would change her mind. It didn’t, the reds were too dry for her taste though she did enjoy a Rose from the region.
Toulouse is the fourth largest city in France and we had never visited it, though we have driven thru it many times in our comings and goings in France. It is the hub of the French aerospace industry and has the French equivalent of NASA it is not on the tourism path in a big way possibly because it is too far inland for cruise ships to come here on day trips.
These covered walkways called arcades are common in southern France and Spain. This one had nice artwork in the ceiling.
Ton did her normal planning for the visit, and I did the navigation. We spent several pleasant hours downtown visiting all of the normal things we go to look at in European cities.
The tower of the Basilica in Toulouse.
The weather was nice again by the afternoon and there were a lot of people in the streets shopping and enjoying their lunch. Toulouse has several prominent churches and we poked into a couple of them and they were very nice.
The rather austere interior of the Basilica.
The streets were very busy but there was a noticeable absence of guided groups, in fact the only one we saw today was from Lebanon which was a first for us. There was a tourist presence and we heard plenty of American accented English, but it was mostly couples or small groups traveling independently.
Toulouse is famous for its pink tinted buildings, but the light didn’t highlight the pink very well today.
What we did notice was the very high percentage of young people on the streets. Toulouse is home to several universities and the number of students is supposed to be around 100,000. So there was a youthful energy to the town that we really enjoyed. A lot of the American accented English we heard came from younger people rather than middle aged and senior people, which we also enjoyed.
The “New Bridge” which is the oldest bridge in town was originally built in the middle ages. Thomas Jefferson was very interested it and based the design for a bridge over the Potomac on it.
After walking it for a few hours we were surprised that it does not attract more visitors than it does. It is a great walkable downtown with interesting and unique architecture, nice old churches, and good food; all of the things that visitors love. But on the other hand we were glad it didn’t attract thousands of visitors in busses to crowd the center. It is a beautiful city that deserves a visit, and hopefully it will continue to strike the right balance without getting overwhelmed with visitors.
We’re back in France so you have to have a carousel.
