Pt.7 Riding through France

Sunday 16^th May 2010. Chatillon sur marne to Dijon

My skin has long since lost it’s bronzed Aussie tan, and has turned white from lack of substantial sunshine. So when I awoke to a blazing golden orb pumping out vitamin D in excess, I was quick to strip down to my bare essentials and frolic in the life giving heat and the clear, lustrous daylight. I broke camp near naked, then thought better of my state of undress as I went to visit the pope and his nearby souvenir shop. Here I bought the required postcards and memorabilia of my stay. The route today I thought would take me through Troyes or Twah as I now knew, and onto Dijon, the home of Mustard, and probably lots of other things too I’m sure.

I wound my way back down the windy-windies, through the small and empty commercial sector, past my campsite for the night, and out onto the road to Epernay, and the Champagne trail.

I’ve never been a great lover of the bubbly stuff, it just seems to get up my nose and make me sneeze a lot, after that I get all wobbly, can’t stop giggling like a fool, and then I fall over and have weird dreams…actually, in hindsight, maybe it’s not so bad. I never really knew how champagne grew either, I guess I knew it was on a grapevine like other wines of course, but never really gave it any dedicated thought. Even now I’m probably none the wiser actually, except for the knowledge that the Champagne region is called that because the whole area is crammed with champagne vines. The road to Epernay and beyond is like a living, breathing excerpt from a travel magazine. Chateau’s and vineyards appeared at every turn… literally every turn. My friend Lyndal would have been in a state of divine rapture riding through here. The hills were covered as far as I could see in great long grids of grapevines, and wooden-shuttered houses of whitewashed stone and red-tiled roofs dotted the landscape like pictures from a lonely-planet travel book. I wished I was more attuned to the appreciation of bubbly grape-juice as I rode on through, maybe I would have been tempted to stop and sample the local produce, but as it was, I wanted to reach Dijon today, if for no other reason than to get some miles under the wheels.

I left the sun-kissed hills of the Champagne-Ardenne region behind me at Epernay, and again found myself on the A26 heading towards Troyes. Soon enough though I turned off the motorway and wound my way onto the D671, which in turn became the D971, a picture postcard road through sleepy Siene-side villages leading all the way into Dijon.

The 80-odd mile route was nothing short of glorious, with too many photo opportunities to possibly stop at. I stood for a while and watched fly fisherman casting their whispy lines into a clear, greeny coloured Siene that flowed rapidly beneath the road; and cascaded out the other side in a wide arc of white water, before settling into a deep emerald-coloured pool surrounded by willows and other lazy-looking, sleepy trees.

As I rode on I became totally enchanted with where I was, and soon found myself singing into my helmet “No, non regret, je ne regret rien’. I again stood up on the pegs as I coasted down through the pine and firs that started to appear road-side, and threw my arms out wide as I burst in rapturous voice. ‘’Non regret rien…’ when a bug of French design flew straight into my mouth, punching it’s weight into my tonsils and almost instantly choking me. As I struggled to breathe and regain control of the now careering bike, I thought about the woman who swallowed a fly…I don’t know why.

Near Chanceaux I had the opportunity to travel five miles off-course to see the source of the Seine, but I didn’t take it. ‘Non regret rien!’

The Vineyards of the Champagne-Ardenne had given way to lush cereal fields, and then at St. Marc, the landscape changed again, becoming forested with high rocky crags, as I began an ascent into the clouds. It became much colder too, and the switchback roads at Val Suzon gave me a taste of what must lay ahead. I noticed the bike felt heavy up the long winding ascent toward the sky, and anything under three thousand revs in top gear became a shuddering twin-cylindered revolt into a lower gear. I reached the top of the climb, and then without prelude or celebration, Dijon appeared below me like a huge concrete lake. Time had got on without me even noticing, so I found myself a campsite quickly and got settled in for the evening. T decided I’d take tomorrow off the bike and spend the day in Dijon at a café where I could get my journal up to date and possibly enjoy some decent food and a leisurely walk around town. That night, as the sun again set on my journey through France, I wrote a postcard to my girls in Melbourne; but they didn’t even know I was on this trip did they? so what to say and how to say it was agonising. I made a hot drink and went for a walk through the forest, trying to ease the pain that throbbed in my chest.

Monday 17^th May 2010. Dijon to Dole.

I had intended taking today off the bike and spending it in Dijon; one of the reasons being that I really needed to get my camera and computer powered-up, and get online to do my internet thing. But try as I might I couldn’t find an internet café for love nor money. I wandered around the old town marvelling at the wooden-beamed building with their multi-stories, and getting all turned-around and lost amongst the winding maze-like cobbled laneways and streets. After an hour or so of local shops, coffee houses and mustard souvenirs, I decided that I really did need to get plugged-in, and started riding towards Geneva to see what would happen. Thirty-five miles later I was in Dole and booking myself into a hotel for the day and night.

The Hotel de la cloches means the hotel of the bells, and I could see why, or actually, I could hear why. It was because the nearby church bells sounded every quarter of an hour and lasted for about ten minutes per chime, so really, there was only about five minutes between each deafening peel of bells. I parked the bike and carted all the gear up to my room in a lift just big enough for me and a couple of bags at a time, after what seemed about fifteen trips, I had a long hot shower, and went for a walk around town. Beautiful though the bells were, after the first hour I was all hunched over and calling out “the bells Esmerelda, the bells”. I hobbled away through the tiny back alleys and twisting laneways that always headed steeply downhill to escape them. Suddenly I was next to a canal with four, five and six storey building abutting it’s length. Many were beautifully painted and renovated in tasteful period guise, but just as many were vacant, and looking for all the world like they were fit to collapse at any moment; they were the Tannery buildings, and had stood here for centuries.

Dole made it’s money from the tannery trade, and the area I was walking through had once been the beating heart of town. The seedy, prostitute-ridden and underworld heart of town mind you, with just as many brothels as tanneries, and just as many pick-pockets, thieves, rascals and rapscallions to boot. Nonetheless, the walk I took was picturesque, with the Roach-filled canal charming and sparkling it’s way along the quay, and the cool, underground grotto stretching out beneath several streets. I alighted from the grotto and was met by a sign advising me that the famous Louise Pasteur had been born just up the road at number 24. Excellent I thought, I can’t remember what he painted, but I’m sure I’ll know it when I see it. Imagine my disappointment when after paying 5 euros to get in, I learned that he wasn’t a French renaissance painter or anything remotely similar or interesting like that at all. He was a world renowned chemist and micro-biologist who saved the world from such blights as Cholera, Scabies, Rabies, Typhus etc, and gave us such gifts as pasteurisation, inoculation and something worthy to aspire to.. I did get to see his accoutrements though, and that made me happy, as I’ve always wanted to use that word somewhere.

I met a homeless guy named Kurt, and his dog named Kessel, or was it Dirk and Vassel? Either way, he was sitting cross-legged on the pavement with a margarine tub in front of him, with a sign reading, ‘Stop Global warming’. I tossed him 0.50 Euros and asked if he minded me joining him, soon I was sitting next to him, patting his dog and making uncalled-for social judgement on his predicament. He was a nice guy though, fluent in both French and German, and very well educated in Munich. When I asked how he got to be in his position, he simply replied. “I walked here”. Then he gave me a knowing grin and shook my hand firmly goodbye.

Dole was quaint and possessed a real easiness about itself, even the bells after a couple hours didn’t seem quite that noticeable anymore. I smoothed out my hump, and left Kurt to his Global campaigning and wandered back up the narrow, winding streets to the hotel; stopping here for coffee, and there for Croissants. A girl named Helena sold me a quiche that I really didn’t want, but she was way too lovely to say no to.