Dijon, but first updates from Brancion and Vezelay
No wifi for last few days, so another condensed post.
Got back from Tournus, had another excellent dinner in Chapaize, in a restaurant that didn't even have a sign. Just luck that we found it. Both of us had magret, in cassis sauce with berries. Great.
Next day to Beaune. Rainy day. Beaune has its own hospice, much more famous than Tournus. Here is a photo:
Pretty neat. Beaune is nice, very wine trade oriented. Not much else here other than the hospice.
We headed back to Brancion. Kathy and I felt like driving around so we headed to Blanot, described as a pretty town. Down the roads we went, narrower and narrower. Found one of the restaurants we had searched for unsuccessfully the other day before we found the second one in Chapaize. Specialized in escargots and frogs leg, so I guess I'm ok we didn't find it. I had escargot the first night in Brancion, pretty good but I don't need to make it a constant part of my diet.
Roads narrower and narrower. Will we ever find this place?
Anyway, we finally found Blanot. It IS pretty:
Communal bread oven, cool.
Cute Romanesque church, related to Cluny...surprise.
Found a little auberge in town. Looked closed, but tried the door..."Bon jour...etc" nice woman, spoke English really well. We chatted for awhile and had something to drink. The menu looked good...lamb! I haven't seen that yet. But kinda far.
We leave, drive up to the top of Mont whatever for the view. Socked in by rain. Road half the width of the car. Feels like a 25% grade...8 really.
Get back. Dinner time, suggest we try the new decourvert. Ponder distance. It stays light until 10:30, why not. Great choice. The place is really simple, just plain tables, paper napkins, but the food was excellent. Place is filled up with people, where do they come from. Agneau is excellent, Kathy had pork with local honey and thyme. Had a wine for up the road...excellent. Another from way far away...6 km. The server was joking with us that it really wasn't local.
So. Glad we drove down that road.
Next day, we head to Vezelay via Autun and Bribracte.
Way late and in Burgundy
Okay, many days later, and no posts. I'm going to cheat and put up photos and sentences.
1. Lyon is great. We want to go back. Many things to do, beautiful city.
2. Burgundy is great too. Very pretty countryside and phenomenal Romanesque churches, many with frescos.
3. Cluny is neat, only the transept is left of a church 187 meters long. Cute town too. Excellent guided tour of Musee.
4. Paray Le Monial is a terrific abbey. The town looked dull as we drove in, turned out to be tres jolie.
5. Azey le Duc has a beautiful church and charming town.
6. Ditto for Semur-en-Brionais
7. Amazingly small number of people visiting these sites. We're almost alone at all of these places.
8. Tournus is a great town, with a neat Hospice and (wait for it) another great abbey
9. Burgundy is filled with cool stuff.
10. Food is excellent.
Cluny.
Medieval house, Cluny.
Branciac, near hotel
Branciac
Tournus Hotel de Ville
Abbey
Abbey
Cormatin chateau...nice to be rich
17th c painting on wall...cool
Decoration...
Chapaize church near hotel
Just finished great dinner...gazpacho, duck, etc. gotta take picture of Chapaize church
Everyone should come to Burgundy...
Lyon Day Two
First to the tourist office (like all in France remarkably well run, we bought a two day Lyon card...best deal ever..all museums, metro, guided tours, boat rides. Amazing). First stop, the Musee des Tissus and Arts Decoratifs...the textile and decorative arts museum. Pretty cool. Lyon was quite wealthy in the Renaissance because of the textile and silk industry. With that money they bought nice stuff, which you see here. No photos allowed, but a fun couple of hours.
After lunch, we took the (free!) guided tour of Vieux Lyon. We'd walked around the day before, but this was excellent. Nicholas explained the various renaissance styles we saw, and pointed out that Lyon has one of the largest collections of extant renaissance houses.
Cool house.
England to Lyon
Friday was quiet. Since R&H live near Hastings, where William the Conqueror conquered Harold many place nearby refer to the events. For instance the nearest town is Battle...get it? Obviously that meant we ate lunch in the 1066 pub, next door to Battle Abbey. Good lunch though. Nice drive about and then an early night, since we needed to get up at 4:00 am to catch a train to meet the Eurostar to Lyon. Great trip, I think. I slept most of the way, but leaving Dover at 8:00 am we where in Lyon by 2:00 (with a one hour time change). Lyon is quite pretty, stuck between two rivers. We grabbed a quick lunch and then wandered around Vieux Lyon, the old part of town.
Beef road, dinner beckons.
Rich Renaissance merchants put cool staircases on their houses is Lyon.
After wandering about the lower part of town, Kathy and I had the bright idea of walking up to the Fourviere part of town, via the pretty rose gardens. Gasping for breath, we reached the cathedral and had a great view
Wedding cake style cathedral. Mass was going on so we couldn't see the interior. Nice mosaics in the crypt though.
Plenty of appetite for dinner at Archange, which was terrific. I had roast chicken with morels, and excellent terrine to start. Kathy began with a very good salmon followed by duck. Bloated we headed back to the Celestins to sleep.
England
An uneventful flight to Heathrow. Schlepping from train to tube to train was slightly more than we wanted, but by 2:00 pm we were in Battle, being picked up by Robert. We wandered around Bexhill a bit, stopped by the De La Warr pavilion, Art Deco crazed building on the beach, saw Pevensey castle and back for dinner.
Thursday we drove to Warum Castle. Built by Henry VIII as a fortification on the coast, it has become a country house. The state gives it to someone who does something big, which is why the Duke of Wellington died there. Winston Churchill also got to use it. Fortresses converted into country homes have nice gardens:
We then drove to Wincelsea, which was a Cinque Port until its harbor silted up. It's church was meant to be much larger, but storm damage and lack of money made it smaller. A British comedian, Spike Milligan, is buried there. His epitaph is in Gaelic, since the church wouldn't let him have it in English. It says "I told you I was sick"
Wincelsea church.
Labels: Warum Castle garden
Test
Testing
Location:Test from home
Dinan
This is a nice place.
So, breakfast was so-so, the hotel is tres basic. Oh well, it is cheap and convenient and clean. Off to explore. Interesting exhibition at the tourisme about the history of the town. The wars of succession didn't do it any good, but the port was enough to make it successful. The town is preserved because after one of the old gates in the ramparts was pulled down in the 1830s a preservation movement sprang up. Who knew that historic preservation was so old? Of course, that also explains Carcassone, so if I'd thought about it I'd know.
Nonetheless, we start walking. The first stop is the bell tower with some great views...
Later, from the donjon on the keep I bag three of the Brittany spires...
Well, two of them at least.
Then walking and walking. Medieval man was in good shape. Cobblestones are hard. But great buildings.
Most were built in the 15th century, and restored, but they look great.
We walked for two hours, and at the Governor's house stopped for what turned into a two hour lunch, since it was so pleasant we just wanted to sit and enjoy the ambiance.
Continuing down the steep hill, after lunch and buying rocks, we found the old port. Tres picturesque.
Back up the hill. Infinite respect for the thighs of the middle ages. The English established a presence here, so at the top of the hill is an English garden next to the basilica.
Worn out, we hobble over to the chateau and visit the local museum. Some very nice sculptures and the views are terrific.
A long day ends with a terrific meal at the Hotel Le Challonge. When we stopped earlier for a drink I'd thought it was just a dopey hotel restaurant, but we each had one of the tastiest meals we've had in France. The lamb was excellent, Kathy's duck very good, Jenny's beef béarnaise excellent. Along with entrees, dessert and a good Cote du Rhone, we've earned our sleep.
Location:Dinan
Le Conquet to Dinan
Memo to self, a base at the end of a peninsula requires additional driving. Le Conquet is a nice little village, and La Vinotierre, despite dragon lady on check in is a nice hotel. But it is better as a destination than a base, since now we need to drive the exact same route to Morlaix to get to the next place. Next time we come to Brittany I'm all set.
Anyway, on to the Cote d'Armor, also known as the pink granite coast. At the very beginning of the area we stopped at Le Yaudet, to look at the Gallo-Roman ruins and the view. Great view, a little estuary winding up into the land with the village tumbling down. Wandered around the site, didn't see anything other than markers. The view was great though, since the weather was ideal.
Find the Gallo-Roman site and win $$$$
It was almost time for lunch, so we decided to continue on into some of the larger towns along the coast. That was a boo boo. Similar to the Jersey shore, this is a beautiful area that is quite well known. Trapped in traffic, we finally found a good parking spot, but all the restaurants were full. Desperately seeking food, we wandered more, gave up our good spot in the parking lot and drove on. We finally found a place in the middle of Perros-Guerac, a creperie of course. But, eating outside on a beautiful day solves many problems.
This drive took longer than we thought, so we skipped Treguier and headed straight to Dinan. We stopped in Lamballe for a quick coffee and walk to wake me up. Again, a very pleasant ville. Are there ugly towns in Brittany?
Fortified, we finished driving to Dinan. A gem. Half timber buildings, interesting architecture all around. We went in search of a restaurant and spent most of our time taking photos. Tomorrow should be fun.
Many choices for dinner, we ended up picking a Moroccan place. Tres bon.
Bhouka is tasty, and mutton isn't half bad.
Location:Dinan
Off to Morlaix
Off to another town I should have used as a base...Morlaix. One and a half hours from here, but an easy drive. Morlaix got rich from being a port in a convenient spot, shipping linen, lead and salt to Europe. A great view when you drive in, a huge viaduct across the city, which lies in a deep valley.
The fifteenth and nineteenth centuries meet in Morlaix.
Nice town. Excellent buildings, many of them covered in slate. I've not seen slate used on the side of building before. Makes sense, it certainly is weather proof.
We wandered for a bit, and found the museum. It was going to close in fifteen minutes, for lunch, so we walked over to the Maison de Duchess Anne, who theoretically stayed there, much like our own George Washington who slept everywhere. These houses were built to flaunt the owner's wealth, and are called pondalez because of their giant spiral staircases.
Pretty keen pondalez you have, Monsieur.
We then walk to number 9 Grand Rue to see another pondalez, but as it was part of the museum it too was closed for lunch. Taking the hint, we had lunch at a Moroccan place. Nice break from gallettes. Very tasty. Moroccan food got us to mourning the loss of Konak, our Turkish restaurant. Now we crave Turkish food.
Back to #9, which was also nice.
From there we went to the main museum, which had a show of Charles Lapicque, a twentieth century Brittany artist, specializing in maritime painting. More expressionist than I like, but okay. The show was silent about the period 1939-1945, and I noticed that he did alot of painting of French naval vessels in the 50s. Did I not understand the French descriptions or was that an odd silence?
Back to the car. Good views of the port....
And off on another scenic drive through the Mont's d'Array.
Near Huelgoat (Breton place names are fun) we saw a sign pointing off the road for an ancient mine. Gotta see that, so down the track we go to the old 18th century lead mine. I have to admit that the anticipation was better the the experience....
Lead mines are not exciting.
Back on the road, and near Loqueffret (really) we saw another parish close. Smaller, and no information other than a terse sign, but charming.
Many of the churches we've seen have some woodwork that I've not seen before. There is a carved wood piece along the top of the wall, were the roof joins.
Too bad it's blurry.
Also, there is a wooden crucifix where the chancel and nave meet, in the rafters.
Also, there are carved wooden beams traversing the nave and chancel. Interesting.
Finally back, through tedious traffic in Brest. Dinner at the restaurant the first night, Restaurant vue sur Mer. Kathy had many moules and I had veal. Tomorrow we leave Le Conquet and head for Dinan.
Location:Le Conquet
