Bruce & Peg's

Great Adventure 

April, 2008

 

Exit Strategies

Donna Turner was good enough to allow us to stay in her drive while we and her mechanic went over Lily to make sure all was in good working order. This process took longer than usual since there was another camper van being checked out at the same time.

After a cold rainy Saturday, the sun broke out gloriously on its day – coincidentally, our departure date.

We woke around 7 am and made ready to leave. The first thing to do was for Bruce to go to a bank and make sure my ATM card was working (by way of getting some cash) because his card was being rejected by the machines. We’ll have to contact our bank to see why, but let me tell you – its kind of a scary feeling to not be able to access your money. Fortunately, my card is working so we are ok, but we need to find out why Bruce’s suddenly stopped.

Bruce returned to the van with breakfast in hand – chocolate croissants so fresh they collapsed in your mouth – and we enjoyed them with our coffee and cocoa.

We finished packing up and I turned on the GPS, plugging it into the 12-volt system, found our route (to the tulip fields) and turned it off rather than waste battery power with the engine off.

Then all hell broke loose.

It seems we have an alarm system and it chose to go off at just that moment! A screaming alarm was blaring out from Lily and we couldn’t shut it off! This, at 8:30 on a peaceful Sunday morning. We were climbing all over Lily trying to find the alarm – being quickly deafened too – and just as Bruce was ready to disconnect the battery it stopped. Then the silence was deafening – or maybe our ears were just numb, I’m not sure which. We didn’t know we had an alarm and we sure don’t know how to arm it or turn it off and we weren’t leaving until we did.

Bruce spent another hour crawling around Lily and finally found a tiny toggle switch near the steering column that we have determined is the on/off switch for the alarm. While we still have no idea why the damn thing went off when it did, we at least know how to manually turn the alarm on or off.

Finally we can begin our travels.

A few notes about Lily: She is a VW campervan, she is a wide-body type, which gives us a bit more room. She is going to be very comfortable and is a major upgrade from Queenie 1. We have a dinette settee which breaks down into a comfortable bed and an upper bunk that makes into a huge bed that we haven’t tried yet. The back kitchen setup is great – the back door opens and it looks like a walk-up for a short order cook. The cupboard space is an amazing difference from Queenie 1 –Lily has seven cabinets to Queenie’s three. We hardly know what to do with all that room. (Note to Kathi and Larry: we are keeping one of the cupboards (with shelves!) open for you guys, but after you leave – woo-hoo - we got space!) We even have a bathroom (or WC to be exact) with a little porta-potty that is quite adequate. The longer we are in her, the more we like her.

So we left Utrecht. As is our custom, we kept to the smaller roads and had a wonderful time passing by lovely, immaculate farm homes and delightful villages. I’ve heard the Dutch are very proud of their homes and from what we saw on our drive we will attest to it. We made our way towards Lisse, an  area known for its flower fields. Last time we came here we were too late, all the flowers had all been harvested. This year we were in luck – the fields were bursting with color. We found acres and acres of pink, blue, yellow and purple flowers.

 

From Lisse we drove to Amsterdam and Gaaspercamping (22.50 euro), the park we stayed in 8 years ago; a  convenient short walk to the metro takes us into the Central Station in Amsterdam.

We spent Monday in Amsterdam trying to solve our customs overcharge. Here is what happened: we sent 3 boxes of camping equipment/travel books/vitamins to the company from whom we purchased the van. Dutch Customs charged us 100 euros for customs tax on our own stuff. That is not right so we went to the VVV (tourist board) to find out the address of customs so we could talk to them and hopefully get at least some of our money back.

Typical government office that it is, they would not give out their address and said the only thing we can do is write a letter or send an email. That we shall do, but why is it that working with a government entity always seems to result in a splitting headache?

 

After leaving the VVV office we hopped a tram and visited the Albert Cuyper Markt, a really cool 3-block long food and flea market. We needed to buy some staples and were planning to purchase them there but we found our favorite European food store, Lidl, a block further down and went shopping there instead. We bought cookies, sausages, cereal, cheeses (goudas, fetas and bries), eggs, zucchinis (courgettes to the Europeans), chocolate waffles(!) all for only 8.50 euros. (I am telling you, if our exchange rate was decent this could be a cheap trip!)

Traveling on the tram was a cheap way to get a tour of the city and we were reintroduced to the lovely old narrow houses that make up the central core of Amsterdam.

Tomorrow we plan to leave Amsterdam for Delft and Gouda (we learned that we North Americans have been mispronouncing that name for a long time – it is actually pronounced “Howda” ) then into France and Brittany.

 

 

Wednesday, April 09, 2008

I woke up Monday morning with a scratchy throat and in less than 12 hours it developed into a nasty full-blown cold. Bruce, meanwhile, was dumpster diving at Gaaspercamping for a board that has become counter space and popped something in his ribs. We are just doing great over here.

Want to let you know how well our GPS “Gar” is working. We set it for back roads only,  give it our destination and off we go! I worried how it would work and if we really wanted to use it but so far we are and glad to. We told it to take us to the Delft camping – Delftse Hout and we arrived with great fanfare (well, not really but it worked perfectly).

 

We remembered Delftse Hout camping to be one of the best campgrounds we visited and it is still so. A little pricier than Gaaspercamping at 26 euro/night but it included free wifi, free showers, toilet paper in the WC (still a big deal in Europe where everyone buys small packets of tissue for use in public toilets) and a short walk into town, so no metro to pay for. And it is very well kept – all facilities are clean and shiny.

Tuesday afternoon we walked into town for a quick tour of the square and to find some drugs for my cold and possible pain relievers for Bruce’s ribs. Then we returned home and put me to bed.

 

Wednesday we got to take a walking tour of Delft with a guide who told us all about the history of the town. This was paid for by the campground.

I am still feeling the cold so I am keeping this brief. Hopefully I’ll feel better at the next posting and be a bit more informative of what we are seeing.

Posted by Peggy 4/09/08 – Delft, NL

Brugge and Beyond

A quick update on our banking cards. We were able to call our bank (courtesy of Delft’s wifi and our Skype connection) and determined that when I called the bank to let them know I was going overseas for 5 months they only authorized my debit card not both of ours. When Bruce used his card red lights began flashing and sirens shrieking so they shut his down. Our call released the flag and authorized his card use as well as mine. Remember to let your bank know all the cards that will be traveling overseas with you.

 

We’ve determined an approximate itinerary for the next couple of weeks, follow the coast from Belgium into France across the Norman beaches and into Brittany. We’ve been to the beaches of Normandy before and feel they deserve another visit. Then we will continue west to Brittany. We missed Brittany on our last visit due to a turn in weather. The standing stones of Carnac and Merlin’s Forest are somewhere out there and I’d like to find them.

 

 

We bid farewell to Delft on Thursday morning after an extended stop at the local IKEA store. We were looking for a clothes drying rack; IKEA didn’t have that but they did have some other items we thought we could use but it turned out we couldn’t.

Actually it was near noon when we left so we opted to take the A16 highway south towards Brugge, Belgium. We drove 221 kilometers along the highway system and I found it to be really boring – a good reinforcement of why we choose not to travel on those roads. Traveling the highways wasn’t even that expedient – there was lots of road construction going on that stopped us at times. We did see “rest stops” where we can wild camp some nights if we want – they are the gas/rest/eat stations just off the highways – similar to ours but with gas stations and restaurants.

We are paying 4.50 euros/gal for diesel fuel – not too bad until you figure the conversion rate which says we are paying almost $7US/per gal. for diesel fuel. We are, however, getting at least 25 mpg and Europe is small (thank goodness!). The Europeans historically have paid higher fuel prices than the U.S. and it’s interesting to see how the U.S. is now catching up with them. (Adding the exchange rate into the factor changes the whole equation, of course.)

 

We arrived at Memling Camping in Brugge (Bruges) around 4 pm. After settling in, we hopped a bus into town center.

We spent a day in Brugge in the beginning of our 2000 trip and were fascinated with the city. We had learned that Brugge, a wealthy and important cloth manufacturing and trading center, went belly-up in the 1500s when its river silted up and ships could no longer reach it. Traders moved away leaving the town in a Rip Van Winkle sleep only to wake up 400+ years later when tourists rediscovered it. That 400-year slumber kept the medieval city intact to the constant wonder and awe of present-day visitors.

 

I don’t know how much land the ancient city covers, but it is a good sized. I believe you could walk the city streets for at least a half day, perhaps longer, and not retrace your steps. Beautifully preserved two and three story brick buildings shouldering against one another line the streets. The ground floors house modern businesses: fast food chains (Pizza Hut, Burger King, McDonalds – pretty disgusting, eh?), chocolatiers, bakeries, clothing stores, department stores, hardware, groceries, etc. You walk the streets looking at the merchandise in the windows and then you look up and remember that these modern shops are contained within hundreds-year-old buildings. The city is defined by an oval shaped canal so the streets meander in a very organic fashion – no grid layouts here – and every street is worthy of walking.

 

The Markt is exquisite:  Built in the 13^th century (that is the 1200s) it is lined with gabled houses, a beautiful Stadhuis (town hall) and the Belfort, a stunning bell tower that used to be the towns treasury. Restaurants occupy the bottom floors of the gabled houses and offer city specials: mussels and waffles as well as daily menus. Market is still held in the square on Saturdays.

Brugge has several stand-out churches: the Church of our Lady has the tallest spire in Belgium. Brugge even has a Michelangelo sculpture; a Madonna con Bambino (we are so thrilled to write that – we saw so many art pieces entitled “Madonna con Bambino” last time; this is our first for this trip).

We walked about the town for three hours just to get a “quick preview” for the Fridays visit, then took the bus back to Lily.

 

Friday morning Bruce woke and thought he’d caught my cold (which is of the nasty variety) so we decided to lay low for the day and visit Brugge on market day – Saturday!

Thursday afternoon when we went into town we found our walk about to be quite peaceful and enjoyable. Saturday was a bit different. We had forgotten about tours and tourists buses - we were quickly reintroduced to the phenomenon. The streets were clogged with tourists, both singular and groups of all nationalities – we lasted about 2 hours and hightailed it back to camp. Plus, the weather has been cold and blustery and our colds were flaring up.

We keep waiting for it to warm up but, golly, every day we have been bundled up and glad of it.

Now we seem to be passing the cold back and forth.

We left Brugge Sunday morning and drove to Calais where we spent the night in the Ferry parking lot. Wild Camping – here we come!!

 

The weather is just horrid – cold, cloudy and sprinklie (sp?) Monday morning we left our wild camp in Calais and followed the coast west along a lovely scenic road through coastal resort towns then inland towards Amiens and city known for its lovely cathedral. That is on the list for tomorrow (Tuesday).

 

Spending a day traveling through the French countryside is a delight I had almost forgotten.

Once we left Calais we took the scenic drive along the Cote-d’Opale, a 40km stretch along the coast, west of Calais. We saw the great sandy beaches, small resort towns with long esplanades following the shoreline and lots of people willing to brave the cold, windy weather to walk the esplanades.

We turned inland at Le Touquet-Paris-Plage (loose translation: Le Touquet, the beach for Parisians) following the D901 through Montreuil and into a farming region. Great plots of rich, fertile soil were being prepared for the spring planting and we passed small flocks of gulls pillaging the newly turned earth for “escargot” and other tasty plunder.

Villages line the road, one building deep. This is something I can’t get over – how the villages seemed to develop along the main road yet no deeper than one house deep. Its like every little town was made up of Main Street only. And the houses – I don’t know how old these villages are, but we are talking several centuries at least – the houses are made of stone with terra cotta roofs, the colors of the villages reflect the soil from which the building materials come. In the case of the Cote-d’Opale – the villages were chalk-colored since they lay atop the chalk cliffs that are across from the White Cliffs of Dover in England.

I think maybe you can tell these villages are old because of their spacing. For modern times the villages seem to be almost on top of each other – from 2-3 miles apart. But if you think back to times when people walked to get around, the spacing is perfect for a days work in the fields then back to the nighttime safety of the villages.

 

And of course, each village has its own church, so dotted across the landscape are spires piercing the sky.

Anyways, when you are driving for a day you have time for musing.

Tuesday, April 15, 2008 - TAX DAY 

We visited Amiens cathedral today - what a grand re-introduction into religious architecture! I'll have photos and more rap on it later on - but wanted to add quickly that we've changed plans already (So much for itineraries). We are going the Versailles and Paris - I shall no longer try and preview where we will be going - we all will just have to wait and see.

Also, as soon as I have time I'll be adding a photo gallery and a camping page. It's a little hard to compose at a McDonalds - not that I don't appreciate the access (and boy, they have become horribly popular fast food places since we were here last - I hate what that says about what we Americans share of our culture!!)

posted by Peggy - McDonalds - Dury, France - April 15, 2008 

Amiens Cathedral is gorgeous. Begun in 1220 AD it only took 68 years to complete - a marvel made possible by the architect's novel idea of having all blocks shaped at the quarry then only needing to moved into place. I am amazed that idea didn't catch on - usually it took centuries for some of the churches we've seen to be completed. And this is the largest cathedral in France. Stone carvings cover the edifice telling biblical stories to the ancient unread masses.  My ability to read apparently leaves me unprepared to interpret the stone stories told here, but they sure are wonderful to look at. The craftsmanship is incredible and the detailing amazing, centuries after the stone masons put their chisels down.

 

The cathedral was built to celebrate Amiens possession of St. John the Baptist's head, retrieved from the Holy Land in the 12th century. The saint's head is still at the cathedral somewhere, encased in gold. We'll put more photos on the photo page once we get it up.

We left Amiens and decided that since we were a mere 143 KM from Paris, we'd visit one of our favorite cities. But first we thought we'd drop in on Versailles and walk the gardens. We spent the remainder of the day driving to Versaille via small back roads through little villages and past more farming communities finally arriving within view of the notable landmarks of Paris - the Eiffel Tower, Sacre Coeur, and La Defense. We made our way through rush hour traffic and hilly neighborhood streets before landing at Camping Huttopia about 2.5 km from Versailles chateau.

 

We keep meeting Canadians - here is another couple -Kris and Julie - youngsters who have been on the road for eight months. They too have a VW L28, similar to Lily. We shared road stories and pics and websites.

We did theVersailles Gardens on Wednesday, April 16.

Way back in 1999 Tad & Terry Olson guided us through our first trip to Paris and took us to Versailles Chateau – that showpiece of decadent 17-century aristocratic living.

Nine years later we wished to explore the magnificent gardens styled into paths, groves, hedges and flowerbeds, water pools and fountains that surround “Le Chateau”.

I wonder how many acres (hectares) make up the gardens – we walked for 2 hours and never saw the borders. We walked up to the headwaters of the Grand Canal where, during the reign of the kings, Venetian gondoliers gave rides to fun-loving rich folk. We walked to the Grand and Petite Trianon – mini palaces where Marie-Antoinette played – we were unable to enter due to a workers strike (strikes of some sort seem to be as common as baguettes in Paris). We negotiated through open-air maze-like hedged “drawing rooms” where one wonders if the aristocrats met for private trysts.

 

It all was lovely - and free – we saw lots of locals using the grounds for (what we assume were) their daily jogs or bike rides.

Once again though, the day - while clear and sunny – was cold and windy. By the time we returned to the camping we felt our colds trying to return to the forefront.

A half hour drive got us to Camping du Bois de Boulogne without incident and as soon as we got settled I sent Bruce grocery shopping so I could try and sleep the cold off.

While I slept Bruce found a cute little McDonalds where we can wifi while in Paris.

Thursday 4.18.08

The last time we were at this camping I was sick for almost a week with a cold – it seems to be happening again. Yesterday, our arrival day, I felt lousy and today it is Bruce’s turn.

We haven’t made it into the city yet and it looks like we will be staying longer than our original 3 nights, which is ok.

We are spending our time either sleeping or walking to Suresnes, the little village across the Seine from our camping. Suresnes is where the wifi McDonalds is.

Have I mentioned how popular these McDonalds are, at least here in France? I don’t recall the American fast food chains being quite so crowded eight years ago, Of course we frequented them very rarely on our last visit and our only reason this time is the wifi availability but, damn, they are really popular with the French. What with all the fabulous food France is famous for, we can’t imagine their fascination with a lousy quick fry hamburger. And you can bet these burgers don’t hold up to the American version (which ain’t all that great anyhow – in our opinion).

I did a walkabout of Bois de Boulogne Camping and was completely shocked at the change in camping rigs that has occurred in the last 8 years. Caravans – tow-able trailers that were the norm last time, have been almost completely replaced with motor homes - at least in this campground. Let us make this perfectly clear – our Queenie, at 25’, would be considered large here, but not by a lot. Most of the motor homes are what we call Class Cs with no sleeping quarters above the cab. There are also some “Class A” styles and we have actually seen three American Class A  32+ footers – one even had slides. They are completely inappropriate for the roads that make up Europe – unless you are staying on the autobahns.

I look at these monsters and wonder that I worry about Lily’s height.

Day of the Dead

 Friday, April 18, 2008

 We chose to spend our first day in Paris in an area we haven’t really frequented in past visits – Montparnasse. It is considered a bit of an artistic area yet also claims the second tallest office building in Europe. We were there to visit the dead.

We were on the metro, heading for the Denfert-Rochereau stop when we detoured ourselves to St. Sulpice a, church in the neighboring Luxembourg Quarter. St. Sulpice played a small but pivotal role in the book the Da Vinci Code. Having been a big fan of the book, I thought it would be fun to see some of the places in Paris that Dan Brown singles out. St. Sulpice played host to a Rose line and since we were near, we thought we’d pop in and take a peek. St. Sulpice looked to us like a tired, dingy church but we did find the meridian line (Brown’s Rose line).

We left St. Sulpice and walked into Luxembourg Gardens, a lovely green oasis in the center of urban sprawl, and shared our picnic lunch with some birds before a lively statue of our friend Bacchus partying with his nymphets.

Then we went visiting.

We are rather fascinated with cemeteries, especially ones old enough to have some character. Montparnasse Cemetery fills the bill. It was planned by Napoleon 200 years ago to replace several congested cemeteries. Many illustrious Parisians are interred there, including famous writers, sculptors, actors and philosophers. 

We found Samuel Beckett – Irish author, Jean-Paul Sartre and Simone de Beauvoir – existential writers and Bartholdi – the sculptor of our Statue of Liberty. The cemeteries we’ve found in Paris are just packed (no pun intended); the tombs are squeezed together – they remind us of the ones in New Orleans – which makes sense since New Orleans was founded by the French.

As much as they fascinate us – we only have so much energy for the dead and we had another stop on our list.

Finally, after four visits to Paris, we made it to the Catacombs.

 

In 1786 the city of Paris began a monumental task of emptying several full cemeteries of their bones and moving them to an old limestone quarry. Each night for over two years, priests led great carts filled with bones (eventually six million) and covered with black cloth through the streets of Paris to their new resting place – the Catacombs of Montparnasse. I can just imagine late at night on the dark streets of the city hearing the creak of cart wheels, the clomp of horse hooves and priestly chanting for the dead. How eerie would that be?

Once the bones arrived, someone went to a lot of trouble to neatly stack long bones and skulls 4-5 feet high and 30 meters deep in symmetrical patterns. I have never seen nor imagined so many bones. The limestone quarry/catacomb was pretty extensive and the bones took up a lot area. We walked perhaps a kilometer past an almost continuous wall of remains. It was interesting and creepy at the same time.

We decided Saturday would be our last day in Paris and we spent the day walking and metro-ing through more areas of the city. We took the Metro to the Tuileries Station which brought us up and into le Jardin de Tuileries – a large park the lies between the Louvre and the Place de Concorde. 

 

It is a good central point from which to visit many of the major tourist points – Louvre, Musee d’Orsay, Champs-Elysee, and with a little walking, points further out – Isle de la Cite,  Pompidou Center, Rue Rivoli, and St Germain de Pres and the Latin Quarter on the Left Bank. We visited all these areas today and spent a lot of time in Notre Dame.

 
There is something about that cathedral that commands reverence and respect. I suppose her age – almost 900 years old – has something to do with it, as does the symmetry and beauty of the Gothic masterpiece, but there is something else – an aura that exudes from the cathedral that captures me. This is our fourth trip to Paris and to Notre Dame and we visit every time with anticipation and pleasure. In the past we have had the pleasure of attending a concert and enjoying the cathedral’s natural acoustics and we have been present at an Easter presentation of the Crown of Thorns – this time we just took our time and absorbed that aura.

 

When we were done at Notre Dame, we took the metro to La Madeleine – a church in the city that we have managed to miss in our past visits. This church looks like a Roman temple and was designed in Napoleonic days originally as a tribute to the French troops who had sacrificed their lives for Napoleon’s wars but somehow ended up dedicated to Mary Magdalene. The church has some lovely statuary and we can now say we’ve seen La Madeleine.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

According to our pedometers, we had walked around 7 miles during this day and our feet were tired so we boarded the metro for one last ride back towards our campground to end our day at rest.

Sunday we will be back on the road – heading toward the Normandy Coast.

Invasion

(Sorry - no photos right now - will post later)

Tuesday, April 22, 2008

We left Paris on Sunday and had a quiet drive west as we tried again to visit the Normandy Beaches. Sir Gar (our GPS) directed us to Villers-sur-Rer, a small coastal town that was the first of several charming, upscale French weekend resort towns. We followed the D514 along the coast to Ouistreham, the port for Caen, where we spent the night free camping (wild camping). The port is a gateway to Portsmouth, GB so we saw a lot of Brits queuing up to board the ferry. We slept almost at the base of a handsome lighthouse.

German held Ouistreham was a key objective for the Allied invasion code named Operation Overlord – in fact WWII buffs would know of the British battle for Pegasus Bridge at the mouth of the Orne River, just downstream from Ouistreham. A British force landed gliders so close to the bridge and with such secrecy, they were able to capture it from the Germans in just a couple of hours.

Pegasus Bridge was the beginning of our Operation Overlord tour. The D514 road faithfully took us past all the invasion beaches: Sword, Juno and Gold beaches, manned by Commonwealth (British and Canadian) forces and Omaha and Utah beaches manned by American forces. We always hear of the beaches in our history lessons but what we don’t hear much about are the towns that took the brunt of the battles: Hermanville-Sur-Mer, Lion-sur-Mer, Langrune-sur-Mer, Bernieres-sur-Mer, Courseulles-sur-Mer, Arromanches les-Baines, Longues-sur-Mer – all these and many, many more tiny towns were right in the path of the battles between the Germans and the Allied forces. In fact, we hear the statistics of the dead and wounded allied soldiers at Normandy, but I didn’t know that 18,000 French civilians died during the prolonged battle.

 

Driving through the aforementioned towns we saw a few old buildings but most of them were post WWII structures. One nice thing though, the rebuilding was done in a style architectural true to the traditional look; there were no glaring style inconsistencies within the towns.

We spent Monday night at a campground on the outskirts of Colville and caught up with some much needed laundry.

(A bit of an aside here – I don’t know how the Europeans make ends meet – everything here is expensive – and I am not talking about expensive for Americans, although that is true – I am talking about everything being expensive. If the Europeans look to the euro as we look to the dollar – they are paying a lot more for merchandise than we do. I was looking for a hairdryer, mine is dying, and at the Carrefour Supermarket chain, which is very extensive and similar to a Fred Meyers, or a higher quality Wal-Mart, the cheapest ones were almost 40euro. At home I can buy a hair dryer for $15-$20 (and on sale for perhaps $12). A portable aluminum framed clothes dryer rack was 59euro! Last time we were here we bought a rack for 16 pounds sterling in England, the priciest country to visit – that was when the British pound was costing us $1.65 (a bit more than the euro is today). I finally found my hair dryer for 17euro but I had to do some looking. Anyways, it seems that everything is pricey over here since the euro took over. We have spoken to Dutch and Irish citizens and they both said their countries took a whooping when the euro went into effect.

I guess people learn where the bargains are, or they are paid really, really good wages.

Now what brought that on - oh yeah,  the cost of laundry – usually 4-6 euro per wash load – 1-2 euro to dry, and then they aren’t really dry so often you must double up on drying costs. Needless to say – we wear our clothes for a long time and I hand wash my tops and undies.

Tuesday morning we decided we needed to check Lily’s oil consumption – oh gee, wasn’t that fun. To get to the engine we had to tear apart the cockpit. We had to remove the passenger seat so we could undo the engine cowl located between the driver and passenger seats. Then we had to try and translate our German language VW manual to find the dipstick and radiator reservoir. We misinterpreted a picture that shows something under the front grill and tried to dismantle the grill, but before we succeeded (or failed –depending on your viewpoint) we realized it was not a picture of the radiator and stopped our disassembly task. Finally we located everything we needed and serviced her to our satisfaction. Phew – at least now we know how it all works. Then we reassembled the cockpit and finally got on the road to continue our invasion tour.

 

As I said, we spent the night just outside Colleville-ser-Mer, the town where the American Cemetery is. Tuesday afternoon was spent at the cemetery and at the excellent visitor center on premises. We went to the cemetery 8 years ago and were completely humbled by the experience and today was a repeat of the event. The Visitors Center, which we did not visit last time – (and I am wondering if it was there, because as most everyone knows I am a museum buff and I can’t imagine not going to it if it was there eight years ago) had me in tears at the entrance. What a story it tells - and it tells the invasion story from the mouths of those who were there. Audio recordings and films and photos and relics all come together in an emotionally evocative way.

 

 

Then we walked the cemetery. Really, unless you have been there yourself, you cannot begin to grasp the emotional impact all those grave markers have. 9400 marble crosses and stars of david in rows and columns – like a farmer’s field of crops. And in case you don’t “get it” yet, the backdrop is the actual battleground – Omaha Beach lies just below the cemetery. You can walk the beach and look up the hillside and really see what the soldiers were up against. Man, that is a battle I would not have wanted to be a part of. The first 20 minutes of the movie “Saving Private Ryan” is about as close as I would be able to bear – and I rather suspect it is somewhat close to the hell those kids went through.

Emotionally drained, we left the Norman beaches behind at Grandcamp-Maisy another town impacted by the war, and turned southwest towards Mont St. Michel. Driving across the countryside we keep seeing fields and fields of yellow mustard plants. We are trying to decide if they are an off-season crop, planted to help the soil between “real” farming, or if the mustard market is that great as to absorb all the harvest. We also are seeing some of the 6 million cows that live in the Normandy area and baby, they are the biggest, fattest cows we have ever seen. They make our American dairy cows look like wimps. 

We stopped at Coutances, a little hilltown with a most stunning cathedral built in the 1200s. We found a parking lot with another motorhome in it and figured we would stop for the night. I walked up to the cathedral and shot a bunch of photos of it then returned to Bruce and we had a light supper of soup, crackers and brie cheese before turning in.

During the night it rained. I mention this because I haven’t really talked about the weather. Well – it has sucked ever since we arrived. it has constantly been cold – we dress in every piece of warm clothing we brought every day (and that wasn’t much). The daytime temperatures are in the low 50s, usually windy and almost always overcast. We haven’t needed our umbrella, surprisingly, but we have been sprinkled on a couple of tmes. The problem is that this lousy weather is not conducive to outdoor sightseeing. The weather seems worse on the coast rather than inland, but right now, a lot of what we want to see is coastal. It is lovely to see all the flora bursting into life what with Spring having sprung but it ain’t warm yet. After Brittany we plan to cross the interior of France and we hope the weather will improve. I don’t even mind the rain if it would just warm up some.

The Abbey on a Rock

Wednesday, April 23, 2008

 

For someone who hasn’t a lot of time for the organized religions of the western world, I am thoroughly enchanted with the places of worship those very religions have created. The Catholic Church in particular, has 2000 years practice in building some of the most amazing churches we’ve been fortunate enough to visit. This trip we have visited Amiens and Coutances Cathedrals for the first time and now we are revisiting Mont St. Michel.

I believe Mont St. Michel is one of the most impressive sites in all of France - perhaps all of  Europe.

Known for a 1000 years as a place of pilgrimage, Abbey St. Michel sits at the top of a small rocky island  in le Baie du Mont St Michel, off the coast of France. Pre-Christian Celtic mythology believed the island was one of the sea tombs where the dead were sent – in fact the island’s name was Mont Tombe. An 8^th Century bishop had a dream in which St. Michel instructed him to build a small oratory on the island. That began a building spree that finally ended in the 13^th Century with the abbey we see today. There is all sorts of symbolism that went into the building of the abbey – if you want read about that check out the link to my 2000 journal on our home page.

In the meantime believe me when I say it is beautiful.

Once the only way religious pilgrims could reach Mont St. Michel was to traverse the beach being aware of the tidal currents; quicksand and fast flowing high tides took their share of victims. Now a causeway has been built that allows safe access around the clock (for all the tourist buses no doubt). Now tourists can safely swarm the tiny town that sprang up at the base of the rock island providing a gauntlet of souvenir stands for visitors to pass through.

Visitors (tourists) can avoid that gauntlet by walking the ramparts (city walls) climbing rock stairways and passing by houses, tiny squares, a local cemetery, a belfry and finally arriving at the top where the abbey is perched. We did it while the tides came in and surrounded the island.

The views are incredible.

We are staying 2 kilometers away from the Mont in a campground that has location, location! and a bargain price of 14 euro for off season rates. And the sun is shining!

We actually shed our coats and long sleeves for a day and enjoyed some rays. Wow - what a difference a little sunshine makes on one’s disposition!

A Good Day

Saturday, April 26, 2008

Today was a good day.

Friday we left Mont St. Michel and began our drive towards Brittany and Merlin’s forest and the Megaliths of Carnac. First though, we skirted le Baie du Mont St. Michel following the coastal road D797 in order to reach the town of Vivier-sur-Mer and buy some fresh oysters to serve up for our dinner. 

Mission accomplished we turned our sights southwest and almost immediately detoured to the Menhir de Champ Dolent just south of Dol-de-Bretagne. The Menhir – our first megalith this trip – is a giant standing stone,  close to 30 feet tall; the tallest megalith (which means “big stone” in Greek) we have seen. It is just standing up in the middle of a fertile, flat plain – probably been there for 3000 years, maybe more. There was a story board with a children’s tale explaining the origins but it was all in French and what sense we could make of it showed it to be a tall tale.

We’ve seen a number of megaliths in Ireland, in Cornwall, Britain and of course Stonehenge, but this fellow could hold his own against those pretty fine examples.

We continued along the D795 until it dead ended into the N137 which brought us to Rennes a decent sized city in Brittany, the westernmost region of France.

Passing Rennes we turned west for 35km in search of the Foret de Paimpont aka the Broceliande. The Foret de Broceliande is an old forest that plays a role in the Bretagne legends of King Arthur and the Round Table. The Arthurian legends may have begun in Bretagne when the surviving Celts fled Britain and the Anglo Saxon invasion (they were the invaders the legendary Arthur fought) and re-established their society in Bretagne (or Brittany). The Broceliande was supposed to be where Merlin and Viviene, the Lady of the Lake, resided.

We drove to the heart of the forest and stopped in Paimpont, a centuries-old village that developed around a 7^th century abbey. We free camped in a parking lot along with 9 other campers. 

We used our BBQ for the first time, poaching the fresh oysters in their own juices, and had a lovely dinner. We are getting pretty good at - and comfortable with - free camping.

 

Saturday, (today – the good day) we returned to Paimpont town center, about 300 yards from our free camp site, and toured the 12^th century abbey. It was exquisite in its simplicity – no soaring steeple here, but a lovely wooden barrel ceiling and finely carved 500 year-old religious statues. We, who love churches and have seen a few, walked out of the abbey stunned by its beauty. “Wow,” we kept saying, “wow.”

 

Paimpont is very fond of the Arthurian legends – there are several storefronts with crystals and fairies and references to Merlin, Viviene, and Morgan le Fey that put us in mind of Glastonbury in Cornwall, England with its Arthurian and new age interests. Both lay claim to Arthurian legends, Paimpont leaning more towards Merlin, but I rather think the Cornwall connection is more compelling than the Bretagne.

We got a map of the Arthurian sites in the forest and took off on our quest. We found Merlins Tomb, the Spring of Eternal Youth, The Valley of No Return, Castle and Lake of Comper (where Lancelot was “raised” by the Lady of the Lake), all stories in the Bretagne Arthurian legends. We also found Guillotins Oak (a 1000 year old oak tree – and we thought we’d seen it all when we found the 800 year-old Major Oak in Sherwood Forest), Trehorenteuc; a town where its restored church has illustrated legends of the Round Table and some cool Stations of the Cross. There is an actual route through the Forest highlighting 16 legendary sights.

 

And guess what? The weather is fabulous. Warm, sunny, skies – almost shorts-and-summer-tops weather. This is the third day of good weather – is it possible that it can continue?

We finally left Foret de Paimpont to continue southwest another 2 hours until we reached Carnac in the Morbihan region; home to over 3000 megaliths erected between – get this – 5000 BC and 3500 BC. They are 1000 years older than Stonehenge which is 500 years older than the Pyramids.

We found a nice campground just outside Carnac – we are their first American campers. We are about 2.5 km from some of the rocks and tomorrow we are going to rent bikes and spend the day counting them.

 

 

 

Sunday, April 27, 2008

There are a lot of rocks in Carnac!

Funny – I’ve known of the alignments of Carnac for decades (oh god, and that’s true, too – decades!) but I’ve always imagined them in two rows, going on for miles – with a road down the middle.

 

The reality is a lot neater. They are 6-10 rows several meters wide and maybe akilometer long – there are several alignments, separated from each other by some distance determined by the ancient builders and a mystery to modern observers. They vary in height – the Alignments of Kermario average perhaps 2.5 meters high, while the more numerous Alignments of Menec are smaller – perhaps 1 meter tall. Like the American Cemetery in Colleville with the field of crosses, these monoliths look like a crop of rocks ready for harvest.

They remind me of the Greek myth of the trials of Heracles when he sowed dragons teeth and had to fight off the army of dead soldiers who grew from the soil. These stones just seem to spring up from the earth.

No one knows why these stones were placed or how, because they were moved long before the wheel reached this area of Europe, and some estimates of weight reach into the 100s of tons. All the moderns seem to be just floored by the innovations of the ancients – they did some marvelous engineering feats and no one can figure out how! Stonehenge has experts stumped, Brown’s Dolmen in Ireland has experts stumped – the pyramids of Egypt have experts stumped – there are some good theories out there, but no one knows for sure.

We rented bikes from the campground and road to the Alignments. The day was a little overcast, not cold but cloudy. As we walked the enclosure of the monoliths we kept hearing this crashing sound and couldn’t determine what it was. It sounded like a dump truck dumping big rocks or…thunder. To our east a dark band of clouds was slowing moving towards us, accompanied by an occasional burst of lightning and huge cracks of thunder. We moved the bikes and ourselves beneath a tree and waited about 20 minutes for the front to pass us by, then we mounted the bikes and road into town where Sunday Market was happening.

 

We saw some of the most mouthwatering meats and fishes, cheeses, fresh vegetables, pastries and breads, and regional specialties (that I can neither name nor describe except to say they looked great). We tried a breaded cheesy/onion thing that was fabulous but kept that our only purchase. The market was large and busy – I bet all of Carnac and perhaps neighboring burghs was there.

We had to find a bank – we were low on euros – and after asking a policeman where the banks were, we started up the hill to town center. We were diverted by a bagpipe band practicing at the police station. Pipers, bagpipers and drum players – about 15 musicians in all were jamming. Bruce left me there to listen in total delight while he chased down 4 different banks to get some money. Evidently the bank ATMs are closed on Sundays along with most other businesses in Carnac – perhaps even in Brittany or even France – hell - maybe all of Europe shuts down on Sundays. He finally retrieved me from bagpipe heaven and we returned to the campground.