Sep 16, 2011

We have seen some beautiful sights today of whimsical chateau’s complete with maidens towers, multiple church’s in villages and as many different versions of French cottages and manor houses as you could imagine but nothing compares to the unspoiled beauty of the little village of Beaune. It is a great credit to its people and its municipal authority. That doesn’t mean we didn’t see a lot of other beautiful things but Beaune is the pick as far as buildings go.



One of the lovely buildings in Beaune

It was lovely to see the many different varieties of grapes in the acres of vines draped across the landscape with some leaves starting to change colour and others still very green. We rode and walked around many little villages including on the back streets with lots of views of grape harvesting machinery in garages under houses and the smell of fermenting grape juice was everywhere and of many different strains of fragrance. Quite delicious really and the flower boxes everywhere were spectacular with massive begonias’ and impatiens as well as lovely leafy vine type things which were a great contrast.



Looking into the Hotel Garage (in the dark) as I kit up before we headed off in the morning

We are back at the hotel now (only a little damp) and warming up in the bar before we have dinner here. We are dining here tonight in their lovely dining room which is a series of five separate rooms made into one. Quite delightful, in fact the whole building is delightful with lovely leafy garden spaces with splashes of colour and beautiful period furniture. Yum!



Streetscape in Dijon

After setting the GPS for the Railway Station in Dijon so we could get good parking for all we discovered that they are installing a monorail (or something) throughout the CBD and heaps of the streets were dug up and railed off which meant on our way to and from we kept being directed to intersections and streets we couldn't access. Once we were out of there we then found entries to Motorways blocked off as well. At some stage we stopped at some traffic lights and Norm asked how I was doing? I told him my response couldn't be published. Fair dinkum, the fact that we don't have two-way communicatin between bike helmets has probably saved the marriage.....on more than one ocassion!