Reims

After touring the fortress, Wolfgang, Rhea, and I set off for Reims - the heart of the Champagne district. We spent the afternoon taking an audio tour of the cathedral and Bishop's Palace, and then sat down to another delicious French meal. I really struggle with French menus, however I was determined to try something I'd never had before, and with Rhea's translational assistance, I settled on something to do with pig's trotters for entree, and duck for main course. It's a real shame that I don't like pate, because every restaurant offers their chef's unique fois gras as the specialty of the house. Anyway, the pigs trotter dish was interesting - I expected something like a pork knuckle, but instead it was more like a slice of terrene with lots of gelatinous cartilege, scattered with pine nuts and doused in oil. It was OK, but I won't be ordering it again.

After spending the night in a cosy little hotel in Reims with a manager who looked like a midget version of Aunty Jack and had what appeared to be prison tattoo initials down her arm, we went to the Martel champagnery next door to see how real champagne is made. Tours were offered in French or English, however Wolfgang spotted a German number plate in the employee carpark, and managed to get a somewhat reluctant German speaking tour guide - a German girl who had just started some sort of internship a few days earlier. Fortunately, the video presentation was quite informative - explaining the process of making champagne. The tour was interesting, particularly the bits where we all groped around in the dark trying to find lightswitches for the various rooms of the cellar. There was nothing particularly interesting about the bunker-like cellar containing steel tanks and pallets of unlabelled bottles, however there were a couple of rooms where the bottles are held in cage-like containers that automatically rotate on a couple of axes (not that you can actually see the rotation, it only happens periodically).

The tour ended back in the shop with a tasting of three Champagnes. (This was good - we were given three proper glasses of champagne each, not the little tasters you get at vineyards!) The Martel company produces several labels, including the Charles de Cazanove. The prices were all pretty reasonable - about what you'd pay in Australia for good local bubbly. I suspect the prices at Pommery, Veuve Cliquot and the other big name cellars may have been a bit higher.

In Belgium, just over the border from Aachen there is a restaurant called Cafe Frite that specialises in French Fries (Belgian style, which means crisp, chunky beer battered fries). However, this is no "chip shop" takeaway joint. It has a clever gimmick of offering a variety of Champagne and other fine wines along with it's chip-oriented dinner menu. And the chips are really good - Rhea and I stopped there for lunch on the way back to Tuebingen.

I don't actually have any pictures from Reims, but there are plenty of pictures on Google Maps - click here! I've also added little blue placemarkers to the maps for the hotel and cathedral.


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WWI Battlefields of Verdun

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About an hour after we left Pont-a-Bar, we cycled into Sedan. Rhea's father was already at the hotel/fortress to meet us, and after a quick freshen-up, we locked away the bikes and set off to see the battlefields of Verdun.

Local attitudes to the wars of the past vary significantly around Europe. In Germany, the wars of the 20th century tend only to be mentioned very briefly and matter-of-factly in relevant museum exhibits. In France, and this region in particular, the First World War is still holds great significance, even 100 years later.

The forests outside Verdun have been preserved as a war memorial, and are scattered with war cemetaries - with a respectful distance between the separate German and French cemetaries. Old bunkers and gun emplacements are still intact, and the old trenchlines and craters are still feintly visible in the contours of the ground within the dense forests.

One of the most significant monuments in this is the Ossuary, which was built very soon after WWI, and holds the skeletal remains of thousands of unidentified soldiers from both sides. Outside, a vast lawn cemetary (French only) is segregated into Christian and Muslim graves, each decorated with a small rose bush. Many of the soldiers appear to have been from colonial forces, so there were many Muslims among the dead.

Another interesting monument is the Bayonet Trench - the preserved remains of a French trench that collapsed during battle, burying the soldiers and leaving only their bayonets protruding from the soil. A sandstone monument was built over the mound of soil with the protruding bayonets, and it has been preserved as a grave of unknown French soldiers. Rusty hilts of bayonets are still visible, with the blades broken off or rusted away, however it appears that there has been some restorative work since they are now protruding from clumps of concrete.

All in all, it's an interesting place to see, and the atmosphere tends to be one of reverence and quiet reflection, as opposed to the morbid and unsettling sense you get at places like the Cambodian Killing Fields.

Sedan

After a long day of wandering around Verdun, Rhea, Wolfgang and I returned to the hotel/fortress at Sedan to meet Gabi and Karlheinz, who had arrived during the afternoon.
We enjoyed a delicious modern French meal in the restaurant at the hotel, accompanied by equally delicious champagne and bordeaux.

It was all very indulgent, although it had been a celebration of sorts, since Rhea hadn't seen her family for ages, and it was her birthday a couple of days earlier.
After checking out the next morning, we finally took the tour of the fortress. The photos you see here are all of the fortress. The hotel is in the modern-looking light-coloured building with lots of small windows. The interior of the hotel is tastefully decorated with modern furniture and fittings that blend really well with the historical architecture. It was a great place to stay, with friendly, professional staff who spoke French and English, it was well worth the 100 euro rate.

River Meuse at 5 knots - Part 8

The final instalment of photos from the cruise. Rhea took most of these pics, and I've just borrowed them since they're better than mine!

The final photo shows the charter company's base at Pont-a-Bar on the Canal d'Ardennes.

We decided to get creative with our logistics for last couple of days. We had enough time to overshoot Pont-a-Bar and travel all the way up to Sedan for a day. We figured out that if we could somehow leave most of our luggage in Sedan, we could actually cycle from Pont-a-Bar to Sedan the next morning. So after a reconnaisance expedition to find the Chateau Fort and confirm that they would store our bags, we returned again in the afternoon with the suitcase and a crate full of surplus cooking supplies, leaving us with just a couple of small backpacks for the following day.

We then cruised back to the base at Pont-a-Bar, and enjoyed our final evening on the boat.


We settled the account the next morning, and Rhea made a great effort of negotiating in French to try and get them to cover the cost of the towels etc that were not on board. In the end, it worked out that the paperwork we had was from the booking agent, and was incorrect. We still need to chase the booking agent about that...

Anyway, it turned out that the fuel charge was less than stated on the booking agent's contract, so we ended up paying the amount we were trying to negotiate anyway!

And then we set off to Sedan, expecting to find a paved towpath along the river with no vehicular traffic. Unfortunately, the towpath for this particular section of the river is a grassy goat track, and not really suitable for a couple of heavily loaded road bikes. So we followed the main road into Sedan - about 9km from Pont-a-Bar - seriously hoping that we didn't wind up on a motorway with our bicycles!!!
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River Meuse at 5 knots - Part 7

There is a diverse range of wildlife to observe along the river. We were often visited by cows, and the river seems to be full of fish despite the vast number of fishermen who spend their holidays camped at regular intervals along the riverbank with their 6m long fishing poles! At this time of year, most of the water fowl had downy young in tow - swan families (two adults and a cygnet) were a particular highlight, showing absolutely no fear of the boats coming towards them, and simply dodging the bows at the last minute. We were entertained by a duck family at one of the marinas - mother duck and a dozen ducklings who all took off in different directions to circumnavigate each new boat they discovered, despite the noisy quacking of the adult duck trying to regroup them.

(The bottom 3 photos are Rhea's)

Meuse River at 5 knots - Part 6

There is a vast variety of boats on the river, and every day we seemed to discover another new and interesting vessel. Downstream from Givet there is a noticeable amount of commercial traffic, most likely associated with the slate and "blue metal" stone quarries of the region. Further upstream, most of the boats were privately owned, with a very small proportion of charter boats in the mix.
Most days we encountered Dutch and Belgian flagged private cruisers and barges, as well as a couple of German vessels, one or two British, and even one boat crewed by Kiwis. The boats themselves ranged from 100 year old converted steel river tugs, to old Dutch sailing barges, a dismasted 18 foot trailer sailer, and various European river cruisers. We even saw a couple of shallow draft blue-water yachts making their way through the river system with their masts on gallows on deck.
After getting back to Tuebingen, I decided to check out the cost of some of these old barges - it's ridiculous! A 30' to 40' steel barge roughly 100 years old, with running engine, but in need of total fit-out costs roughly 30,000 to 40,000 Euros! To get anything inhabitable costs more like 90,000 Euros. For anyone interested in spending more than a week or so on the rivers, the best option would be to purchase a shallow draft cruising yacht and dismast it!

Meuse River at 5 knots - Part 5

A little further upstream from Givet is a town called Chooz. Chooz is interesting for two reasons:

1. The nuclear power plant lies in stark contrast to the rustic villages that surround it.
2. Boat traffic bypasses the meander of the river where the power plant sits via a canal running through a long, dark tunnel!

I had never before driven a boat through a tunnel. Locks on either side of the tunnel ensure that traffic can only move one way at a time, which is just as well since the tunnel is not much wider than the boat. So after a bit of tinkering to get the navigation lights working (thanks to a blown inline fuse for which we had no spare), we set off into the tunnel. It's a bit like one of those Disney canal boat rides, except you're under your own propulsion. On the river, it's common practice to leave fenders out all the time, since you need them for the locks, so nudging the sides isn't a serious concern, and narrow canals and tunnels also have timber rails just below the waterline to provide further protection.












Below is a "Google Map" showing the entire course we followed - all the way to Sedan and then back to Pont a Bar.


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Meuse River at 5 knots - Part 4

Day-to-day life on the river is pretty laid back. We clocked a fairly constant top speed of 1 km every 7 minutes travelling upstream (the wiers reduce the river flow so that it is almost imperceptible), which works out at about 4.6 knots. At this speed, we needed to spend about 5 hours a day underway (including locking time) to make it to Pont a Bar in good time. This was pretty easy going, since we typically chose our evening moorings about 4 km downstream from the next town of interest.






After a leisurely breakfast, we'd typically pull out our stakes and make our way into the next down to stretch our legs ashore to find a boulangerie, an artisan patisserie, and once or twice a friterie for some authentic French Fries. Patisseries in France usually make miniature versions of their various tarts and cakes, which enabled us to sample a variety of these delicious treats without being overly gluttonous!

Most towns have either a public quay or marina where you can tie up for a few hours for free. Overnight stays often cost a few euros, but you can usually access the shore power, tapwater, and sometimes even showers and laundry facilities. Apart from topping up the freshwater tank every few days, we didn't really need the other facilities, as our boat had a gas-fired instant hot water service, and a reasonable handheld-shower arrangement.

Our first couple of stops were Hastiere and Givet, Givet being the most memorable and interesting due to the fortress and associated ruins that overlook the city.

Meuse River at 5 knots - Part 3

Negotiating the locks was interesting. The first few locks in Belgium were geared towards commercial shipping, which allowed for half a dozen pleasure craft to lock through simultaneously, with a full time lockmaster managing the operations. Further upstream, the locks became much smaller and automated. We used what appeared to be a garage door remote control to signal our approach to the lock, and once inside used a push-rod behind the ladder to activate the process. The biggest challenge when going upstream is getting a mooring line onto the bollards - which might be on top of the lock wall 4-5 metres above the deck in some of the deeper locks! This usually requires the careful transfer of a crewmember to a slippery steel ladder with mooring line in hand.

We encountered a couple of automated locks that were out of service, but a lockmaster would typically appear within 20 minutes of pressing the intercom button, or calling the helpline.

We typically passed through about 5 locks each day, stopping off at various riverside towns along the way to buy fresh baguettes and sample the local patisserie specialties.

Meuse River at 5 knots - Part 2

Mooring on the river is a little different from coastal anchorage. The boat came equipped with two steel spikes (half-meter lengths of re-bar with one end ground into a point), a hammer, and a gangplank. The idea is to find a nice patch of riverbank that isn't totally covered in blackberry bush and stinging nettle, gently nudge the boat into the bank, and deploy a crew member ashore with hammer and spikes to set up fore and aft moorings.

As a result it became quite common to wake up to the sound of cattle grazing alongside the boat, peering in through the galley window at us while we prepared breakfast. Fortunately for the rather tasty looking Belgian Blues who joined us for breakfast, the boat came with a very small fridge, and there was no way the two of us could get through so much beef in one week!


The downside of mooring to the banks is the amount of wildlife that comes aboard. Within hours of mooring, we'd find half a dozen spiders (just harmless little European spiders) busy spinning their webs on the handrails and windows. Combined with the mud that inevitably comes aboard from the cow paddocks during mooring procedures and shoreside excursions, we soon gave up trying to keep the decks looking clean.