Whatever you are, be a good one…
We checked out of the Amiens campsite at 10:15am and headed south east past Roye and Noyen on an incredibly long, straight, presumably ex-Roman road. From Noyen we wiggled on down to Soissons and then directly south down the much faster D1 to Chateau-Thierry where we found a big supermarket to buy some lunch and dinner for the day. We then turned east along the D3 and pulled up in a lay-by for our first ‘pommie picnic’. The view out of the window was across the endless fields of grapevines, which looked very dormant and damp.
The rain poured down outside and then the sun came out and then, of course, it disappeared again. We parked Eileen right outside the gates of the Moet & Chandon headquarters just off the Avenue de Champagne in Epernay. According to local hearsay, this is the most expensive street in the world, due to the 90 million plus bottles of champagne stored in the chalk cellars under the street.
In a moment of sunshine, Piglet had his photo taken outside (he’s the only one of us that actually likes champagne) and then we went inside to book a tour of the cellars for Saturday.
By now it was getting rather late in the afternoon, so after a quick stroll around the town in the rain, we drove back to the village of Vandières and checked in to Camping Rural which is actually in the grounds of the Nowack Champagne vineyard. Before sunset, I whipped up a pork in mushroom and cream sauce dinner while a storm, complete with thunder and lightning, shook Eileen and us inside.
We made sure we arrived early for our appointment at Moet & Chandon and managed again to get a parking spot right outside the gates. We gathered in a rather fancy reception area with fifteen fellow tourists; we were pleased to find that we were all English speakers and one was a journalist from the New York Times, so his English should be really good…..! We were told the history of the company and shown the sitting room of the original part of the house where Napoleon 1st was entertained by Mr Moet. We then followed our guide down the steps into the cellars.
Only a small section of the cellars are open to the public, but then I’m not sure I would want to walk all of the dark, damp, 28 kms of tunnels. Having passed thousands of bottles of the bubbly stuff, all in different stages of fermentation, we resurfaced in to a tasting room.
The exit was, of course, through the gift shop where there were some ridiculously expensive bottles of champagne. However, having been informed that champagne has to be stored lying down, in the dark, at a constant temperature, we decided we better not buy any; Eileen doesn’t have a cellar, doesn’t stay still and we’re travelling through too many different climates, sorry Mandy.
After the one glass of champagne we strolled over to the Orange phone shop. Unsurprisingly for France, it was closed for two hours; by the time we manage to buy some megabytes for our dongle, we will probably be in Italy!!!!
It wasn’t worth hanging around, so we hit the road and drove south through Sézanne, Méry sur Seine, Troyes, St Florentin and Auxerre finally stopping at Les Ceriselles campsite on the banks of the Canal du Nivernais in Vincelles, Burgundy. It’s a lovely campsite and we’re so excited…..there’s free unlimited internet!!!!
In recognition of its name, Sunday turned out to be a sunny day, a beautiful sunny day. The sky was blue, the light breeze was warm and the temperature reached 25°C in the shade; we were actually really hot in the sunshine. The winter clothes got pushed aside and we had to ferret around in the bottom of our bags to find something summery to wear! We grabbed the chance to get washing done and hung it outside in the sunshine; aaah, the little things that make me excited nowadays……! Rodney cleaned the mud from Eileen’s exterior, while I cleaned out her interior and after catching up on a few emails, we went for a long walk along the banks of the canal and through the village of Vincelles.
Rodney has now decided that he is back on holiday at last. Oh and for the record, at the Johnson’s request, tonight’s dinner was a Mediterranean risotto with jamon, spinach, beans and edamame washed down by a €2 bottle of red wine, followed by strawberries and cream, our first of the season.
