Back in Europe, France. Can there be a bigger contrast? Maybe we didn’t travel enough to answer this question. There are however big differences. Immediately you see a difference when you hit the road. Cars smaller, houses smaller, roads smaller. “Ah back home J ” was our common feeling. Is there a European identity? In our opinion: “Absolutely!”. The people who red our last blog saw that we were fed up with the American way of living and all the things that disturbed us 3-4 months ago about Europe, doesn’t do this anymore in the present. It is true what they say. You start missing things if you lost them for a while. We’ll add to that: “you enjoy them more when you found them again.”.
We only stayed for 5 days in France but enjoyed every bit of it. Did the sky became bluer? I have no idea, but with 29°c in a September sun, cycling becomes more fun. We stayed in Paris with a warm shower host for 2 days and used our bicycles to discover/recover Paris. Paris is a thing of beauty. The old houses, the “Arc de Triomphe”, the Seine, la cathédrale Notre-Dame, Montmartre and so much more history. Yes cycling is the best way to discover a city. You can see so much more on a short time. We did 55km in Paris. We must thank our host for their hospitality. There was cheese, wine, dessert, nice conversation and much more. Real chees! Not the plastic version, the version that has a good creamy salty taste. Good wine! Wine that gives your face a smile when the first drop of divine liquid touches the tongue. Real Dessert! Desserts not made out donut dough but out of chocolate mousse, meringue, chocolate,… Yes the French know how food should be prepared. We thank them also for the 2 bolts we needed to repair our kick-stand. They didn’t get broken in the airplane. It is one of those things that bends after a while because our heavy loaded bicycles. The bicycles survived the airplane surprisingly very well. The boxes we had where pretty small. So we had to disassemble both bicycles almost completely. We assembled them again in Charles de Gaulle airport with afterwards only a couple of things to spare. We took the train from the airport to our host. When we cycled a couple of km to our host, immediately you feel the air flows different here. Traffic is more dangerous because of the smaller roads. Drivers pass you shorter and seemingly faster. But by now we are experienced cyclist who aren’t scared easily. For people who still doubt our critical view and over-romanticising Europe. Yes we saw also homeless and poor people. But we expect this in cities of millions. Not like in the US where you have to expect them in villages of 500 inhabitants. Anyway we’ll keep this blog about France and the road.
After 2 days Paris and still a heavy jet-lag we mounted once more our bicycle. Every cyclist should do the trip we did. Paris-Reims-Orval (be). It is an understatement to call it a beauty and it only takes you 3 days. It starts with a fairly easy drive along a canal out of Paris and further alongside the river Marne where the banks of the river aren’t always paved. Although it is still official summer the colours of the trees start to change. All this only gives in our opinion flavour to the trip. Meanwhile you pass some nice small and old farmers villages. After 40km or so the landscape changes into hills. On these hills, grapes, ready to turn into Champagne. Every village has 10 or so brands of Champagne. Small, non-commercial, family owned businesses. We bought our first 2 bottles in the first appellation from a woman as old as the appellation itself out of the shed for 12,5€ taxes included of course.
Later we will buy one more because we had to show something of our concurring trips around the world to mom and dad. Mom and dad should hurry up, the warm weather makes one thirsty. To our pleasant surprise we saw that most of the villages are fixed up. We had the image of these old towns where most houses were ready for the sledgehammer. But we have to adjust this a bit. Apparently people are taking more care of their houses. You can see in many houses that there have been some investments. Keeping in mind the charms of the country side and their old buildings. First night we stayed at Chateau-Thierry in an IBIS hotel for 80€. Stef needed to tell you that breakfast was included on a ceramic plate. Katrien wants to tell you that there weren’t hidden fees.
“The roads may be more narrow but it also gives you more a sense of belonging to the landscape. Again the homesickness went away. We belong here on these roads. They are made for us. We aren’t strangers anymore.”
The writers can’t comment yet on the quality of the champagne because we are serious cyclist who live for our sport. There might be a post scriptum below about this. 
You need your good legs here. The hills become steeper and more quickly behind each other so resting is out of the question. On the way we encountered numerous graves from WWI and II are within the beautiful fields. Especially after Reims and its nice cathedral we drove into the French Ardennes. The cathedral in Reims is a must to visit. The glass windows are magnificent. In the back you should look for the windows designed by Chagal.
The Ardennes are in our opinion still the most difficult place to drive a bicycle. The hills aren’t high. But steep and one after the other. The sun was burning and there was almost no shadow between the fields. Luckily there was a bit of tailwind. We crossed the border with Belgium and looked for a bed and a Trappist beer in the abbey of Orval.
Thank you France for the warm welcome back home.
To be continued…
Alternative World Destination 