Reims, city of calm and parks and nature 09.05.

Today being a public holiday, most shops and restaurants were closed, and at the start of the day, the streets were deserted. This, a good time to get out and explore.
Sadly, the market was closed today, but nearby we found the oldest Roman arches in the world, dating back to the second century. 
Work still ongoing to tidy them all up, but it was an amazing sight. 
The Place de l'hôtel de Ville is a super impressive Place and now the citizens of Reims like to show off their Olympic Flame sculpture and are very excited about its imminent arrival.
Tgen there was a very exhausting one-hour visit in French to Musée Hotel de Vergeur, which had been built in 13 th century and then unfortunately destroyed in WWI . Fortunately, the very rich owner was able to assist with financing the rebuild, and today you can get an excellent idea of life at that time for the wealthy. 
it took great concentration and determination to understand the guide, who had so much to tell us that she really put her foot down and raced through. At the beginning, I understood very little, but by the time we reached the guest room on the top floor, no problem!
incredibly, people at that time had very short beds because they slept sitting up! 
We walked over 22,000 steps today and are now totally exhausted.
The highlights for me were The Promenades, a series of shady, lush parks with something to please everyone.
Play equipment to challenge the young, particularly one little girl of probably 3 years, who got to the top of the rope climbing tunnels and then freaked out. It took ages to get her down, with such lovely children offering assistance, but only causing her to scream louder! 
Tgen there were gorgeous streams, so lush the colours don't seem real! They are.
We decided to also take the Promenade along the Canal  de L'Esne à la Marne. The wide pathway was buzzing with young and old, cyclists, Walkers , scooters and fishermen. 
it already seems ages ago I was on the barge cruise on the Nivernais.

With aching limbs we headedh home via St Remi, with its magnificent abbey, and a new housing area of 3000 homes purpose built, with all the services imaginable, accessible to all, with no need to take a car. It was lovely. We need to do this! 
A brilliant end to a different type of tourist day. 
Tomorrow, Epernay! 

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Tairua and the Coromandel

Image
What a lovely start to the day! Sunrise over Tairua .  Although the journey through to Coromandel was not too many kilometres, the extremely winding roads and passes made it a long, though magnificent journey. The forested mountains here are just marvelous and everything seemed so lush. Our first stop was in Coromandel at the Driving Creek Railway, set up originally by a potter wishing to transport his clay to his pottery. As he needed to pay his debts and people became interested in his tiny little railway, he opened it to the public, and it is certainly worth a visit. Not only is it a feat of engineering and construction, but the views and the forest are sensational.    They have planted thousands of Kauri trees and we learnt some interesting facts about them. When young, they have little leaves sticking out of their trunks, acting as protection but also there to ensure that there is more chance of photosynthesis.  Clever tree! No wonder they get so old....
Read more

Family and beautiful places in Hemel Hempstead and Llantwit Major

Image
  Time is such a strange concept when you are traveling. 10 hours on a train can seem an eternity, or, with good company or spectacular scenery, is over far too quickly. So it was with the Polyglot Gathering. One moment you are surrounded by like-minded people (842 from 59 countries, speaking 196 languages), you are in your element swapping from language to language, and then in a flash, you are in another wonderful yet totally different world of family and everyday life. The PG seems so long ago already, but thankfully the motivation it gave me to learn, remains! I have checked up about The Moravian Sparrow dish Sergio was eating, and am pleased to find out that it has nothing to do with sparrows! Moravian sparrow" (moravský vrabec in Czech) is  a classic dish from the Czech Republic, particularly Moravia, that is not made with actual sparrows .  It typically involves braising pork with onions, garlic, and spices, often served with dumplings and cabbage. Hemel Hemp...
Read more

Kaikoura - Seals galore!

Back on the road again with my dear old Mazda, Ken. I needed to have a trip to settle me down and to appreciate even more how marvelous this country is! What more special place to visit than Kaikoura, and even more amazing, Ohau Point, just north of the town.  From the moment you descend to the coastal road, you can see seals all along the coast, in the sea among the waves, on the rocks and on the stoney beach. Yet Ohau is the main breeding colony, this year far too successful for its own good. There will never be enough food for all those hungry mouths. All the little black dots on the beach are seals, basking in the sun, waiting for their parents to return from fishing. The beaches of Kaikoura are certainly not used by sunbathing visitors. Hey are covered in most areas by very jagged but stunningly beautiful rocks, forced up by the power of the huge earthquake in 2016. Who could have thought that such a scary and costly event would produce such beauty. The late sun catching the r...
Read more