Our English Diversion

We left Nancy early December intending to have a quick look around south west England before returning to Oz for Xmas. Marg had been to Oxford previously but wanted to show Peter around “Inspector Morse’s” home ground. Peter, after watching English shows like Morse and Midsomer was keen to find out if this corner of Britain was as pretty as these shows depicted. He was concerned that the pretty thatched cottages with their well painted windows and tidy features was make believe and that reality was The European Grunge – a feature on a lot of buildings in France.

A train to Paris and this fellow met us at Gare du Nord as we boarded the Eurostar to London. Another quick train to Oxford and we made our base there for a few days.

Thomas Bodley, the gentleman above was the founder of the library system in Oxford now known as the Bodleian Library. (He may be better know to Harry Potter fans as Nearly Headless Nick – or more simply, John Cleese.)

The Bodleian library is the largest library in the world with over 12 million works, most of which are now digitised and available on line.

After a few days we hired a car and headed off into the countryside. We visited Blenheim castle where Winston Churchill grew up. We even saw the dents in the organ pipes made by him and his cousins playing cricket indoors.

We passed through Swindon the town that used to be the home of the Great Western Railway. Of course Peter had to visit the old workshops and yards. They have all gone now, a massive shopping centre has taken over the workshops leaving a small museum as an indication of the area’s illustrious past.

The Caerphilly Castle stands as a wonderful example of the machines that came out of these works.

Going south to the Salisbury Plain in search of Stonehenge we found ourselves in Avebury. This is the site of a much larger henge and lies at the centre of one of the greatest surviving concentrations of ancient monuments in Western Europe. Photos on the ground don’t do this area justice. If you can follow our Google earth link, the extent of these monuments will be clear.

We found Stonehenge a little further south and were disappointed that we could not get close. We could have purchased a tour but the weather was closing in and we pressed on.

Salisbury was our next stop and we admired the cathedral.

The christening font is a modern water feature within the church. Most dramatic.

We came across a golf course and were intrigued by these wild New Forest ponies. They seem to leave the greens alone as the grass on the fairways and the rough is easier to eat.

Peter found that this country met his expectations.

We returned to London and saw a little more of this beautiful and historic city.

A highlight, especially for Marg, was a tour of Cricket’s hallowed ground, Lords.

We visited one place, a little way off the tourist track. That's not quite right as it is in the shadow of St Paul's Cathedral. It is Cutler’s Hall, home of London’s Worshipful Company of Cutlers. Cutlers were the journeymen who crafted knives and swords and other weapons of war and were recognised as a guild in the 13^th century. They received a royal charter in 1416.

Within this fairly unimposing brick building we were given an unexpected insight into part of the history of Old London.

The guild whose wealth is firmly in the original square mile now primarily remains as a charitable institution. A keen eye will see elevenses on the table.

We must thank John most sincerely for this glimpse of the London of the past.

We departed London on the 21^st December heading for Sydney and our Christmas in Australia.

There will be more to tell, so we will keep in touch.

Lyon

Nancy again is settling down to Winter. We have things we want to do but it is not long before we are organised and into our winter way. Being fascinated by the architectureal flamboyance of the Art Nouveau period we do like to keep an eye open for anything we might see.

We love the surprise when we take visitors into this quite ordinary looking building.

 

It is a bank and in the main banking hall, the ceiling is a skylight of the most beautiful work. The LCL or Credit Lyonase is a French bank founded in 1863 and this building was built for them as their regional headquarters late in the 19^th century This skylight, typical of the Nouveau style is one that visitors must see.

Having little to do we thought that it would be nice to visit Lyon to have a look at the city. Our plans for next year mean that we may not get down this way.

Mid November we caught a train to the city and stayed in a hotel in the older part of town. Lyon is at the confluence of the Saone and the Rhone rivers. Because of these rivers it has always been a big inland commercial centre. Towards the end of the 18^th century it developed a big silk industry and quickly became the centre of the production of silk in Europe. During this time it became the second biggest city in France.

 

 

 

The silk industry has all but gone, but the city is full of the signs of its affluence during this period.

 

 

 

The Romans had a big influence here and these ruins of an amphitheatre and other buildings are high on a hill overlooking the city.

 

 

We found these wonderful examples of  trompe-l’oeil on a building's blank walls.

Unfortunately for us while we were on an open topped tour bus, the heavens opened up and we were caught in heavy winds and a massive downpour. A miserable end to our visit.

We have more travel in store because soon we start another holiday and our return to Australia for Christmas. There will be more to tell, so we will keep in touch.

Back to Nancy

Peter M was leaving us to visit friends in Denmark. We were on our own again and continued from Strasbourg, slowly up the Canal de la Marne au Rhin towards Nancy. (Consider this, “up” used here may not be considered correct. We were actually travelling in a westerly direction. We were going upstream along the canal, gaining height in each lock we passed. In a few days we would start to travel “down” after we crested the top of the hill. Is it correct when we say we have travelled down the Rhine, when we have been travelling up in a northerly direction? All too confusing!)

We would slowly make our way to Saverne where Peter M would join us again.

At Souffelweyersheim we cycled through the countryside and came across this fortification. It is called Fort Rapp and was built between 1872 and 1874 by the Prussian general Von Moltke. It was one of 14 fortifications built around Strasbourg after the Franco Prussian war. The very different names of the towns and villages indicated the changes in the history of this part of France. The fort is now a museum but unfortunately was closed when we were there.

We passed through some very productive farm country and were intrigued by these mounds of what looked like large roundish lumps of dirty woody roots. Potato-like but they were 20 to 30 cm long. It was sugar beet, ready to be trucked to the local mill and processed to sugar. More than 80% of Europe’s sugar comes from beet.

We moored in a small village Waltenheim-sur-Zorn which had some lovely old houses. The photo does not show it but none of the walls of this cottage were either straight or vertical. Probably been like it for years.

The corn harvest in the area was in full swing and bin loads of the grain were arriving continuously at the silos near our mooring.

Saverne was our next major stop and we found a very well run port in the harbour in the middle of town. The other side of the port was dominated by this palace, Le Chateau des Rohan. It was built in the 18^th century as a residence for the Archbishops of Strasbourg. The 140 metre wide building of red Vosges sandstone replaces the smaller Chateau Vieux on the left that was built in 1417. It is now a community building housing a school, a library and many other facilities.

Peter M arrived back on board and we departed Saverne on the 19^th October. The canal actually crosses the main street in the old town and this deep ecluse at the crossing always has a crowd of on-lookers.

We stopped at Lutzelbourg and found this shop absolutely full of magnificent cut crystal. Peter and Marg had been here before but they were still impressed with the volume of beautiful works on display. Serge Wurm, the artisan, was working at the time. It goes without saying that a few purchases were made.

The Arzviller Inclined Plane lift was built in the late 1960’s to lift barges up the eastern face of the Vosges Mountains.

It replaced 17 locks over 4 kilometres of canal which gave a gain in height of 44.5 metres. This had been a massive bottleneck and barges could take 2 days to clear them.

The lift has been out of continuous use for almost two years following two mishaps. We have been anxious for it to re-open so we could make this trip.

Compare the support structure with this photo taken in May 2012 and see the extent of the repairs and strengthening that has been carried out.

We were soon on the top of the Vosges range where the canal runs through a large series of lakes. These etangs du Gondrexange were developed in the middle ages by monks as fish farms. They cover over 700 hectares and are a haven for fish, birds and other wildlife. Some of these etangs were almost drained to replenish the canal after the failure of the Arzviller inclined plane in 2013 and the area beyond Matilda was still over 2 metres below its normal level.

As we travelled down the canal, we realised that we were passing lots of spiky bushes on the side of the canal. They were covered with little dark blue fruit. We realised they were sloes so we had to stop Matilda and bring her bow amongst them. Peter M and Margaret harvested about 2 kilos of these bitter fruit which are now mulling away in jars to become Sloe Gin!

Foraging this season has given us cherries, walnuts, figs, apples and now sloes.

We were now back in Nancy and took a quick tour through the city. We bought Peter M’s train ticket to Paris and wandered back through Place Stanislas .

There was a crafts display in the old Hotel de Ville and quirky gardens in the Square. The Town always seems to have displays like this around this time of year.

Peter M took his train to Paris next day and was on his way home to Oz.

We were alone again. Winter is settling quickly in France and we were getting prepared. Two cubic metres of firewood and a thousand litres of heating oil should see us through.

There will be more to tell so we will keep in touch.