Day Forty: Choisey to Gevrey-Chambertin: (Year 40: 2007)

October 30, 2017

Flash Back to 2007:

Education is highly prized in our culture and in our family. So the year Laurie got her Ph.D. was a big one. We were sorry that Walter was not alive to see it. But Laurie had changed her last name to Walter's - Marczak. So now the world had a Dr. Marczak!

Laurie got her Ph.D. Walter would have been intensely proud. We were!

Laurie took the name Marczak, which was Walter's. So now the world had a Dr. Marczak!

On the other hand, Dodie's ailing Mom had come to stay with us, and Dodie began to wind down her farm and preserving activities in order to care for her.

With Walter gone Hilda weakened. She came to stay with us, and enjoyed chores like husking corn or setting the table. We relied on her to know how many plates to put out - not always easy to figure!

Hilda took a fall in her room, and landed in the hospital. Sadly she would never really make it back out.

With the need to care for Hilda, Dodie wound down production, soon ending the farmers market era. Steve here is clearly sold out.

TURN TURN TURN, here sung by the young Pete Seeger, is appropriate for how we now began to turn away from activities that had occupied the previous 20 years or more:

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Fast Forward to 2017, France:

We had chosen the 62 euro Ibis in Choisey as an economy measure, but they really surprised us. The room was great, with fluffy quilts, lots of electrical outlets, a good desk area and reasonable wifi. But breakfast was the real surprise. They put out pretty close to a "ten jammer" and even threw in a twist - crepes with a bottle of real maple syrup. By "real" we of course mean "Canadian". Not only that, at 6 euros the breakfast cost was half the usual amount being asked in this area.

As is often the case, the Ibis was located near some giant box stores, including an absolutely mammoth Cora hypermarket. But Cora was closed when we came and when we left, saving us getting lost in there. Instead we popped in to a Casino, which is infinitely smaller. But Casino has Casino branded fresh salads and refrigerated custard/cake deserts of many types that are just super. If you read the ingredient list you see that they actually only contain - food!

Our Eurovelo book showed that coming right up after Choisey would be an on-road detour through or around the Solvay chemical plant. The plant makes salt, bleach, caustic soda, and other chemicals, using in part limestone from nearby Domparis. It turned out that EV6 had cooked up a different alternative route, taking us in fact through Domparis, but very comfortably, and putting us soon back on the canal.

The red on road bit did not materialize - instead we had a nice ride in Damparis.

The canal, however, was soon to join the Saone River, and it was from that point that our day really took off. The sun had been out all the time, and there is nothing like sun to make a river look clean and blue. Canals are nice, but usually not clean and blue. The Saone also holds some nice memories for us. Just along the river is the little town of Losne, and across from it on a bridge, St-Jean-de-Losne. One time here for us there had been boat races on the river, and street food on the shore. We had joined in the festivities. And in 2015 we had gotten to meet Keith Klein, and to share a meal in Losne. Keith is an American who has lived and taught in France and Germany, been a bicycle racer, and who has thirteen blogs here on Crazyguy. Go to our blog page where we met Keith, and while you are there, scroll up and check out Millefeuille Month in Damparis!

We crossed the bridge to St. Jean and this time had a look a little deeper into the town. It seems though, that the main attraction of the town is the church and the bit by the river. For example, we did not find a real bakery. That probably explains why we saw a lady striding over the bridge carrying two baguettes to the St Jean side. So in Losne at the Banette bakery we did scoop up one éclair. We are only now developing our standards for what makes a good éclair. Dodie wants to include "not too sweet", but I am not so sure about that.

St Jean de Losne, across the bridge from Losne

We have seen a lot of Chemin St Jacques signs on this trip. It's a little strange that St Jean is this much into it.

We then left the Saone and began a stretch of road that was rather nice, and unexpected. It was a not heavily trafficked bit of D road (D12a) that led up to the Abbaye de Citeaux. The road passed through open pasture land, and also a lot of forest, which was looking particularly nice in its Fall colours. So I could be heard to remark to Dodie "Wow, this is like - real forest!" to which she sweetly replied "You are in the Foret Domaniale de Citeaux, dum, dum".

Says Wikipedia, the Cîteaux Abbey (French: Abbaye de Cîteaux) is a Roman Catholic abbey located in Saint-Nicolas-lès-Cîteaux, south of Dijon, France. Today it belongs to the Trappists, or Cistercians of the Strict Observance (OCSO). Cîteaux, formerly spelled Cisteaux, is the mother house of the Cistercian order. The abbey has about 35 members. The monks produce a cheese branded under the abbey's name, as well as caramels and honey-based candies.

But, when we got there, we as yet had no idea what the thing was. No matter, today being Monday its gift shop and visiting was closed. We had been bucking a strong North wind since the Saone and we cycled around the Abbey grounds a bit looking for any sheltered spot in which to have lunch. We did not really find it, and truth be told, we did not among all the buildings really find one that we might definitely call "the abbey". We think we entered the grounds from the wrong angle, and in fact we left then on not quite the "official" road to Nuits St. Georges (D8 vs D116). That may have affected what happened next, but maybe not.

The abbey, to the extent that we saw it. The Cistercians were serious about wine, making it logical for the abbey to be here.

Parts of D8 towards Nuits St George were really nice

First a little background. Our guidebook shows a chain of wine villages from Nuits St Georges to Dijon - places like Vougeot, Chambolie-Musigny, Morey St Denis, Gevrey-Chamberlin, Marsannay la Cote, Chenove, etc. They lie along what is called the Route des Grands Crus.

From Wikipedia: "Grand Cru (great growth) is the highest level in the vineyard classification of Burgundy. There are a total of 550 hectares (1,400 acres) of Grand Cru vineyards - approximately 2% of Burgundy's 28,000 hectares (69,000 acres) of vineyards (excluding Beaujolais) - of which 356 hectares (880 acres) produce red wine and 194 hectares (480 acres) produce white wine. In 2010, 18,670 hectoliters of Burgundy Grand Cru wine was produced, corresponding to 2.5 million bottles, or just over 1.3% of the total wine production of Burgundy."

The chain of wine villages. The book is deceptive, because north is to the right.

So we expected in Nuits St George to find a quaint wine village. But as we entered all we found was traffic and no provision for bikes. We were thinking - well many nice old towns have a ring of horribleness around them. But when we reached City Hall, things were if anything worse. We carried on, clinging desperately to the sidewalk, such as it was, until it disappeared. Then we had to go out and mix it up directly with the cars. We were sort of ok until all shoulder disappeared and the traffic accelerated. At that point we stopped dead, and executed a hard left - taking to the hills.

The cartoon in the guide book gave us an expectation for Nuits St Georges that we did not find.

Our view of Nuits St Georges - coming in.

Trying to leave Nuits St Georges. We are clinging to that "sidewalk" but it is about to end.

In Nuits St Georges, we came in on D8 and turned onto D974. Once at city hall (Hotel de Ville) we figured we had a right to assume we were downtown. As it happened, the action was a couple of streets over. But still, the town's welcome for us was really poor.

Google street view reveals the scene a couple of streets from where we were being terrorized by traffic.

As it happens, the hills by this point were not ordinary hills, but were the famous grand cru vines of Burgundy! We were amazed. Suddenly we were right in the middle of it all! And the little paths we were on were completely free of pernicious cars. It was a little tricky, since the paths did not necessarily go where we wanted, which was of course along the chain of villages. But we noodled our way, and eventually did get onto D122, the "official" route. It was strange, though, that the route was not generally marked.

One thing we did see was signs pointing out the various Grand Cru vineyards - some as small as just a few hectares. We were surprised to see that all the vines still had some grapes on them. Naturally we gave them a try. They were really flavourful, sweet, and sticky. As wine ignoramuses we were thinking - wow these really taste Grand Cru, maybe they are for "ice wine". That was until we asked someone knowledgeable - in the form of anyone French - in this case a worker from the electric company installing an underground line. He patiently explained that these grapes had not been ripe enough at the time of the harvest, and even now would be too acidic, so they are bird food. Oh. But also good Grampie food, and boy could Dodie ever make good grape jelly from them!

Clos de Vougeot. A lot of people, including families, seemed to be visiting this winery, and also walking the hills. Since the 12th century this was run by the monks of Citeaux, but it may now be in private hands. It costs 7.50 to visit.

The bakery in Morey St Denis - Looks good, but closed (darn Monday).

Grand Cru refers to a vineyard - some are very small.

Mme Ascotte - the guard dog for the hotel!

Today's ride: 72 km (45 miles)
Total: 1,550 km (963 miles)

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