May 30, 2024
Hattonchâtel - Pont-à-Mousson
Today's ride takes us back to the Moselle, and then after another day we will be in Metz, back to where we started. Since we have the car, Janos will be driving to Pont-à-Masson, our destination, and will also carry some bags - it's always nice to ride with a lighter load - while Susan, Kathleen and I cycle with just a light pannier.
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annier each for the day's needs. It will be a quick trip in the car so once he gets to Pont-à-Masson, Janos will have time to cycle our route in reverse and meet us.
We all met downstairs at 10:30, sorted out the bags to take and the bags to go in the car, synched our routes and set off. The weather report for brief appearences of sun, lots of clouds, quite cool at the start and some wind turned out to be pretty accurate. I had all my layers on and wasn't too warm. And it didn't rain until the evening! We waved bye-bye to Janos and got on our bikes for the steep downhill from the chateau. First stop on the agenda was the bakery for some treats for later on in the day.
After about six kilometers Susan called out to stop. She had left her pannier in the barn where we had parked our bikes for the night! Oh no, that hill again but she had no choice but to go back, an additional 12 km for her day. Kathleen and I decided to just poke along, take a detour to Lake Madine and let Susan catch up somewhere along the way.
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We cycled on and in Pannes we could turn off onto a delightful small country road, and although the road until then never felt too busy it didn't have the charm that the road from Pannes to Euvezin had.
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It is/was a lavoir, or village wash house for laundry. The sloping stones around the periphery of the pond are a give-away. They are where the women of the village would scrub their laundry. The previous pond also has these stones, and is also a lavoir. They were all constructed during the second empire when the government was putting in water systems in rural France, and the basins could be built from standardized parts with each village embellishing their lavoir or not according to local tastes and budgets. People still use them, but not very often. I’ve seen women (always women. Make the appropriate social observation /comment here) cleaning large items like rugs and horse blankets in them. There’s a myth about the origin of the law supporting their construction that posits that Napoleon 3 rd overheard Queen Victoria exclaiming about how the French smelled bad, and he was determined to do something about it. Not true, but it makes a good story.
Cheers,
Keith
6 months ago
6 months ago
6 months ago
I believe those are indeed benches, although perhaps not the original ones. The only photo I could find of a lavoir in use shows baskets of laundry lined up on benches near the pool. As for the little house, without seeing inside it’s difficult to tell what it was used for, but I’m guessing it had something to do with sheltering the washer women during « averses » or rain showers, or at least offering shade.
Most of the lavoirs around here do have raised basins or at least raised rims, but we are in a wine region, and have always enjoyed a bit of prosperity not found everywhere. The old lavoir here in Gevrey was rather grand, being fully enclosed and was later converted first to a public bath house and now to a community meeting room. But in Nuits St. Georges, the lavoirs were along the banks of the Meuzin, and open to the elements, one with a raised basin, one with simple scrubbing stones lining the river’s edge. Different communes, different budgets.
Cheers
6 months ago
6 months ago
https://www.estrepublicain.fr/culture-loisirs/2020/07/26/trois-constructions-pour-le-lavoir-de-pannes
6 months ago
We dawdled, we stopped to eat our sandwiches, we checked our devices for messages from Susan. Why isn't she here yet, is she taking pictures of cows? Then I heard something, was it a dog barking in the distance? I sped up a bit to catch up with Kathleen, because as the German saying goes, the dog bites the last one. Well, it wasn't a dog, it was Susan trying to yell loud enough to tell us she could see us. At first a speck in the distance and then there she was. Then in the other direction I saw a pinpoint of light, it could only be a bicycle. Yes, it was Janos. By chance we had all converged at the midpoint of our ride.
The rest of the ride went more quickly as we headed for the Moselle bike path and our lodgings in Pont-à-Masson. We hadn't been able to book at the same hotel so Janos and I headed across the river to our hotel and Kathleen and Susan checked in at their place directly on the river front.
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Tomorrow more pictures from the Abbey hotel, an amazing place.
We had a fine dinner at a restaurant recommended by Kathleen and Susan's host. Those French desserts are wicked. The end of another great day.
Today's ride: 42 km (26 miles)
Total: 112 km (70 miles)
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6 months ago