September 5, 2015
To Compiegne via Clairiere de l'Armistice: A lovely day
Roye is I not high on the places people most want to visit. Our hotel an Ibis Budget was in the middle of a huge shopping centre consisting of at least 4 massive supermarkets and other similar shops, its claim to fame being it was near an off ramp of the Motorway. Actually our 'handicapped' room was absolutely wonderful, spotlessly clean, plenty of room for bikes, BBC World and good free WIFI. Ken who loves visiting Supermarkets to see if they have cut price chocolate was happy. Leaving through downtown Roye this morning it certainly appeared to be a rather dreary town that is down on its luck. There was an old town wall that seemed to be its most exciting feature. It was from there on to a plane that made me feel as if I was in the land of the giants as we were surrounded by huge wind generators, thankfully they weren't working much today. The road was dead straight for about 10km with the only trees in sight in the distance. Easy riding but motorists seem to take these dead straight road as a challenge so although there wasn't much traffic it was scary at times.
Ken has been doing a wonderful job navigating using Michelin Maps and largely keeping us on 'white' roads. It was here we turned off and headed towards the forest. Immediately the scenery was entirely different. I had been imagining quite bad hills but there were only gentle undulations and the little roads we were on passed through tiny, pretty villages. I was puzzled at first because some of the villages we passed through seemed to just have barns with great wooden double doors. Then I saw one set of doors opened and I saw that it led into a courtyard with a very pretty house across it.
Actually we were not going to Compiegne directly we were going to Clairiere del'Armistice first. We came to Longueil Anne and after asking someone where we could get coffee we were directed to a magical place, it was beside the busy Canal Lateral to L'Oise . We sat in the street and drank our tiny coffees while we watched the busy locals going about their business. A considerable amount of disorientation then occured and we went in circles ending up at some kids' boat races where the locals all gave us conflicting advice on our way.
Eventually we were in the forest and before long were at the Clairiere de L'Armistice (The Armistice Glade Memorial). It was here that on 11th November 1918 that the Armistice was signed in a restaurant car of a Rail wagon. In a cruel twist in 1940 it was in this very Railway Wagon that Hitler insisted that the Armistice on the surrender of France was signed. Hitler then took the Wagon back to Berlin and destroyed the monuments that had been erected. This wagon was destroyed in 1945. Its remains are in the museum and of course in pride of place an identical wagon to the original is proudly displayed in this fascinating museum. The whole area is lovely, peaceful and quite extensive but what surprised me was how few people there were there on a Saturday early afternoon.
It was a short ride from there to Compiegne and we found our hotel with a view of L'Oise easily.
Today's ride: 63 km (39 miles)
Total: 1,829 km (1,136 miles)
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