Wednesday, July 30: Colmar, Alsace-Lorraine, France

Yesterday we woke to a light steady rain. We filled with fresh water and drove ¼ mile away to an Aire where we could dump both our black and gray tanks and then stopped yet another Wal-Mart type store called E.LeClercs for a few groceries. We were going to continue on the wine trail south to Colmar, but the mist rain and fog in the foothills made us rethink that and we headed down the expressway directly to Colmar. 

The sculptor of the State of Liberty was born here in Colmar and they have this mini statue at the entrance of the city

 We got a campsite right on the canal in the city's marina where we stayed the rest of the day while it rained steadily all day. We enjoyed watching the duck-like birds cruise the canal and then we were treated to a playful river otter feeding.

This "New Jersey" camper showed up in the campground, but I never got to talk with the owner..

This morning, we decided to go into town regardless of the threatening weather to see the old section of the city. We walked about 1 mile into town and found the visitor center when it began to rain pretty hard. We decided to take a mini train ride around the city with English taped commentary. It was not very good – it did describe a few of the old buildings we passed, but gave no real history of the city and played a lot of music.

Our lunch cafe

We walked back to a couple of the buildings to get some photos and stopped for lunch at a river-side cafe in the section called Petite Venice. It didn't look anything like Venice, but it was pretty with colorful half-timbered homes along the canal and bridges festooned with flowers.

Brussels presented this mini Mannekin Pis to Colmar as a friendship gesture

Now this is a great stylized water tower!

We spent most of the day ambling about the city (that's what you call it when you are lost most of the time due to the winding streets and inability to read 'you are here' maps.... We got back to the RV late afternoon for a nap and when we awoke, the dark heavy skies were getting higher, promising better weather tomorrow when will cross the river back into Germany to explore the Black Forest.

Monday, July 28: Ribeauville, Alsace-Lorraine

Woke to threatening skies, but it is not supposed to rain until this afternoon, so we decided to stay on at this campground an extra day so we could tour the village and spend the afternoon doing laundry and internet.

Loved this village - here are lots of photos!

Stork nest in the middle of town

Ancient well in town

An alley off the Rue Grand

Store window with real cat, fake bunny

They really like colorful homes

Closeup of the castle on the hill

Sunday, July 27: Alsace-Lorraine, France

We woke to clear blue skies and headed south to travel the Alsace wine route. We caught it in Molsheim, a few towns south of its beginning. This is wine country with villages close together nestled on the sides of the foothills of the Vosges Mountains.  

This archway was about 1/2 meter too short for us, so we parked outside and walked in.

Most of these medieval towns have changed little with arched entry gates, half-timbered buildings, the town wells and grape presses still standing along the narrow streets. We drove through many of these towns and stopped at one where the entry arch was too short for us to get through. We found a parking area outside the town and wandered around and visited the tourist office to get the wine route map.

Gate at other end of town

We continued through the little towns – Jack did a great job of maneuvering our too big RV through these towns that are not meant for large vehicles, and we stopped at a rest stop for lunch and a nap. We wanted to stop in a town that was having a large wine festival, but we could not find any parking anywhere close.

Note the castle ruins on the hilltop

Flowers in every town along the roads and bridges

They had vines trained across the streets in this village

Typical village surrounding the church in the foohills

Wine and Bear Country!

This one we fit through

The clouds began to roll in as they seem to do in the afternoons and we stopped about halfway through the wine route in a the town of Ribeauville. Internet for Jack, some reading for me and one game of Rummy before bed.

Saturday, July 26: Luxembourg to Germany to Alsace-Lorraine

Jack's online banking problems are back, so he is one unhappy camper (pun intended). We left the campground in Luxembourg close to noon and traveled southeast into Germany through Saarbrucken and along the Saar River. This is an old industrial city and one of the old abandoned steel mills was at least one mile long as we drove and drove the adjacent road and this building never seemed to end! According to the guidebook, it is even lit at night, like a tourist attraction...

We stopped to do a little grocery shopping since stores will be closed tomorrow, had lunch and took a nap. We continued south, back into France's Alsace-Lorraine region. 

We spent the night in the small city of Saverne, slightly northwest of Strasbourg. The place names here are mostly German, but the language in French. The region has switched hands between the two countries over many centuries and now it is a great mixture of the two – they love their wines and their sauerkraut!

From our parking lot campground, we could walk into the city with the hopes of finding a nice restaurant. We did see quite a few, but we were not really hungry yet and the shops in the cobble stoned pedestrian area were all closing up.  Jack wasn't feeling well, so we returned to the RV, made a nice dinner and early to bed.

So, I spent my birthday in three different countries...Luxembourg, Germany and France!

Friday, July 25: Reims, France to Bastogne, Belgium to Luxembourg

On Thursday, after re-bandaging Jack's finger and rechecking the repairs, we headed east to French-speaking southern Belgium, known as Wallonia. We stopped at a campground in Bastogne, the central town of the Ardennes Forest where the Battle of the Bulge took place. We continue to have trouble with our online banking, so Jack took the afternoon to work with the multiple banks and credit card companies so they talk nice to each other.

We have a nice grassy site, which is a good change from the parking lot last night and we enjoyed a nice evening as thunderstorms rolled through, one after another, cozy in the RV with rain drumming on the roof.

Friday morning we awoke to a clear, cool beautiful morning. We filled the fresh water tank and drove a few kilometers to a small museum about the Battle of the Bulge. They had a lot of WWII motorcycles, scooters, jeeps and other military vehicles, all set in place as if in the forest, including the snow, giving us an idea of what the area looked like during the battles. They also had an interesting propaganda film telling the Battle from the German perspective along with an excellent film of interviews with American and British commanders in the Battle.

We have made a gigantic circle from northern Belgium west across the northern French coast, back southeast through Paris and the countryside into southern Belgium. Now, we will start our journey south in the general direction of Italy.

Entrance Gate to American Cemetery in Luxembourg

First stop Friday afternoon was Luxembourg, one of the smaller countries in the world, at 51 miles long. We stopped just outside Luxenbourg City at the only American Military Cemetery in Luxembourg. Over 5,000 men and one woman are buried here, along with General George Patton, who requested to be buried with his men.

We have not seen much in Luxembourg to make us want to stay and explore, but maybe we just didn't find the right areas. Boxy, stucco, boring homes and buildings and lots of office parks.... The northern part of the country was pretty, lots of forests and streams, but the southern part is practical and business-oriented, so not much for us here. We found a nice campground just ½ hour south of Luxembourg City with good WiFi – again. Hooray!

Wednesday, July 23: France, Montigny to Reims

Crossroads in a Champagne District Village

We realized that our box of champagne was missing a bottle, so we drove a half hour back to the vineyard through wonderful old villages precariously set on hillsides with the vineyards spread out down the hillsides to the valley below. Every village had champagne producers and places to s top for tastings, but we passed them all by since we had to drive...

You guessed it - this is NOT a one-way street.  Whoever is there first gets to go first!

We picked up our missing bottle and headed northeast towards the city of Reims. We stopped at a forest preserve and did a nice 2 mile walk through the woods to see some unusually formed trees with twisted trunks and branches that hang like umbrellas – sort of France's answer to our live oak trees. 

A baby "faux" tree

Twisted trunks and umbrella like foliage

We came across this small chapel (10x10) all by itself in the woods with a very pretty stained glass window in the back wall that you can see through the doorway

We then made a quick stop at a tiny museum in Reims where General Eisenhower had his headquarters and where the Germans tried to negotiate an end to the war. The allies would accept nothing but unconditional surrender and the papers were signed in the map room around 2 in the morning.

Photo of Surrender

The map room today, just as it was

More of the map room

It was getting late, so we opted to stay at close-by Aire, right in downtown Reims. It took a while to find the entrance to the small parking area behind a building that held about 10 Rvs. The narrow entrance driveway had a sharp turn and a low steel post jumped out and scraped down the side of the RV, tearing off the handle of the slide-out bay near the door, cracking the fiberglass in a few places along the rest of the bays and damaging the steel supports for the locks on the bays.

We pulled in one of the remaining spots and Jack got to work trying to fix the various damaged pieces. In the process, he cut his finger quite badly and I found the number of a taxi that could take us to the nearest clinic/hospital. We waited a bit longer and the bleeding finally slowed, we were able to clean it up, apply antibiotic cream and bandage it up. Although the cut was deep, it wasn't a separating gash, but more of a flap on the pad of his right index finger. It opened up a few more times, but finally stopped bleeding, so we decided to hold off going to the hospital.

Since Jack couldn't use his hand, he instructed me on how to finalize the repairs he figured out so that we could secure the bays and get flapping fiberglass tied down. Afterwards, we sat in the adjoining grassy area, had a glass of wine (OK, maybe a few glasses of well-deserved adult beverages), and had dinner.

What started out as a serene, bucolic day in the countryside ended with a some very stressful hours. It stayed very warm during the night and without electricity, we tossed and turned, reliving the day's aggravations, worried whether the fixes will last, but grateful that Jack seems okay and we can continue our trip.

Tuesday, July 22: France, Verneuil to Epernay and Montigny

This morning around 10:30, the couple from Sweden and ourselves were treated to a wonderful private tour of the traditional Champagne-making process. The word Champagne is protected and only sparkling wine made in this region can be called Champagne. Matthieu explained that they grow three types of grapes (Chardonnay, Pinot Noir and Pinot Meunierre) and that Champagne is typically a blend and does not have a vintage. The grapes have to be harvested by hand – no machines, and the vines are kept trimmed and small to produce the best quality grapes. Quantities are strictly controlled and overproduction is destroyed.

The vineyards that produced the Champagne we purchased.  See the roses?  They serve as the canary in the mine because there is a disease that affects the roses a couple of weeks before it hits the vines, giving the growers time to counterattack.

Of course, the tour ended in a wine tasting and it turned out that this free campsite is our most expensive one if we include our champagne purchases.

After our tour, we said goodbye to Anna and Roger and drove east through the vineyards and into the small city of Epernay, one of the key cities in the Champagne district, home of many of the larger Maisons du Champagne, like Moet and Chandon. 

These vineyard markers identify the Champagne House

 Then on to our free Aire campground perched high on a hill overlooking the valley with acres and acres of vineyards spread out below us.