You have to love a bit of a cliffhanger eh? There are you folk eagerly awaiting the presence of wine and wine fields! What have I been delivering? Pictures of drunk folk in France as well as a questionable Citroen! But I guess as they say “Whatever floats your boat” But wait no more. There is some wine involved I am glad to say. Vinyards too!
For the final leg of the trip we made it to Beaune, Burgundy. In this quiet French town we had an Ace up our sleeve ; to book a wine tasting session on a bike! Were we initially aprehensive? You bet! OK. Most of us were. I was secretly looking forward to it. After all I love biking and I like the odd tipple now and again ;).
And so we hit the bikes, provided as part of the wine tour. This shot is of one of the wine enclosures in the region of Burgundy. With a relaxed and banter loving French wine tour guide we lapped up the information he gave us. I never thought I would know so much about wine! The trick to getting a good bottle of wine besides looking at the punt of the bottle? See if it originates from a town or an enclosure. But most of all, use your taste.
It was joyous going around the vinyards. So lovely that a friend of mine soon forgot he was a Brit and started acting like a Frenchman!
Although it must be said at least he was cheerier than me! I was pleased to be there, despite my facial expressions!
Before we knew it we had cycled quite a few miles, looked at quite a few vine stalks and crossed over some busy roads! It was then time to relax. What better scenery to relax in Burgundy other than the sacred wine fields?
With the rest period in place it was finally time to cheer to some lovely white wine and to simply lap up the fantastic surroundings.
It’s fair to say that I choose my place to drink carefully, even with inquisitive Americans about the shop. But I must say they were great company for the wine tour! But where was my glass. And my comrades glasses? Fear not, we all have a glass eventually!
But there was no time like the present. After a quick taste of some OKish “Application” wine we went on and hit the road. Or rather the cycle path. The next bit I did not get any photos of. What the next path entailed was stopping at a winery. My God the wine was good there and cheap! Why can’t we get that stuff at similar prices over here? If I knew I’d probably have started selling the stuff over here! So good was the stuff that we all ended up bringing back a couple of bottles of Pinot Noir and a ‘Ville’ wine ; A Pommard for those wondering what bottle of Red I returned from France with.
It was fair to say that the car was doing great! Not so fast! The next day we drove from Beaune to Cambrai. Even with no AC we were loving sitting in the old Citroen with the engine lapping up the miles with ease and the suspension absorbing every little bump. Even a whiff of petrol now and again could not break that illusion! That would all change when we came off the motorway when we decided to visit Laon, where the superb Laon Historique event is held (http://www.circuit-historique-laon.com/en/). It seemed the car however was not too keen to go to Laon, or should I say to not leave France again.
Yup, as soon as I pulled off the motorway I heard clunk clunk clunk coming from the offside wheel while coasting. Going slower and thus coasting more seemed to make it worse! Bad enough for me to consider left foot braking while I wasn’t on the accelerator! With the noise and feeling of it getting no there was nothing for it except to pull over.
With this in mind we let the car rest for a bit and gingerly pushed onto Cambrai. It was time for a well earned beer but also to see how we would make it back to the UK.
Leyland Legends 