Post #2

May 9, 2011

My legs were feeling the day before so I decided I would explore some of the cellars filled with champagne underneath Épernay which in total run over 110km. The first champagne house I went to was the Mercier champagne house. The Mercier family is one that has always pushed the envelope when it comes to promotion. They made one of the first promotional films to ever come out France, hosted a car rally in their cellars (not a single bottle was broken) and they made one of the largest oak barrels in history for the Paris world fair. The tour for their cellar consisted of sitting on a small train with an audio guide explaining details along the way. After the tour we got to the good stuff where I got to taste both their Brut and Brut Rose champagnes and a Mercier vintage champagne from the year 2006. They were all excellent, especially the vintage. 
After Mercier I went to Moët & Chandalon who is the worlds largest producer of Champagne. I did there tour which was by foot and learned some more interesting facts about champagne and the very strict process. I got to taste their Brut.
 
If a champagne house releases a Brut or Brut Rose champagne without a specific date then you are drinking grapes over the past three or four years so that the taste is similar from year to year. If you are drinking a vintage champagne you will get a specific year that the grapes were grown... Which also comes with a larger price tag. Even more expensive is if you get vintage champagne from a Gran Cru vineyard where you are ensured that you are drinking the finest grapes that the champagne house has to offer. The most expensive bottle I saw was a 1999 Vintage Dom Perignon at Moët & Chandalon for a mere €2550. Not the cheapest stuff. 

May 10, 2011

I decided to do the Montagne De Reims ride today based out of Épernay. This ride was about 55km and took me through the Parc Naturel Régional de la Montagne. The bike was great and during the mid-day heat I was able to bike in the shade of the forest. Now the word Montagne (mountain) in the park I was in really wasn't a mountain, the highest I got was 283 meters and Épernay is at 80 meters. But still the ride was great as I rode through more small villages and throug Grand Cru Champagne vineyards (high-quality vineyards).  I also came upon a bunch of small dwarf trees near the peak of my ride. No one knows how the got there but they are alive because they can reproduce sexually... I have no idea how that works. 
After the mutant trees I saw more vineyards, a windmill in it's most stereotypical form (which also acted as an observatory in WW1) and a light house that is now a museum, but used to be an open air dance floor and theatre. I had a steep 2km climb (13% gradient) out of the villages of Ludes and after some riding in the forest had a 4km ride downhill all the way to Épernay. 

May 11, 2011

This day I took it easy and planned my trip over the next couple days to Verdun. 

May 12, 2011

With the plan of heading to Verdun I set out with my loaded bike. However, I did not even make it close. With the weight on my bike I started breaking spokes which in turn untrued (probably not a word) my tire. This forced me to stop in Chalons-en-Champagne and get my bike fixed. By the time I was ready to hit the road again it was too late to continue. I stopped at the campground and examined what I had packed. After throwing some stuff away I hoped it would do the trick. I planned to make it to Verdun the next day. 

May 13, 2011

Unfortunately, the problem did not go away. I started heading towards Verdun and only made it to St. Menehould. I again had to get some spokes fixed and my tire trued. However, my bike would not be fixed until the next day at 9 am, so I explored the town and set up at the campground. 

May 14, 2011

I knew I wanted to make it to Verdun, so I was willing to put up with another day of problems in order to make it there. I tried one more small fix which involved me moving a couple kilograms forward on the bike to spread out the weight. It wasn't the most optimal option but I just wanted a good day of biking. I managed to cover about 60km of biking without a single problem so I hoped the trouble was behind me. 
Upon arrival in Verdun I headed to the tourist office, got some maps and set up camp. I ate a restaurant that serves every dish on the menu with potatoes. Definitely hit the spot. The weather was a little rainy and windy which put an even heavier tone on the city. 
Verdun seems like it's been hit hard economically recently, the town center is nice (obviously driven by tourists) but away from that all the shops and houses really look worn down. The whole area is pretty somber taking into account the history and  once you head east from Épernay it's easy to see where the money is (in champagne). Unfortunately for Verdun I don't know if they have a lot going for them. 

May 15, 2011

Verdun was one of the main battlefields during WW1. The battle went from february 21 to December 18, 1916 and was the longest battle fought during the war. In the last 2 years of the war 800,000 soldiers (400,000 French and nearly as many German, along with other countries) lost their lives near Verdun. I decided to take a day ride to see the sites it had to offer. I saw a couple of the major forts used during the war and visited memorials and cemeteries as well. One of the museums I went to told the story of Verdun over 300 days, 300 000 dead and 400 000 wounded. I saw a memorial that marked the extent of the German advance, the site of a town that was completely leveled to the ground and learned a lot about the war that I did not know about. I went to one site called Tranchée Des Baïonettes, where two companies of the 137th Infantry Regiment were apparently buried alive when oncoming shells covered their position with mud and debris. Several hundreds of their bayonets were found several years later sticking up out of the ground. The site is still untouched. Very sobering day. 
In the evening I went to a small traditional French restaurant with the the checkered red and white tableclothes and all. I ordered off the plat du jour, receiving escargot for an appy and the house beef for my main. The escargot were awesome but my main...was, well, interesting to say the least. The server brought my meal on a cutting board of sorts and plopped it down in front of me. What I found was a bed of fried potatoes on a bed of lettuce on my left which looked appetizing and on my right finely cubed raw beef along mixed in with veggies and and a raw egg broken in half sitting on top. As I raised my head to look around the whole restaurant was looking at me. So I pretended it was exactly what I ordered, poured the egg on top and dug in. The meal was actually pretty good, it even tasted as if it had a hint of wasabi in it. It became too heavy after a while and I had to stop. I finished my meal with a small chocolate pastry and went back to
camp. It was bugging me the whole way back what had just happened and how I had completely misjudged what i had ordered for dinner. Upon return to the campsite I asked the lady at front desk what exactly I had eaten by explaining the ingredients. She promptly told me in french that I had eaten "a good french meal." I went to bed to settle my stomach. 

May 16, 2011

The ride to Metz which was about 50ish km went perfect! I'm happy about not having to deal with the crazy spoke issue. After pulling in and checking into the campground I took a quick siesta and decided to walk around for a change.
The layout of Metz (pronounced Mess) was one of the best I've seen. It had not near the craziness of Paris but had all the zeal. The massive spikey Cathedral was tr centerpiece and the streets of cafes, restaurants and shops spread from. I went and saw their new art center called Centre Pompidou-Metz and the architecture on it was amazing. I strolled around and just enjoyed the evening stopping in at a North African restaurant to eat a huge belly busting meal. 

May 17, 2011

I made the biggest bike of the tour yet going from Metz to Sarrebourg covering 105km. I stayed about 8 km out of town on a small lakeside campground and ate some food from a local boulangerie and promptly passed out. It felt good to make that much ground. 

May 18, 2011 

This was another large day of biking as I covered 85km from Sarrebourg to Strasbourg which Is right along the German border. The day was very hot but i got treated with my own bike path heading into the city. After finally finding the tourist office I went to my campground which is only 3km from the city center and set up. I was pretty drained from the distance covered and the heat so I hid in the shade and did some reading. Tomorrow I will cover Strasbourg and will be heading out on the Alsatian wine route within the next couple days. Gonna look at a solution to spread the weight out more on my bike.