Day Forty Six: Montargis to Fontainebleau: (Year 46: 2013)

November 5, 2017

Flash Back to 2013:

In November 2012, our fourth grandchild, Evelyn, was born in Montreal. But we only got to see her this year. We also launched the idea of taking the grandkids on bike tours, using the wonderful kids' tandem idea - the WeeHoo. With this we took the twins to Idaho. We also went back to Europe - this time circling around Netherlands and Eastern Germany as well as Switzerland and France.

Avi had graduated from the trike and is training on two wheels.

Here is Violet starting two wheeler training.

Setting off with the twins in the "Wee Hoos"

Marius and Sandra help us get ready for the next European trip.

Dodie has cycled to her father's original house in East Berlin.

As the number of grandchildren increased in these years we focussed on how much we love them. This song by Bobby Vee (With You) helps to express this.

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Fast Forward to 2017, France:

The Ibis came through with the same good breakfast that we have now discovered they do. We are not sure that every flavour of Ibis does the same - there is Ibis Budget, Regular, and Styles. The chain that owns Ibis - Accor - also has about another 10 major hotel brands. Anyway, regular Ibis is doing it for us - breakfast wise anyway.

Outside the Ibis we had another look at the nice building this Ibis was in, in the middle of downtown. Then there was the unique building down the street, which I think was or is a hospital.

Then we set off back down what had been the walking street yesterday. Today it was devoid of both walkers or cars, but was still fun to look at.

The walking street in Montargis, deserted on this Sunday morning.

We got a peek at some other Montargis features as well. For example, it claims to also have a "Little Venice" by virtue of some small canals. That is true, but this is by no means gorgeous like that in Colmar.

Montargis "Little Venice" does not measure up to Colmar's

We also spotted the chateau and got one photo, but of course as usual we were anxious to move on down the road.

As far as the "road" goes, we had brought ourselves to Montargis because (in addition to Mazet) Eurovelo 3 (EV 3) goes through it. EV3 is also called the Scandiberique, because it starts in Scandinavia and goes to Santiago de Compostella. In doing this, it goes through Montargis and Paris, making it our ticket.

We are on EV3 - the Scandiberique. In principle we were also on this in the Spring, in Spain. Signage started out very well as our day began, but soon dropped away. Presumably they expected us to just stick on the canal.

The only thing, to do this it uses the Loing canal, which links through to the Seine. So there we were, back on a canal.

The canal. This was built, by the way, between 1720 and 1723. It is about 50 km long and has 19 locks.

In France, a big feature of a canal is the fishermen, who we have mentioned before. Today, as everyday, they were out there. One scene, encouraging or sad depending on point of view, was a father introducing a boy to the joys of sitting for hours by the water. Another scene had a number of people, all identically outfitted by a single company - I think it was "Rivage". They had serious looking equipment, plus jumpsuits, hats, and whatnot, and even some women (wives?) sucked in. We have thought about stopping to interview some canal fishers. Do they ever catch anything? If yes, do they actually eat it?

Serious fishers. If you can zoom in, you may see a woman with a really serious fishing jumpsuit.

Canal side equipment. How do they manage to sell this stuff?

The canal path started off paved but pretty soon devolved to gravel of various degrees of roughness. The rougher the gravel the greater our effort and the lower our speed, of course. Eventually we got fed up and decided to take a parallel D road. It was not totally easy to escape the canal, but we found a little laneway and eventually made our way to D40. We took that through La Genevraye, only occasionally being worried by a too fast or too close car. At Genevraye we were rewarded with a nice scene of a medieval church on a hill.

A house that seemed typical of a fancy one in Nemours. We have to admit that we did not really see Nemours.

We carried on to Episy, where we hung a left and made for Fontainebleau. The road led through part of the famous forest of Fontainebleau, which had attracted French kings for hunting since Louis VII in 1137. They carried on until Napoleon III in 1870. The forest, at least in this part, was rather spindly. And we would not expect to see any animals, since idiotic people on motorbikes were zooming noisily up and down its twisty and hilly length.

The road was moderately narrow, and shoulderless, providing for the chance to look on in horror as car after car would pull out to go around us and risk a head on collision on a blind corner. Heck, even if they saw someone coming they would gamble on being able to tuck back in in time. Slow down and wait two seconds? Unheard of. I was torn between two "entertaining" types of thoughts. One was about strangling a motorcyclist and the other was speculation about in which directions car parts would be flying once someone's gamble did not work out. In my remaining time I was mentally drafting a letter to the local police, asking where in heaven's name they were today (and every day).

The road to Fontainebleau town from the canal, and the bit of Fontainebleau forest it goes through.

We did somehow make it to the end of the road, where a large obelisk stands in the middle of a roundabout. This was a true meat grinder, with absolutely no provision for cyclists or pedestrians. We had to force several cars to jam on their brakes.

As usual we had only a vague idea of where or what we were about to land at. We knew that Fontainebleau was a hunting preserve and had a chateau. But oh my, once past the "meat grinder" we found ourselves in the "zoo". Cars were parked all up and down the street, and at the end of that was a giant chateau "campus" much like Versailles. There were a lot of people around, but to be fair not like the crowds and lineups we had seen at Versailles.

In Fontainebleau - blocks of parked up cars.

Our hotel, the Hotel de la Chancellerie, had received some disparaging reviews. We could see some of it, as the desk clerk fussed about for an inordinate time checking us in, and both the halls and our room dramatically lacked light. But in general, it's ok.

We dumped our stuff, including the bikes in the small reception area, and set off to see what the chateau is about. It is certainly huge, having had 13 kings over 800 years fiddling with it. Tomorrow we will go back and have a real look. We have time now, because we are literally on the doorstep of Paris.

Back for a second quick look at the chateau.

These are the parts of the chateau buildings that most commonly appear on post cards.

We ducked into the chateau for a teeny peek. Look, you can dress up in period costume!

Out on the street we went looking for a place to eat. There were lots of choices, but somehow we were attracted by the simplicity of getting a crepe from a stand set up outside a restaurant. There were options for sweet crepes, with Nutella, or Bon Maman jam, or chestnut crème, but since this was supper we were interested in the ham and cheese variant. I decided to go whole hog and have an egg thrown in as well. Dodie cautioned me that since this was France the egg would not be "properly" cooked. "No problem", I countered, "I will just ask the man to cook it properly". "You will embarrass me and besides there is not way that is going to happen". "If you order it, I'm insisting that you eat it, no matter what!"

So I did, and the man not only broke the yolk but flipped the egg, with a flourish. Maybe he has seen a North American before? Anyway, it was great. For dessert we stepped in to the bakery next door (in a town like this, there will always be a bakery next door) and got an éclair and an apricot tart. These were top quality. But the surprise was the "chausson prunes". Not only was this prune and not the usual apple, but the crust was just great - not the kind of tasteless flaky standard. We are threatening to buy several more tomorrow.

Out on the streets of Fontainebleau, we dropped in to a "Pmu/Tabac" news stand an bought a 1:100,000 map of this region. On the news rack was the latest edition of Charlie Hebdo, in bad taste as ever.
Tariq Ramadan is a Swiss academic, philosopher and writer who has been accused of rape by two women in France.

The newspaper "Liberation" notes the US has had one year of Trump. All the fears about him, it says, have come true.

Here is my egg, starting out, but will it be allowed to cook?

This ham, gruyere, egg crepe is going to be good!

Just another building, near our hotel. They really have some attractive architecture here!

We are now just ever so slightly dragging our feet before hitting Paris. So tomorrow we will take time to look at Fontainebleau. We are hatching a plan then to look at the "Brie" region, which is just adjacent to here. If I can get some Brie in "Brie" it will make up for missing "Epoisses" in Epoisses.

Today's ride: 60 km (37 miles)
Total: 1,935 km (1,202 miles)

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