Saarburg to Trier

After all the excitement of Metz city life, we needed a few days in the country, so took a short detour away from the Moselle for a look at another big river, the Saar at Saarburg.  We don’t know much about German holiday spots, but guessed this might be a good one from the number of camp-sites nearby, and it is a real gem.  Saarburg is a small town on a big river, but it could hardly be more picturesque. It is built on and around a rocky outcrop and manages to incorporate a canal flowing under little bridges lined with hanging baskets, endless pavement cafes, a waterfall with working millwheels,  and high up on the rock, a ruined castle and a couple of steepled churches.  All this and little cobbled streets of smart brightly painted old houses, and in the background, hills with vineyards.  By the way we have noticed that on a sunny day at 4pm in France the cafes are full of people drinking a small beer, glass of wine or soda, in Germany, at least so far, they are eating ice-cream sundaes and apfel strudel with lashings of cream!

Saarburg

Around Saarburg

Mosel and Saar meet at Konz

 We had really good weather at Saarburg so we spent one day cycling along the Saar towards Trier – and reached the point where the Saar flows into the Mosel as we must now call it.  Although, or perhaps because, we don’t speak French or German anything like fluently, it is very hard to go from one language to the other in the space of a few hours or kilometers. There is, of course, a tarmac cycle path right along the riverbank in both directions so the cycling is mostly flat and easy, with an occasional biergarten for coffee and cake along the way.  We also managed to do a really long walk through the hills and vineyards around Saarburg, so we saw all the views from all the angles.  It really is a pretty spot and we were sad to leave. 

Yesterday we travelled on to Trier – the number of motorhomes in the area is increasing rapidly, unless they are all, like us, driving round looking for somewhere to stay!  We had thought we would go to a Stellplatz at a winery, which had been recommended to us, but when we found it, it was full to bursting so actually didn’t look that pleasant, so we made for a camp-site nearby that we have visited before, which apart from a fiendish shower system, is a nice riverside site with lots of boats and barges going past.  And as of this evening a float-plane, which taxied down the river, turned, accelerated and took off right in front of us.

Crane?

Float plane on Mosel

 Today we have visited Trier – a city we visited last year and thought worth a return trip.  It has a lot of Roman remains, including bath houses, gates and an amphitheatre. On the banks of the Mosel there are some ancient cranes which were powered by human treadmills, now looking picturesque on the cycle path.  There is also the much restored Constantine’s throne room, which is now the evangelical protestant church in Trier and is a lovely building.  Every day in September the church is doing a 10 minute ‘thought for the day’ with music, homily and prayer, and we managed to catch it today.  It was good to sit there and reflect for a few minutes, even if we didn’t follow it all – we are almost certain it was about sheep as they gave us some wool to remind us of the theme.  Thinking of themes, we hope that the Harvest Festival Services at home go well.

Constantine's basilica

And finally - a bus stopped for a coffee break!

More from Metz

While at Charmes, we took advantage of the voie verte, (green way) or cycle track along the canal towpath, which in turn follows alongside the Moselle river.  10km upstream is the little town of Chatel sur Moselle, which has a huge castle complex, seemingly being lovingly restored by volunteers, to judge from the hand-written information boards.  The town itself is less than a one-horse- town (i.e no prospects for lunch), though it did boast a couple of donkeys (in a field, not on a menu).  With all this water around it is clearly a great place for fishing, in fact one chap had his fishing rod laid down across the cycle track and must have been in a world of his own as he didn’t respond to Ray’s cycle bell, and didn’t notice us at all till we rode close enough to stop and say ‘Pardon, monsieur’ in our best French.

Our next stop was at Toul, as we decided to bypass Nancy in case of more, or continuing, bus strikes.  We managed to find the small but perfectly formed ‘aire’ in Toul, just space for 9 motorhomes, 5 euros a night with water, electricity and a view across the canal to the town included.  It is outside the police station so we felt quite safe. We liked Toul – it seemed more of a going concern than some little towns, with proper shops and the most amazing civic flower displays – like something from the Chelsea Flower Show.  The town is seriously fortified with huge and complex ramparts all around its perimeter and some very beautiful old streets and buildings within its walls.  We are, of course, in the Lorraine area, and for lunch managed to find a ‘Formule Lorraine’ which included a huge piece of excellent quiche Lorraine with chips and salad, followed by a slice of nut cake, also delicious.  We didn’t need another meal till breakfast the next morning!

View from the aire

So now we are in Metz, which as Ray says, will be nice when it is finished.  We drove into Metz relying totally on Lady Satnav, as we didn’t really know where the campsite was.  She, and we, soon got confused by the number of diversions, as the whole city is a mass of roadworks, we think they are putting in a new bus or tram system, it is a massive undertaking.  Fortunately we began to see signs for ‘camping’ and arrived safely, if a little fraught.  This is a very busy camp site and not the best, but it is so close to the centre of town, and on the banks of the Moselle, so we are not complaining.  We have walked miles looking round the city, which is interesting as there are distinct areas built under different rulers e.g the old kingdom of Lorraine, the French monarchy and republic and the parts built under German occupation.  For those of you with a taste for the ‘flamboyant gothic’ architectural style, Metz is a must see.  There is also a very modern satellite Pompidou centre, I suppose like the satellite Tate galleries in England.  The cathedral is immense, with the tallest nave in France (apart from the two taller ones – who writes this stuff in the travel guides?) and some incredible stained glass, including three windows designed by Chagall, who I think is a local hero. And we liked the sense of humour displayed in a big temporary garden outside the Opera House, which poked fun at the traffic chaos in garden form.  Metz has seen Sheila get us into another bad habit - honey flavoured with nuts.  A speculative purchase at a small farmer’s market, in the foyer of a local supermarket, it has proved to be absolutely delicious.

Chagall window

Moselle at Metz

Today we are moving on again, always supposing we can find our way out of Metz through the roadworks, and going further downstream towards Trier and those Moselle vineyards.

Heidi Hi

We have been off-line for a few days so lots to catch up on – the quick version is that we are fine and enjoying ourselves. We discovered the source of the Moselle last Saturday and have spent the week slowly following it downstream to Metz, where we are now.

The longer version for those with the stamina to read it!

Plan A was going jolly well till we decided to stop off at Nancy.  We didn’t really want to go that way, but the route from Troyes up into the Vosges to the source of the Moselle is quickest via Nancy.  A seemingly reliable Dutchman had recommended the campsite there, so it seemed an opportunity to tick Nancy off the list.  We arrived at mid-day all ready to get the bus into town, to find that there was a bus strike, so we sat it out in the crowded and not very wonderful campsite (in our view) only to find the next day that the bus strike had been (unexpectedly) extended.  It was so frustrating as we were only about 5 miles from town, but too far to walk sensibly and not good for cycling as the way back was steeply uphill all the way (a Dutch person said not to try!!).  So we shook the dust of the outskirts of Nancy off our feet and made for the hills.  The campsite gets the prize for most amusing health and safety instructions so far, which read: ‘if there is a flood you won’t be half as surprised as us!’

Just to prove Ray is on this trip

Across the Moselle

Maybe it was all for the best because we enjoyed glorious weather for the next four days, which we spent walking and cycling in the Vosges national park.  This is real Heidi country – even if she technically lived in Switzerland – all forests and meadows and log cabin houses.  You could just imagine grandpa coming round the corner with a bowl of fresh milk, which would instantly make everyone well again (I think the story was something like that).  The young Moselle actually flows through the camp site, and there is a 30 km tarmac cycle path (the now disused railway line) from the back gate, so we used it to cycle up to the source of the river;  the photos prove it.  Our last night in the Vosges was at a France Passion site at over 1000m, which in winter is the base station for a ski tow.  The views were incredible.  We did a lovely day walk from there (some serious up and down), spent the night camped in the middle of nowhere and felt very adventurous!

View from France Passion site

Next we followed the young Moselle down the valley to Charmes – it widens out very quickly, but doesn’t look very deep.  It has also been extensively exploited over the centuries for industry, with all sorts of canals, mills and navigable bits running alongside, making a real jumble of waterways.  Charmes is a very small town with, it turns out, an interesting history.  We called into the Tourist Info Office to ask about cycle routes and were invited to a special evening at the local eco-museum.  As it was just down the road from the campsite we decided to go, and of course we were the only visitors apart from the staff.  The guy we had met at the TIO was there, and a real enthusiast, so he gave us the whole tour in broken English - it was just as well we had got a late pass from the camp site.  But at the end of the tour we helped launch 15 lanterns into the night sky in celebration of 150 years of industry on the site.  The museum was the remains of an industrial complex that was partly built over a small canal that powered, firstly, a waterwheel and then two electricity generating turbines.  Originally a tannery, then an electricity generator for Charmes  -  the second ‘city’ in France to have electric lights (110V DC – so no change there then).  Finally, it was an engineering workshop and is still full of some very scary lathes and drills powered from overhead belt drives.  Along the way (our Franglais conversation stuttered here) it included a brewery, button factory and a few other ventures to boot.  So no one can say we aren’t sampling the French night life.

Moselle at Charmes

I get no kick from champagne

Not strictly true, a bit of artistic license as actual champagne has been in short supply here, but we are having a good time learning about it and seeing it growing on trees (well, vines).  We liked Epernay, and the weather was good so we stayed a few days.  We arrived to learn that there was a ‘son et lumiere’ at one of the champagne houses, starting at 10 pm.  We managed to keep awake long enough to walk into town to see it and it was great, a very inventive fast moving champagne themed animation, with music,  projected onto the entire facade of the building.  It is difficult to describe but they really used the windows, columns, shutters etc to good effect – even the statue (prancing horse with rider) in front of the building was lit to fit the story, eg when the animation was about can-can nightclubs the horse was wearing fish-net stockings.  OK, perhaps you had to be there.

Trompe d'oeil in Epernay

We did the obligatory tour round a champagne house (Georges Cartier – never heard of it but never mind) and cellars, with tasting – and a taste was all you got, but it was nice fizz in a nice glass.  Of course we could have bought some to take away, but the good stuff is as expensive as it is at home, unlike other wines and beers.  It is amazing that all the ‘real’ champagne in the world is made in such a small area.  It is a complex and highly regulated business, eg the date for the beginning of the harvest is set by law, and varies with the season and weather etc.  At the moment they think it will be 20^th September.

We also went for a short bike ride/push around the nearest ‘grand cru’ champagne village, Cumieres.  It was a bit steep up into the vineyards, but worth it on a lovely sunny day.  The village was pretty with lots of tiny independent champagne houses (it seemed like every other house) who apparently make some of their own champagne and also sell grapes and juice to the bigger and well known houses.  We didn’t see any for sale though.

Some of the 15,000 independent producers of champagne

We moved on from Epernay and drove through some more champagne villages, and so did what we had planned to in May if it hadn’t been raining so hard.  As a last attempt to find some ‘artisan’ champagne, we made for a France Passion site near Troyes, which was supposed to be run by a champagne producer.  Hey ho – out of business we think, although the FP site is still there and very well appointed too.  Just as well, as about an hour after we pitched up, a convoy of 5 motorhomes hove into view and pitched beside us.  They turned out to be a very friendly bunch of German, Belgian and Dutch campers who were members of the NSU Wankel-Spider owners club (a small red sports car manufactured in the 1970s, if you are as confused as we were).  They were charming and we sat and had tea and cakes with them.  By the time we had finished a Danish family and a French couple had also arrived.  So much for a small quiet site!  None-the-less it was delightful, parked among the fruit trees on the edge of a small village.

Sheila and friend in Troyes

Now we are at Troyes Municipal Camp site, which is much better than it sounds.   Troyes has been a revelation, it is a very attractive town with lots of three storey half timbered houses painted in pastel colours, some lovingly restored, others seemingly about to fall down.  We have spent two half days wandering the streets and visiting various churches in various styles.  The cathedral was by far the best, to our way of thinking; while we were there they were playing a sung mass over the sound system which was really echo-y, in a good way, it was very atmospheric.  Claim to fame –Joan of Arc stayed there on her way to Reims.

Typical old street in Troyes

Tomorrow we are off again, in search of the source of the Moselle, which is somewhere around Epinal.  Plan A (to follow the Moselle to where it flows into the Rhine) is still on, stopping to walk, cycle and imbibe at regular intervals on the way.