Excellent riding today from Chartres to Autun today - lots of fantastic rural roads, and the last stretch through the Morvan National Park, which is really beautiful. Too bad it rained at the end, and some nutter had to come past us in some down hill bends into a blind right hander... We overtook him in the queue of traffic about a mile further up the road and didn't see him again!
We seemed to make slow progress today, it was about 200 miles, but took nearly 7 hours including all the food/wee/fag/routing stops, so that was about 30 mph. Good job we did 90 in a couple of places, or it would have been even slower ;) ! No highways though.
The Excellent Patisserie!
We pulled up at a nice-looking restaurant for lunch about 1.30, just as the shutters came down! Lunch 12-1.30 only :-(. So we turned to the local boulangerie artisanal with attached patisserie... Yummy feuillete roquefort and viande (like a square filled croissant (actually a carré?!)), a chocolate eclair for Jim and an excellent walnut and almond tart for me. Just the ticket.
More winding roads, the aforementioned rain and dodgy drivers, until we get to Autun, originally a Roman town. We're staying at the Chambres d'hote d'Autun, which turns out to be a B&B in a house about 1/2 mile out of town. Phillipe is the owner/operator, and he's about to leave to pick up the kids from school, is it ok if he shows us the room and then buggers off for a bit to get them? Naturellement, pas problem, mate.
The room is simple, homespun, wood-panelled, but comfy and large. Wonderful. He makes us a cup of tea and tells us his life story - local boy, works in a cable factory 6km away, bought the house in '97 and gradually converted it to put 16 people up in various rooms, grandpere does the breakfasts, he's ridden his bicycle (yes push bike) across the Sahara a couple of times from Algiers to somewhere in Mali - 2200 km at about 200km/day, easy to plan when you've already driven the family the same route 5 times, daughter 7 likes chocolate milk and practises reading, son plays basketball and swims, only things to do in small towns are sport and religion!
We walk into town, 20 minutes down hill, Jimmy fretting about making it back, it's thinking about raining...
The Restaurant du Fontaine is rather rustic, so is the food, especially the apparently challenging pork with foie gras sauce - the patronne thinks I shouldn't have it, so I do. Very tasty.
As we leave and walk home for an early night which we deserve, I'm struck by the beauty of the cathedral and square in the streetlights and wet. Very atmospheric. The picture doesn't really do it justice!
p.s. Jimmy made it back, in fact it didn't even seem as far as it did going down!
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