3 legs to home

The trip home started by waking to the sun brightly highlighting the interesting rooftops of the building opposite the windows.

Down below yet another young couple were moving slowly up the road being pursed by a photographer and duly captured from all angles (mostly with the tower in the background). It must be a thing as it's been spotted many times over the last 2 days. Yesterday one of them was wearing a lovely white lacy wedding gown which was doing a fabulous job of sweeping the street clean as she swished along turning the dress into a lovely dual white upper/grey lower colour combo. 

In the apartment opposite one of the young kids was being preschooled by either his mum or nanny. He'll go far one reckons which is not the observation, what is is that that it appears the locals are willing to give up their privacy I.l.o natural light filling thier home.

Non-blogger went to get breky from the same Cafe as yesterday, which we consumed in the room as the final packup was performed. A quick walk up the street to the dog shop (nothing for him though as costs were prohibitive) and then into a taxi to start the long arduous journey back to other side of the planet. We got up to 135kmph on the way to the AP which was impressive and as the bright blue sky slowly became covered in contrails from the never ending plethora of jets plying the skies. 

We got to CDG AP which was ultimately confusing in it's layout including a line of peeps being pulled aside at xray as we all had new replacement knees and curved travellators and headed off to Istanbul. 4 hour stopover there and then an 8hr hell flight being right next to the food service area and thus kept awake for the entire trip due to the ensuing noise. Not even good quality ear plugs could block that racket. 7 hour stopover in Bangkok passed by as one would expect. Starting to feel quite weary. At least with all this available time the blog can be completed.

Seen some big airports this trip. Bangkok still amazes, so many people and the never ending shops, all selling the same stuff over and over. And they seem to make sure everyone passes by them by ensuring the departing planes are at the end of the terminals. Definitely part of the business model. One bit of culture in the whole place was a dragon.

Next and last leg home was relatively smooth sailing, landing early morning to finally have a hiccup. Stuck on the tarmac at Tullamarine due to a passenger medical emergency.  Border Security gets on the plane on the tarmac - maybe we're all infected?. Anyway, welcome to Melbourne AP. As we don't have enough terminals we had to be ferried in by bus. So the bags beat us in and then a security glitch caused huge delays at customs. OS2 and her brother picked us up and home we are.

And thus endeth the 26 European adventure. Credits to the players N&S and J&S for their organization skills and wonderfull company. OS1, SIL & OS2 for looking after their brother and to the pooch himself for keeping his commentary to himself this time as he does tend to ramble on a bit when given license to do so.

From the bowels to the peak

 One reason for lack of sleep was knowing that the early morning was last chance to catch an iconic slowtv, so was constantly alert for the alarm and thus every other noise emanating from the street below. The early morning city streets are a buzz with street sweeping, garbage collection, motor bikes etc. making up just some of the cacophony. Managed to get to the tower before sunrise and captured it slowly geting  brighter.

Probably ruined a few others shots by standing in prime position for about an hour. Extraordinarily one dude walked right over the camera at one point. When pointed out what he had done he said "I know". Who ever said the French were arrogant....anyway this guy then spent the next 30 mins combing the field for goodness knows what. And searching surrounding bushes. Maybe it was for escargot, don't know.

On the way back to the room the street had become even more alive with parents all escorting their kids to school. Heaps of pushbikes with two seats on the back carrying them. Chaos everywhere. One signifant difference between our two lifestyles is aussie schools have sports grounds. Nothing like that here (at least in the inner cities).

After a catchup rest we headed out for the day with the aim of reaching Monte Marte. Breaking fast in a cafe next to the hotel with coffee and a pistachio muffin. Was good. Diversion along the way to get to the site where SIL got down on one knee for Offspring no.1. Found it but couldn't replicate it as the knees no longer work that way. Possibly caused some damage as well and onlookers suspecting some sort of defecation was taking place.

Walked past Notre Dame on the way and was very pleased we had no need to look inside as the queue looked about 2 hours long. Been there, done that. Suckers. Needed to pay 15Euros for two coffees to cover two pees though.

Back into the bowels off the joint, picked a station close by the mont and after the standard change of lines somewhere obscure got off at the "wrong" station but very insightful as it was full of vervacious locals of a specific coloration of skin. All extremely wound up.

Trying to sell hair brading by showing A4 laminated sheets of all the possible styles as the passengers rode up the escalator. Then outside trying to push peanuts (of all things). Slyly selling earbuds. Guys strung up along the street leaning on the posts as if that square 2 meters was their territory. Totally a different vibe. Suspect it was on the verge of one of those areas people are told to avoid. Then went up a street, got near the greenery of the monastery gardens and they all disappeared as the charm of the old villiage took over. This is the mont, renowned for bohemian lifestyles as a contrast to the city below. And it has an imposing basilica on the top of the hill.

Grabbed a quick bite (lemon crepe) and coke on the pretext for another loo stop and then joined the walking tour. This was very insightful for not only understanding what happened in these parts but also how modern Americans think and behave. Say no more on that one. Picasso was an impressionist - never made that connection before but this is where he and the others hung out to get inspired by breaking the rules of not just the art establishment but also societal norms in order to do so. Inspired they were.

Moulon Rouge, Can Can dancing, the night life, hedonistic stuff they did it all to get that edge, that "je ne sais quoi" in order to make them stand out and make money. Of course they became famous and their outputs valuable once they were dead. So we saw their houses, their nightclubs and restaurants etc.

Also saw public drinking water fountains, statues of decapitated priests who managed to walk around carrying their heads, bronze busts of famous Italian singers and a guy that could walk though walls (no.no. .not where the door is...). Up the top of the cobblestoned streets the place was totally chaotic with the tourist throngs swarming everywhere. 

The tour stopped at the church where our passionate guide revealed her true religious colours. Didn't go in but our guide was a practicing paritioner. Got a good lecture on the relgion  because non-blogger had asked why the priests in there had prayed non-stop for the last 200 years. Not sure if the Americans took in about what practicing virtues (like justice) of the good book actually means when it comes to human behavior. Basically it was a slap down if they did understand it.

Another interesting insight was the guy strung up by the Romans had a crown of thorns and that was procured by one of the French Loueys during the crusades and is now down in Notre Dame where they bring it out every Friday morning to gawk at. Who'dathunkit? It's amazing what you can learn when you actually listen. Immediate thought was maybe they should check it for some left over DNA. Could discover that God particle the scientists keep banging on about.

After the rest of the tour group departed we were escorted back through the milling throngs and onto a lovely balcony for a private wine and cheese tasting (because we'd paid for it). 

This was a lot of fun where the dude telling us about the wines was having a full glass each time himself. Took us through the whole smell test rigmorale. "What can you smell?" He asked "cigarettes" was the reply. His raised eyebrow was answered by pointing at the dude just upwind behind us which was chain smoking like a steam train using wet coal. Our host also left the bottles on the table so we could've consumed as much as wed've liked, considering the last couple of weeks though interest in that sort of behavior was pretty low. Did learn about line though. Above it and they're all single grape varieties and below it, they blend. The line stretches right across the country at about the latttitude of Lyon. But it's not called the Lyon Line. I think. It was all getting a bit blurry and lost in translation about that point. 

Finding the nearest Metro involved a lot of down hills on cobblestones and it was a out thst point one of the new knees started to play up so it got a bit slow from there. The metro station was down a significantly long/deep spiraling staircase. Round and round, down and down. An engineering marvel..We made our way to a recommended shopping strip which turned out to be full of the high end establishments (the Melbourne end of Rue des Francs Bougoise). Had to have yet another drinks stop at a Cafe in order to wee. A pleasant break while blogger blogged and non-blogger shopped.

Took the long way back home in order to wander through the expensive island and caught the locals lounging around on a bridge enjoying the warm setting sun and the view of the river dividing between the two islands.

No one seemed concerned about the possibility of a bottle or glass being knocked into the waters below. Wouldn't happen in the Nanny State that's for sure. A hike to get back on the metro, two trains and home. Last night in France what else does one do but have Greek for dinner. It was just around the corner, and was a good variety to suit everyone. And so back to the room with the tower sparkling away up the street (just need to open the windows and defy death leaning over the railing to see it) the windows needed to be closed as the street is still extremely noisy.

Now we have a function going on in the restaurant below (they're all extremely well dressed) and there always seems to be a garbage truck growling its way along. At least they do spend a lot of resources trying to keep the city clean.

And so to Paris

Thanks to S's fabulous organization skills the troupe stuck together for the first leg our different journeys home. Thus the get up, eat up, prepare lunch (using non-blogger sourced bagels and leftovers) pack up and clean up was a well choreographed arrangement with everyone ready to exit the apartment on schedule.

Bags ferried down the four stories via the worlds smallest elevator (room for either two suitcases or 4 replacement knees, claustrophobic conditions automatically included) and off to the tram stop again to perform the well tested notion of not paying for the short trip to the train station. 

Whilst we were waiting it was interesting to see a large contingent of cops with a sniffer dog checking out all the arrivals. No indication of what they were looking for.

We managed to get the luggage in the proper place early on the train (so there was no nursing this time) and we shot through exactly the same type of countryside as the other areas of France. It's all very seemingly consistent throughout the land. Crossed a significant slice of it again at very high speeds.

Once disembarking at Garde de est we all said our farewells, au viors and ooo roo's in the  main concourse as S&N headed home to Bucks via the Chunnel to be home by dinner time to resume their normal lives, whilst J&S to Stains to spend time with family for a few weeks. Bucks is picturesque whereas Stains lives up to its name apparently. 

Blogger and non-blogger turned left and ploughed into extensive underground labyrinth known as the Metro. Had issues with the ticket machine accepting credit cards and in the end inserted cash, much to the relief of the huge queue building up behind us. Then the fun really began, down stairs, lugging the luggage, many stairs, a few concourses and then many more stairs. Really felt like we'd passed through the earth's crust and was running into the molten bit. More stairs. More lugging. Lots of looking at the maps on the walls as well.

Deep imbedded memories came into play. It also helped that non-blogger remembered the obsure name of our destination, so with a two trip, crowded carriages we arrived at the La Tour Marbourg and a short escalator ride up popped out at a very pleasant little park with a wecoming bench in which we sat, caught or collective breaths,  had our previously prepared lunches, used our devices to determine where to do the lugging to next. The hotel was about 5mins lugging the luggage away and we were very happy that when you lean precariously out the window and look left there is clear view of a very impressive steel structure that looks like it was modelled on the Arts Centre spire in Melbourne. Slightly bigger, but I guess you can only improve on the original when giving it a second go.

After an hour or so kip/rejuvenation (not reslly a siesta, but as effective) we headed out to what has changed in the town over the last 17 years.

Wandered up to the river, which was going off with cruise boats plying the waters, local kids screaming and yelling in delight as they practiced their soccer skills,  tourists throngs strolling along the banks with everyone seemingly enjoying the balmy afternoon sunshine.

When we finally got to the tower was disappointed they've secured the entire base of it and must pay to walk underneath it. Not sure if this was based on security or extracting more from the visitors pockets. The second reason is definitely an outcome. Still there are numerous locals selling models of the structure, now they have flashing lights in them. Woo hoo. After sussing out possible slow tv capture points we walked away in the direction of base. 

Stopped for a refresher on a pavement café where we went through the non-blogger service top up scenario again and then back to a joint very close to home to have dinner on yet another footpath. Whilst blogger dashed back to the supermarket and the room to set up the sunset capture from out the window on the jury rigged tripod.

Sitting and watching the world go by was fascinating. The street we are on is a narrow thoroughfare and has a constant stream of peeps going about their business. They kept do so well into the small hours, so whilst the room is well appointed, it still has no sheets, is overly warm and can't control the aircon. Sure can't open the shutters due to the incessant sounds from the street below. So a disturbed night's sleep  but really not a problem as there is no stress involved. After all, we are on holidays. And in the heart of one of the 3 big metropolis in the world.

More Champagne anyone?

Our last full day together saw the troupe up and at 'em early and as the town slept in on their sabbatical day, we were scamming the tram system by not touching on for the two stops required to get to the train station. No trains for us today but this was where the tour pick up was, so we hung around coughing and sputtering hoping the other people who were obviously waiting as well wouldn't mind when we were enjoying the same enclosed space of the bus. As it turns out we had our own sleek black vehicle so we only really annoyed the driver.

Very quickly out of town we started being surrounded by fields of vines and we actually stopped by the side of the road for a while for a look and chat about the growing side of the process. It was very pleasant and interesting given blogger and non-blogger's past experience in this field (well, obviously not this exact field as that would be really silly, but the fields of yonder years....never mind...)

Back breaking stuff for the farmer's  here as they keep the vines low to absorb the heat off the ground. And they all must be carefully hand picked and gently treated until the very careful pressing which happens as close to the plot. Back in the nearby village in other words. That's where we headed.

Into one of the many local establishments, based on a small area of Village land where they do all the pressing, ship some off to the larger houses and keep the best for their own production. Vats and casks and bottles and cellars where they spend countless hours twerking the bottles (or something like that) and history and maps and more discussions about the finesse of making the product. E.g. more spin

The ensuing tasting was good even if before lunch. Bought a bottle for us to share over dinner and we moved to the next establishment which was a smaller operation in a well set up man cave. Thinking of putting in a cellar at home,  shouldn't be too hard.

On the way home we stopped by to catch the panoramic view of the various plots changing colour as the sun occasionally exposed itself behind the high clouds.

Back at base we had a few hours to ourselves so it was off on the hire bikes for this here blogger. Spent the time hopping from one to another in search of one that had a decent charge. Not sure how they charge them but it sure isn't done on a Sunday. It was tricky, at one point got to a lonely treadly that had charge but for some reason was erroring and wouldn't release from the stand. Seemingly a common theme. All power had been consumed to get to this outpost . Stranded. All alone. A long way from home. Choice time as the location was next to the planetarium ( which was of no consequence and therefore not really relevant to the story but does add some colour to the post and is therefore included .... words are, after all , cheap) and the end of the tram line which could've been an easy out and fast way home. Naah, no fun in that...so putting the new knees to good use, set off on foot to the nearest station in which the app alluded to having a few options available.

A long uninteresting walk ensued, through the dreary suburbs of a major French metropolis on a cloudy dull Sunday afternoon with very few locsls moving about. Nothing interesting to describe this leg of this adventure except that nothing much happened. Luckily it was all possible due to working devices with coverage and appropriate subscriptions and therefore comforting that what was being attempted was possible. Scott of the Antarctic, Bourke and Wills would've loved such an easy challenge. Blogger without an ebike was put to the test...eventually a rack of blue beasts came into view and one with 30% charge was unlockable. So away we went. Back down to the canal and along a bit until it seemed pointless in trying to find a place to cross (was never going to ask anyone again), so back to the known bridge and around the town and bit to suss out what all these peeps do on their Sunday arvos considering most things are closed. A few of them noticed the gopro on the hat and gave cheery waves. That's nice.

It was also nice that the sun decided to poke it's head through the clouds just as the final bike docking occurred. Luckily the SanSebastion experience made sure it had registered the end of trip because it hadn't. Save a whole lotta pain there.

So sometimes these posts can be interesting, other times not. That was one of those.

The troupe was extremely well prepared for all the eateries being closed and J&S put on a fabulous (if not - spectacular) array of dishes of which we all heartily consumed and enjoying the finsl overall debrief, summarisation and subsequent review. Many members of the troupe had gleaned a significant insight into the whole champagne thing  (and it is, without doubt,  a Thing) whilst one heathen still can't tell the difference from a bouquet perspective but sure can now from the spin angle. From bucket to bouquet  - who'd a thunkit.

Riems downunder

The truope had the morning to themselves and thus we split up and went out on the town in various configurations, some wandering the streets, some wandering the shops. Your intrepid blogger headed downhill with the vague hope of finding something worth capturing video wise. Got to the canal which is very much a working part of the town. It'll be quite nice city side once all the works are done, today though it wasn't. The far side was lush,  green with paths and trees and looked very inviting. Just couldn't see how to get there. Spotting a dude across the water I yelled out "Comment puis-je aller de l'autre côté du canal?". He looked one way along the water, then looked the along the other way, down at his feet and the back at me and yelled back "Tu es de l'autre côté du canal". Smart arse.  Continuing along eventually found a bridge, got across, got picturesque and headed towards some moored barges that were coming into view. A huge privately owned industrial barge lumbered by, seemingly ridiculously oversized for the waterway.

The barges whilst interesting were not visually inspiring so instead fell to the next plan of seeing how hireable the town bikes were, whilst inocculously sitting on a bench under the high tree canopy as the fit locals jogged by and the ladies dragon boat team thumped along the canal.

Success with credit card and drivers license so wandered back over another bridge, around the old basilica and finding a bike started getting around town at a greater pace. Very rattley over the cobblestones. Good fun though. Low powered ebikes. Not sure how they charge them as there are a few flat ones that are thetefore not available.

Once the crew were back together we all headed up around the cathedral to hop on another minitouristbus over the other side of town to the Pommery Champagne house. This is a very large, theme park type set up enabling the owners to fleece money from their visitors in a variety of ways. It was all very interesting. We did the self guided tour of the caves which have a long history where the Romans originally dug deep pits for limestone and chalk. Madam Pommery came along many centuries later and after disposing of her husband created a high class Champagne manufacturing empire that catered to the well to do of society by supporting the arts. And getting them pissed at the same time of course. She did all this by using and extensively expanding the pits into a network of cellars in which the wine was fermented in ideal stable temperatures. History 101 in Riems...there's probably more that happened (like the royalty being crowned in the cathedral etc., a war or six), but they're not so interesting as how this toffey wiley widow effectly transformed the industry into the highfalutin money spinner that it is today. The crockery in the museum dedicated to her was real crockery! All laid out on a table just as it would've been ( by her servants) all those years ago. Extraordinary stuff. 

The caves were very cool. From a few perspectives. Temperature. Lots of bottles in storage (aging away as they do). Subtle lighting. Old pulley systems used to move the product around rusting away overhead. Some very interesting art exhibitions, some interactive in the tunnels, some mind-blowing in how they made use of the huge cavernous pits. We all agreed that doing the self serve tour - exploration at whim was far better that traipsing around in a group listening to a know all explaining the process of making champagne...again. 

After the tour we were treated to a glass of their base model product that we all agreed was ok, possibly good and thus spent a lot of time applying our new founded knowledge on analyzing the qualities of the beverage and comparing to others recently experienced. Connoisseur is a French word.

Leaving the glamours locals to thier glamourous methodolgies of swilling the glamorous product in the most salubrious surrounds of the gardens created by the the genius of Madam Pomery, we headed out of the grounds, past the pumpkin head farmers statues and the big gumboots, back into the word of reality in search of the next "house" . Had to wait 30 mins for the next free bus to arrive but it did on time and easily rattled our way to the other side of town to the Charles De Cazanove house, which was high on the house priority list as you can sometimes get this in Coles back home.

This was a good wrap up self tour day where we were lounging around in the carpeted corner of the house central carpark and shared a bottle of their lower bracket offerings. We were all wishing  the guy serving thee stuff had not've stood there for about 15 minutes rambling on about the methodologies, the bad weather this year, lower yields, higher sugar levels, his second cousins bunions issue...luckily he eventually left allowing us to critique the stuff on our own. Very pleasant in the warm fading sun of a Riems autumn afternoon.

The troupes next move was to catch the tram out the front of the joint , back to the centre of town and thus home base around the corner and let those who needed a kip to do so whilst N & the blogger went in search of a restaurant booking and maybe sneak in a quick bevvy beside a busy square full of french people enjoying thier locale (consuming goods whilst sitting alfresco style in the space where once the Romans did exactly the same thing under the name of Forum.

Job done, we went and collected the team and back for dinner at an Italian theamed place mostly just so blogger could get his hit of seafood risotto.

Later on  N&S and your blogger went outside and around the corner to the cathedral in order to view the laser lights lightshow projected on it. After a seriously long technical glitch which saw bloggers arms just about drop off trying to hold a tripod against a wall overhead,  eventually the show got underway and was well worth the wait. 

Eventually got to bed. Magnifique effort on behalf of the tour organizers and yet there's more to come...

Into the Heart of Champagne

 It was nice to have our own space in which to construct our own breaky. Although less options than any restaurant buffet it was certainly more comfortable than having to elbow German tourists out if the way to get to the the granola. Let alone the Americans who can't use coffee machines properly. Instead this was all nicely civilised with the six protagonists weaving a merry dance around the space as we all did our own thing in order to exit the premis in the pre-ordained time. This blogger had a bad start with breaking the tripod and jamming the bedrooms sink. (Forgot to include them in the previous plumbing count but there are quite a few of these as well). That combined with the chesty cough that is not going away but slowly spreading throughout the team made it all a bit harder to be in the groove. Nevertheless we all got out the door in time and headed up to the nearby tram stop where J&S deftly navigated the ticket machine to enable us to quickly get up to the train sration we had seemingly just left yesterday (about lunchtime). Combined we all spent a fair amount of euros on tickets thst were never checked ( however that's not the point) in order to spend 30 mins on a local train over to Eperney. Never heard of it before. Many had though as this is the heart of the Champagne region (which is why we came here in the first place so S&N could show us around). 

A very picturesque ride through extensive platations of grape vines was a nice entrance to the town. They have a famous road called the Avenue of Champagne. It's called so because all the big names have their operations based here. It's very fancy and reaks of wealth. These people take this stuff very seriously. The reason is not so for pleasantness that the product bestows on the consumers, it all about how much of their hard earned can be extracted from them in the process. This is where the spin comes in and thus revenues are significantly enhanced when one feels a sense of achievement when simply being able to purchace such a quality product..

The Avenue has all the big names (e.g. Moet & Chandon) with their large admin buildings fronting the factories behind as well as store fronts, attached to salubrious restaurants and tasting areas. These are all discreetly called  Champagne Houses. They've been there for ages and create an extremely popular tourist attraction by doing so. Didn't know about but can tick it off anyway. After N had cleverly sniffed out a free tasting in the tourist info centre we wandered aimlessly up the Avenue looking for something. Anything. Took lots of pics of grand old buildings that were looking immaculate in their finery. Eventually decided to see what all the fuss was about and ducked into a courtyard and demolished a bottle of Collard Picard in very elegant style whilst non-blogger was threatening a young couples dog by describing it as delicious. 

We then had a few hours to fill as the only tour of a house we could get was later on in the day so we wandered aimlessly towards the other side of town in the general direction of that event and found an establishment which could water and feed us for while which was quite pleasant. Heading off away from the pristine surrounds of the Avenue the place started to look very run down, onwards we trudged through the streets of run down buildings  cracked pavements and schools with very high security screens around them.

We'd almost given up hope and were wondering if the six of were going to be the focus of one of those shows on the TV where the audience is saying "well they made bad choices and deserved all they got", but no, into view came a salubrious establishment in which we spent quality time hearing all about the industry through the eyes of this house.

Got the spiel about how it's made, the rules, the aromas, the regional villages and how they're ranked in quality, lots of insight as to why we should fork out so much dosh on a single bottle of the stuff. We hen had a tasting session of thier quality products which was nice.

Blogger is a heathen , couldn't really tell the difference and therefore decide on his favorite. Guess we'll just  have to take our guides advice and keep on tasting different varieties.

After that the timimg was pretty good, so wandered with direction this time back down to the train station and whipped back to Riems in  a carriage that was seemingly full of people coughing and nose blowing.

Back in Riems,  we strolled though the town soaking up the feeling of thr joint as the locals started to settle into thier Friday evening. Lots people out making the most of the pleasant evening. Seemingly not caring that the half moon was the wrong way around. 

Ended up having dinner in the same place as last night as it's close to home. Everyone went to bed early except the lone blogger, labouriusly tapping away on his device...

And so to Riems

Two intros to this post. Skip to intro two to avoid the long winded one..

Ok bloggers this may be a quick teaser or it may end up being the final polished post... actually thinking about that and the way all off this falls together over periods of availability and capability it is definitely a work in progress, constantly updated and refined, so what you consume now may be totally different from the final product and thus therefore indeed is the legal get out clause that whatever you read in this ongoing saga is not necessarily accurate, most possibly incorrect and should not on any level be taken as factual. In a legal sense. 

That's the fineprint as far as commercial legalities of this whole tome goes. Just to summarize... not one word can be taken as truth.

Whew.. glad to get that legal eagle crapition out of the way so I can get onto our adventures. 

It was a big day. 6 musketeers heading across the dry barren desert landscape that precedes the train station. Took all of 30 seconds. No time for wailing trumpets setting the scene for an honest showdown, guns blazing as they dived and rolled into the concrete sanctuary of the station.  Nup pretty boring  just wheeled the lugage into the station and then onto the train.

Intro two:

All went very smoothly.

Up early for the transit we trundled out of the hotel and across the road and into the train station. It was all extremely close and thus too easy. The French train network runs extremely smoothly and extremely fast e.g. ears popping as we went into tunnels. The landscape was consistent all the way across the country, we covered about half of it in the course of a couple of hours. Crops drying out at the end of the season and many brown fields having been prepared for the next crop. 

3 separate trains and we arrived in Riems, trundled our way through a very elegant townscape to arrive at the appartment door and eventually got in. It's very modern in an old building. On the 3rd floor. Has 2 living rooms, three bedrooms, 2 toilets and 4 showers. Not quite sure why. Suspect plumbing  contrstraints may have influenced the design. 

The location is amazing,  literally around the corner is the heart of the town, with the cathedral domination of the area pretty much complete.

Had a lite lunch of bagelely stuff and the troupe split. Some to rest whilst your blogger and N had a wander around the cathedral which is significantly impressive. One of the best given how far up they went. Eventually ended up having a couple of quiet beverages siting on stools watching the locals in their environment. No tourists evident so it made a nice change to actually consume the genuine ambiance.

This town is very well groomed as are the people. We had kids coming home from school, tradies dropping by for a quick one before heading home, people of all types, ages and abilities riding bikes, scooters, roller blades etc. along the smooth street which was shared with consistent  electric busses and the varieties of all sorts of other vehicles. Very interesting and pleasant soaking it all up whilst solving the world's problems.

Together again for dinner at a great pub/restaurant across the road which the owner was a very sharp comedian who could and does cater for all races.

A defrief around the kitchen table by the 6 troupadours before a nightcap in lounge led to rediculous intro to this post. You get that sometimes.

Much ado about nothing much

 A planned late start was derailed somewhat by the previous days debrief and took sometime to get up to speed as the days activities unfolded.  The weather turned this morning in a very Melbournesque way. With a couple of rain fronts drifting up from down south, being pushed by a cool change from the north. Same patterns, just here the directions are upside down. As is the half moon. Pretty sure this is why they drive on the wrong side of the road as well.

The Troupe trouped over to the UnTiers bus and was duly transported into the olde part of town, this time to explore the covered markets which are normally the life blood of the town.

Not so sure in this case as they seem to be more focused on selling immediately consumable products than (say) stocking a restaurant to meet it's daily activities. I.e. one fruit and vegi stand does not feed a city, whereas 5 outlets selling beers and other drinks will keep the diehards happily inebriated at 11 am. We had a very slow coffee whilst the worst of the weather ran itself away outside.

Emerging into the relatively quiet streets we  did some yet more aimless wandering. Sort of  drifted up to a museum to see if that could fill in some time but no, it was shut until later on.

Admired the ancient anti-semntic gargoyles on the church whilst not fully understanding what the sculpturer was thinking at the time. So many shops fronts were perused, some visited most were actually closed..eventually ended up sitting under umbrellas in a tourist courtyard to slowly consume a drink whilst waiting for the 2pm wine tasting to commence. 

This was fun, it was in very clean modern room next to the olde building where the wine is produced by 4th generation family. Apparently the only one in the actual town. A great spiel by a young lass who was very engaging. Found out about winestone (yes it's a thing) and about new wine which is recently produced, not bottled and is only freshly available for a short time after the harvest. Festival this weekend, so we were lucky to get a taste yesterday.

After that we did yet more aimless wandering, sort of trying to figure out where to eat dinner that night. The hours ticked by. Stork nests on churches is a thing too. Pretty much now fully familiar of the town and the layout now as we kept walking past the same places yet coming in from different directions. Eventually we ended back in the same place as the first night here as we new the food was that good. Repeat. Repeat.

Once again walked the couple of kms back to the  hotel for a very brief nightcap before winding up for the day. Didn't do a whole lot but pretty exhausted from it all. Tomorrow we're on  the move again..