Hotel des Arcades Reims

... were walking out with carts full of Cases of wine, not to mention all the cheese, fois gras, ham, mushrooms, and other french goodies that were up for grabs. We spent a piddly 5 hours drinking wine, and now have a much better "education" of French wine. But after a couple hours, food was definitely in order. Istead of opting for the 9 euro fois gras sandwich, we got the pate en croute, which we soon found out is not supposed to be eaten ...

... quick peeks of it over the rooftops as you approach, and there are great visas once you’re at the top. One thing we noticed was how skeletal it looked; the amount of arches and thin columns gave its towers a spindly appearance, or as spindly an appearance you can have when you’re talking about something made of tons of stone. According to my friend, it looked like it would be ...

... a breeze which allowed us to fully enjoy the city and its champagne!

We purchased a few post cards before leaving the tourists center and decided on a place for lunch. I was and am usually designated as the map person. I carry, read, and just generally know (or think I know) the best route to travel in. We had some time to kill before we had to board the bus for the outskirts of the city so we walked more of the pedestrian streets in the heart of the city ...

... back and had further entertainment when rushing into one of the service stations to find police with guns. We were told in French by a policeman that the service station was closed. I of course had no idea what he was telling me and must have wrinkled my eyes in confusion as it was quickly translated into English. It was only then did I spot the four people sitting on the floor handcuffed - I guess that was the reason why it was closed ...

This morning after breakfast we finished packing our bags and ordered a taxi. Our driver spoke not a word of English so in very poor French I told her we were going to pick up our rental car and showed her the address.

More than half an hour later was quite clear that we were lost. I translated the directions from the rental company to our driver and she did eventually get us there, after ...

-We drove through Reims on the way back to Maastricht and stopped at the Pommery estate for a tour of its cellars. It felt like we were spelunking in the underground cellars, which are more similar to mining caves, housing over 20 million bottles of champagne. It was even complete with riddling racks, though they don't use that technique anymore. After the tour, we had a tasting, which ended in purchasing four bottles that complete with the Pommery logo straws... weird french people.

... We cooled our heals at the train station and took the next connecting train on to Strasbourg. Reims had charm to it as it appears to go out of it's way not to be snobby because it is the business epicenter of Champagne country. It came across as a fairly low key town with a slow pace populated with a large middle class that has nothing to do directly with champagne. It was comfortable if not bubbly.

Local specialties tried: It's really all about the Champagne.

... of turkey.  We weren't able to find cranberries or sweet potatoes either.  One of my British friends was INSISTENT on having a dish made with marshmallows because it is "very American".  So I ended up making a fruit salad recipe of my Grandma's that included marshmallows to placate the Brits, and placated they were!  After some searching we finally found fresh pumpkin, baked it, mashed it with a fork, and mixed a variety of spices ...

... deem it necessary to go to a camp site for a shower. Don't worry we aren't completely disgusting; baby wipes are doing the job quite well. The drive was fairly uneventful, but we stopped to stretch our legs in Laon, a nice town on top of a big hill, and got lost coming back down. Other then that we arrived with out a problem. Reims is a nice place, but not all that exciting. We went on a champagne tasting tour at Tattingers ...