Artres to Sedan

A Ride in Two Halves

Today's journey was 147 kilometres long. Another chilly start saw us set out all rugged up once again. According to my fancy GPS watch it was 6.8 degrees Centigrade, but the lack of rider comfort was largely due to the high humidity. 

It seems that most of us saw the ride as being made up of two very clearly delineated halves. The  cool and very overcast morning took us through lush but ultimately not very interesting farming country, especially with the somewhat gloomy conditions. I don't want to say it was boring as we were riding largely on quiet back roads and there was such a greenness about the landscape that made one think that if it was warm and sunny we would probably have thought of the riding as quite glorious, if not overly endowed with magnificent views. And let's remember: any day on the bike is a good day!

The second half of today's ride was really quite marvellous. I'll come back to that in a moment. First, here are some photos from our lunch stop. As for yesterday, the midday break was in such a great spot that neither Di nor I could do without taking a few photos. Here's one of the magnificent fortified church adjacent to our lunch stop. Note the turret in both the middle of the facing wall but also on the far left of the building. Maybe the rationale in building a church thus fortified goes along the lines of God helps those who help themselves.

The little town where we had lunch is called Signy-le-Petit. Its central square was most attractive and Sam had set us up in the bandstand right in the middle ...

The photo that Di took of me munching on a sandwich will give you an idea of the temperatures still in play at this stage ...

As indicated by its name the town was quite small but there were a number of quite impressive buildings ...

... which I guess testify to the richness of the surrounding farmland. 

The Beauty of the Ardennes is Revealed

Up until lunch we had been gradually climbing, as you can see in this cross-section, where I've marked our lunch stop with a dot ...

Although the altitude gain wasn't significant, what it did mean was that we finally started to get some more expansive views in the second half. Di and I had decided to ride on our own today so that we didn't feel we needed to keep up with the gun riders, which worked out really well for this section of the journey as I was able to stop and photograph and shoot some of my very amateur videos while moving slowly.

As you can see from the graphic above the twenty kilometres or so of riding was through a plateau of mostly gently rolling hills. Right near our high point I waited for Di to roll past ...

Just a little further along I paused again to pan across the landscape ...

I was going to cut the front part off this next video which I took while moving slightly uphill, but decided to leave it as it is because you can hear me puffing as I hold on with one hand and I think it gives a slight sense of the  gently undulating nature of the terrain at this point ...

Route des Églises Fortifiées ...

... or, the route of fortified churches is where we were riding for this section. In fact, the heavily fortified church in Signy-le-Petit where we had lunch marked the start of this road through history. I paused at one of the little villages along the way to take a photo of one of numerous signs marking the route ...

Whereas the first part of today's ride was largely farmland with towns sparsely scattered along the way, in this section the villages and hamlets came more re

gularly and each had its own fortified church, mostly small in size but still a stronghold against bands of marauders who would have been roaming the landscape in unsettled times. Here are a couple more  examples ...

Garmin Glitches and Losing Ground!

A great thing about using a GPS unit with pre-loaded courses is that it gives one independence. Each of us is carrying a Garmin which means that we can generally follow a route without having to be led all the time. Unfortunately, just before we entered the city of Charleville-Mézières not far from our destination of Sedan Di's Garmin died, which meant weren't able to cross-check the route through the city and missed a crucial turn. 

As this map shows, the city is a little complicated with a myriad of meandering waterways ...

While my unit was still working it had momentarily frozen when we stopped to work out where we'd gone wrong. Still being a bit of a Garmin rookie, I forgot that if you tap the unit it will relocate one's position. We spent about 20 minutes going around in circles before finally getting some directions that got us going the right way, but then only after another small detour. Our helpful local spoke quite quickly and I hadn't done due diligence and double check what she was saying. Another lesson learned: our French is improving but at certain times we need to be careful we get the info we want!

 Finally back on track we rode the rest of the way at a nice leisurely pace we stopped once more so I could take this snap of a more modern faux-fortified building in a small hamlet ...

In Sedan

When conceiving our route, Sam and Dylan had originally planned to spend this night in Charleville-Mézières as it is the capital of the region and has a number of interesting aspects, including being the home of the famous and influential poet Rimbaud and a centre for puppetry. For various reasons they decided to bring us to Sedan for the night and we were all glad they did. Sedan was founded in the early 15th Century and, reputedly is home to the largest castle in Europe, which now contains the hotel where we are spending the night. Here's a photo Di took which gives a bit of an idea of the place ...

... and another of our able soigneur Richie ministering to one of the bikes ...

(Unfortunately, massage is not within his scope of duties:

that will have to wait another two days when we have our first rest day in Troyes!)

Featuring Faces

After the delightful day's riding we gathered in the bar for pre-dinner drinks. When I saw the great dress that Jo was wearing I had to get Di to take a photo with her man José ...

Jo and José herald from Sydney and have been heavily involved in triathlon and ironman, respectively. Great riders and great company.

Where are we exactly?

Here is a graphic showing the route we covered today, traversing country near the Belgique border ...

The area also hold some special significance for me personally. As a small child (some say I am still that ...) I lived only about 20 kilometres from Sedan, across the border in Florenville. Here is another map showing how close it is ...

There were many reasons why Dianne and I wanted to join this wonderful tour, and this connection provided me with yet another. If you want to know more, buy me a beer sometime! And with that invitation to a future rendezvous I bid you Adieu!