Baccarat - not Burt (Bacharach)

Thursday 15th May

Time to stop lazing about and explore a little more of France. Moving on today to the far northeast corner of France - if we're not careful we'll fall over the border into Germany. The weather seems to be on the improve. The sun is out today and it's going to be low 20s. Maybe we can put the jumpers away!?!

This was the secondary school in Bains les Bains.
Named after Julie Victoire Daube - see previous  posts. 

A memorial to 58 Canadians killed in an aircrash
in the mountains nearby - 1950.

Only about 200k to travel today. I was hoping that Dora wasn't planning a route mostly on motorways, and no, she wasn't.  She had us travelling in almost a straight line north-east. Again we found the roads to be very good. In an area where they get a lot of rain and snow and icy conditions in winter, why are their roads in such good condition? Better materials? Better engineers? There seem to be a lot more trucks on even the minor roads and they aren't damaged like our roads. 

First stop along the way was an unplanned discovery. The route was taking us through a village called Baccarat and until I saw the signs for a Musee de Cristal, I didn't connect the dots. Yes, it's Baccarat crystal. They've been making it here in Baccarat since 1764, 260 years. They had a crystal bottle for a perfume called Christian Dior J'Adore Gold. I have Christian Dior J'Adore perfume, but not the gold one, and certainly not in a crystal bottle - just plain ordinary glass. I would have loved to buy a piece but a bit out of my budget and we have nowhere really special to display it. They had one really cute piece of Snoopy. Tempting! Only 2 race tyres! 😉 In no hurry, we had time for coffee and millfeuille sitting in the sun.

Unusual church spire in Baccarat.

These chandeliers were hanging in the entrance to the museum.

These were beautiful paper weights - handcrafted. 

A wall of crystal butterflies. 

Next stop was one of the villages in our beautiful villages book. It was just a few k off our planned route, and it was about lunchtime, so we took a detour. Nothing really special here. Saint-Quirin. It's claim to fame is the burial place of the remains of the tribune Quirinus who was tortured under emperor Hadrian in 132 ce. Useless facts for you. 

Different church style - baroque.

The organ in the baroque church - 1744.

The church where the remains of Quirinus are buried.

12th, 15th and 18th centuries.  

The story goes that they were taking the remains to Rome 

and they stopped overnight and in the morning couldn't move them, 

so they decided that here was where they'd stay. (More useless info)

We had lunch in Saint-Quirin before moving on to our next accommodation in a village called Gundershoffen. We have noticed that the villages in the last 30-40k are very different to those further south and west. A lot of single type homes rather than terrace types, with yards and set further back from the road. Also a very different style of house. And most of the houses and villages in the area are relatively new ie. postwar. It will be interesting to see more of this part of France - we're expecting some very German influences, and probably food also.