The fat lady is about to sing....

Thursday 26th June

Sorry , no photos this time.

We are now in Kuala Lumpur and resting up for the final stage of the journey tomorrow. 

All went well dropping the car back in Paris on Tuesday. We spent Monday travelling from Fontainebleau to Paris via the Elephant Blu car wash where we spent a good hour cleaning and vacuuming the car (and touching up a little scratch or two). After finishing the car we headed to our final hotel for the last night in Paris and dropped off the luggage. I was dreading the run to the hotel as we had to pass from the south of Paris to the north, but the roads were all highways and not too congested. Then by a stroke of good luck we found that the car drop off point was on the approach road to the airport from where we were staying so that part was easy too. We had our final french meal at the hotel restaurant and the meal was very nice.

Our flight to Kuala Lumpur on Tuesday left Paris at noon and we landed in KL 6am Wednesday, where we were able to check in to our hotel (paying an early check-in fee) and get some much needed sleep. After 3 1/2 months using booking.com for all our accommodation, this is the first hotel where we have had problems - no breakfast organised, eftpos machine not working, aircon not working, mix-up with checkout date, room safe locked. But I guess on the plus side, this is a new hotel so the bed is new and all the bedding is new - lovely fluffy pillows and 2 each.

We spent the rest of yesterday and today just cruising the shops (haven't bought anything) and enjoying the malaysian food - vegies, yum! We leave here tomorrow morning at 6am for our 10.30am flight home. We are looking forward to catching up with family and friends on our return - but I am not looking forward to having to do the cooking and cleaning again. Anyone want to invite us for dinner? :)

One final Chateau

Sunday 22^nd June

Today was our last touring day in France. Tomorrow we clean the car and return it before heading to our airport hotel for the last night in France.   

We visited the Chateau de Fontainebleau which has been home to French royalty over time from as early as 1137. It has had several modifications in this time – each King felt he needed to do something to put his signature on it. A part of the chateau is a dedicated museum to Napoleon 1^st and his family whilst another section is a Chinese museum containing objets d’art collected by the Empress Eugenie. Again we see the immense display of wealth by the royals in France. It seemed to be a smaller version of Versailles with the extensive gardens although these were much simpler than Versailles. The ball room and the galleries of portraits and paintings were really spectacular and the period furniture in the rooms was lovely.  

 

A few different views of the Chateau. 

Just one of the portraits of  Napoleon on display throughout the palace.

The upper level of the Trinity Chapel.

The ground floor level of the Trinity Chapel.

The portrait gallery containing portraits of all the Napoleon family.

One room I was quite taken with was the boudoir of Marie Antoinette where they have recently had re-made the silk brocade that decorates the room. They were able to reproduce the colours from the period and it was really quite stunning. In other rooms we again saw fabulous tapestries and our audioguide frequently mentioned that the designs had been done in the 1600s by Gobelin, who still produce tapestries.

Just one of the enormous tapestries hanging in the palace,

An example of the silk brocade in the boudoir of Marie Antoinette.
It was everywhere - the walls, the bed coverings, the bed canopy,
 the chairs, cushions. Really lovely.

Dog of the day no 1 - in the hunting room.

Some of the decoration on the roof of the palace.

These were dog of the day no 2.
A fountain - close up below.

We spent a couple of hours there and then headed for our accommodation – via a laundromat which was found quite easily for a change. The laundry is now done for the last time before we get home we hope, and now all we have to do is squeeze everything in to the cases we have. Wish us luck!!

Vineyards and villages

Friday 20^th June

We have continued to head north and west towards Paris. Today our destination was the little village of Chardonnay where we had booked a B&B. As the morning progressed we moved out of the serious mountains and into more hilly areas of France. The roads again were excellent and not too much traffic. The scenery was different but still beautiful. I don’t think I have mentioned the red poppies before – in the early weeks in France we saw very few, but through Italy they were growing wild everywhere and now we are out of the mountains in France we are seeing them on the roadside again.

Our first stop was the town of Bourg-en-Bresse where we had lunch and a bit of a look around. It is wonderful to see the old buildings in the town – built without a spirit level I am sure. We didn’t do anything special here.

 

The cathedral at Bourg-en-Bresse had
some beautiful stained glass windows.

Crooked as a dogs hind leg but real character.

Dog of the day - Milly, we found your sister.

The clocktower in Bourg-en-Bresse.

More crooked buildings - but they have stood the test of time.

From Bourg-en-Bresse we continued towards Chardonnay. Finding we were going to be too early to check-in we took a detour through the wine growing area near Macon and looked at some of the old chateaux. This was a beautiful drive through the vineyards and forests and no traffic. We had another stop in the town of Cluny for a coffee and looked at the old cathedral there. From the outside the cathedral is pretty dark and gloomy but is surprisingly light inside. There is also an ancient abbey in the town but we didn’t have enough time to visit there.

 

An interesting sculpture on a roundabout we passed. 

One of the chateaux we passed on our tour of the wine country.

A fairly outstanding rock outcrop along the way.

Another of the chateaux.

The old church in Cluny.

Our B&B is in a tiny town with nothing else there so thankfully they did dinner. It is owned by an English couple and Nic is the chef. We enjoyed a very nice dinner there and had a lovely evening.

 

Our B&B in the town of Chardonnay.

Saturday 21^st June

Dogs of the day - the 2 golden retrievers at the B&B.

North west again and today’s destination is the town of Auxerre. More lovely roads and driving through the country with almost no traffic. Our first surprise for the day was only 30 minutes after setting out when we found the medieval village of Brancion. This truly is a medieval village and if you put people there in costume and the odd horse and cart, you’d swear we were back in the 1600s. It was a lovely walk around the village and the church seemed to be in almost original condition with the marble slabs on the floor where people were buried. I think they are slowly working on bringing the village up to ‘tourist’ standard though I’d hate to see it too commercialised. They have a program there where they are using prisoners close to release to work in the town doing restoration.  

A few photos of the medieval town of Brancion.

They are working on restoring the frescoes uncovered in the church.

The church in Brancion.

The castle at Brancion.

Following this we then stopped at the town of Autun for lunch and this town was also a surprise. We had seen nothing in any tour brochures about it but the town has quite a few sites to visit. We didn’t give the town the time we wished we could but we did visit the Cathedral, the roman amphitheatre, the roman walls, including the towers, which are still complete around most of the town, one of the old town gates, the town square, the military secondary school which was originally built in the 1600s as a seminary college, and the church and school where the Bonaparte kids went to school (Napolean for 4 months). For not spending much time there, we sure covered a bit of its history.

Another chateau along the way.

The church and school in Autun
where the Bonaparte children attended.

The military high school in Autun. Look at the tiles on the roof.
I think it was a graduation day, or family visiting day
 because there were a lot of kids in uniform
eating out with their families.

The old roman amphitheatre at Autun.

The cathedral spire in Autun.

One of the corner towers in the roman walls at Autun.

The roman walls at Autun.,
Hard to believe they are in such good condition considering the age.

 

One of the original roman town gates.

We hit the road again because it was still a fair distance to Auxerre. We did stop for afternoon tea in the town of Avallon where we found the tea rooms frequented by the over 70s in Avalon. A very nice afternoon tea so I can see why they go there.

The clocktower in Avallon.

Tonight we are staying with our old favourites, Premiere Classe. Just next to the hotel is a Chinese buffet restaurant so we had dinner there where we got our vegetables for the week. It was a really nice meal – as well as the usual entrees and dishes, you can fill a plate with raw ingredients and have them cook it with the sauce of your choice. We both had 2 dishes cooked for us and they were excellent.

Loving the mountain scenery

Thursday 19^th June

We woke this morning to mist and low cloud with some blue sky peeping through. It was cool but not cold. Another beautiful drive through the mountains – the scenery truly is spectacular and photos just don’t do it justice. The roads today have been really good (obviously we are in France, not Italy) and the traffic was fairly quiet.

 

This was the guard dog at our hotel last night.
A Pyrennean Mountain dog.

A beautiful chateau we passed on the drive this morning.

Just some of the scenery - it changed around every bend.

Our first stop for the day was Grenoble where we had lunch. Until this trip we both thought that Grenoble was in Switzerland. Not so, it is in France. It seemed to be quite a new city and as cities go was very quiet and did not have any of the frenzy surrounding some cities, especially Italian cities. How many cities can you drive in to the centre and get a parking meter one block from the centre? We were able to just park and have a wander around.

A few shots of Grenoble.

From Grenoble we headed on to Albertville where the winter Olympic games were once held. We weren’t too sure of the year but found it was 1992. The Olympic stadium is still there but is now a derelict building – the sign said they had plans to rejuvenate it for 2015 though there was no sign of that yet. We were standing at the site of the opening ceremony – the tower was still standing but the stadium is now parkland. The mountains surrounding Albertville were very impressive – there was a little snow remaining on some of the higher peaks and in the sheltered areas. I can only imagine what it would be like in winter – pretty stunning!

 

Another chateau on the drive to Albertville.

The Olympic stadium at Albertville.

A picture of the opening ceremony at Albertville in 1992.

The tower is still standing
but no signs of the stadium surrounding it.

Finally we travelled to Annecy which is our overnight stop. Again a magical drive along a valley between the mountains and finally along the shores of Lac D’Annecy which is that beautiful blue/green colour. As we drove from Albertville to Annecy a lot of the houses seemed to have a swiss flavour to them - all we needed was cowbells and we could have been back in Switzerland. The day has turned out to be quite warm and there were a lot of people enjoying the lake in Annecy – swimming, sunbathing, boating, walking and just generally relaxing. There were a few majestic white swans cruising the canal near the lake and turning bottoms up to feed from the bottom. A very pretty place to visit.

A chateau on Lac D'Annecy.

Strret shot in Annecy - not sure that the mountains
 have come out real well in the photo.

Dog of the day - out for a walk in my handbag.

Beautiful scenery surrounding Annecy.

Looking across the lake at Annecy.

A lovely building on the lakeshore.