Bourgogne, France

June 30 and July 5, 2001

Since we had plans to meet our friends Pierre, Ann, and Alexandre in EuroDisney, we decided to drive up and see the sights along the way. This meant that we would be driving through the region of France known as Bourgogne, or Burgundy to us Americans. Yes, the famous wine region. We left Saturday morning, June 30, which turned out to be the first Saturday of the school break, and the official start of summer vacation. You'd think we would have known that given Jeff just finished school the previous day himself. That meant everyone had the same idea as us and the drive up was torturous. Tons of traffic, accidents, and complete morons who couldn't figure out for the life of them how to pay the road toll at the toll booths. Sheesh. So it took a very long time to get up into the Bourgogne region, and it left time only for a stop in Beaune. We then had about another 2 hour drive to our hotel for the night in Joigny. On the remainder of the drive into EuroDisney Sunday morning we stopped in Fountainbleu. Once we finished our time at EuroDisney we started the drive back and spent a few days at Versailles. The rest of the return drive took us back through Bourgogne, with a stop in Auxerre, Chablis, and Noyers-sur-Serein. The pictures below will contain more of the stories !

Beaune

Beaune was the first stop, and is considered the center of the wine making region. The most famous place in Beaune is the Hôtel Dieu, which really isn't a hotel. It is a charity hospital founded in 1443, and it is an architectural wonder. It is a Flemish-Burgundian-Gothic building whose major claim to fame is the colored geometric patterned tiles that make up the roof. To really get a good look at the roofs you have to go inside on the tour. After all those hours in the car with the kids we really weren't up for that. But the photo below shows what you can see from the outside. Since this is Burgundy, the Hôtel Dieu also owns large acreage full of grapevines. From these grapes they make wine that is auctioned off every year during a fundraiser. Inside is also supposed to be some famous tapestries from the 15th century, but we didn't see those either. Beaune was also a walled city, and many of the ramparts are rumored to still be there. But we had a hard time finding any to look at. Beaune would be an excellent place to go wine tasting, though we never got a chance. But with all the Burgundy around you would have left town a happy person !

Here is a picture of those famous roofs.

   This picture is of Steve and Connor in front of the main entrance to the Hôtel Dieu.

   This is a view of the Burgundian vineyards on the outskirts of Beaune.

  Beaune had a merry-go-round in the city center and after that drive we just had to let Jeff and Connor have a little fun.

Joigny

The next stop on our drive was the town of Joigny, which is also where our hotel for the night was. We were a little anxious about this because it was very difficult getting a hotel room for the night. Steve, having left it too late, couldn't find anything in Beaune, Auxerre, Avalon, Chablis, you name it, it was fully booked. So why did this hotel in Joigny have a room ? What was wrong with it ? Then Steve couldn't find any information in any of the tour books about Joigny. After calling up to confirm the hotel room they were surprised to find out we had a second child, and the hotel said the rooms were small. Whatever, we had nowhere else to stay. So we entered the town of Joigny with a little trepidation. We could not have been more wrong. Joigny was a very nice little city with a beautiful river running through it, the Yonne. It had an old gothic style church and cathedral, many architectural styles were mixed in the city, with a Tudor building next to a Gothic church next to a modern stone building. And the Tudor style buildings were the nicest we've seen outside of England. No idea why the tour books didn't cover it. And the hotel was very nice, too, and the hotel room was plenty large. It was a very welcome sight after that long drive.

So we checked in and just hung around the hotel since it was getting pretty late. But the next morning we decided to tour around Joigny before we headed up the road to Versailles and EuroDisney. What a treat. We stopped at the old Gothic Church first, built in the 14th century, I believe. We then drove on over to the Gothic Cathedral, which I believe was built in 15th century. We were able to go into both and there were absolutely no other people around. We were charmed, and loved our time in Joigny. It is recommended.

This is a picture of the 14th century church and the very narrow streets.

Here is Patti, Jeff, and Connor in front of the same church. It was cool with gargoyles and all. You can see some of the Tudor style buildings to the right.

Here is the gothic cathedral with it's flying buttresses.

We couldn't mention fine Tudor buildings without a good picture !

Auxerre

We finished the drive up to EuroDisney, stopping in at Fountainbleu and Versailles, and then started driving back to Mandelieu. We had met our friend Larry in Versailles and he got the pleasure of driving back with us and listening to the kids the whole way, and me yelling at the kids to be quiet, and Patti yelling at me to stop yelling at the kids. You know, the "driving with kids on holiday" thing. So we decided to break up the monotony with several stops back in Bourgogne. Our first stop was Auxerre. Auxerre is famous for it's excellent soccer teams, spires, belfries, and steep-roofed houses, and the Cathédrale Saint Étienne. The cathédrale is, of course, Gothic and was built between the 13th and 16th centuries on the site of an earlier Romanesque cathedral and 3 even older churches. It includes a 68m tall bell tower built in 1550. Even more impressive was the stained glass, which dated back to the 13th century. The picture on the left is the front of the cathédrale, the second of all of us inside the cathédrale, and the third is of the famed stained glass windows.

Chablis

We next stopped in Chablis to get lunch and try some of the wine. Didn't take any pictures because there is not much in Chablis, though it is a very nice, clean, pleasant place to be. Just nothing to take a picture of. But we stopped, had lunch, drank wine, and moved on.

Noyers-sur-Serein

The final stop on the drive back was in Noyers-sur-Serein, a tiny medieval village with a wall around it, too. We stopped mostly to look for the walls surrounding the city, but curses, foiled again. We gave up and just toured around in the car. It is a very nice village, again with some outstanding Tudor style buildings, which I didn't think we would see in France. I guess good old King Henry VIII had a global influence. The first picture is what we think was the medieval wall with some 15th and 16th century buildings behind them. The river Serein is just on the left. Very pretty. The last picture is of the downtown area with another Tudor building. Cool.

Last Updated July 18, 2001 23:52 CET