Day 31 - Reims to Chateau Thierry - Ride total 2,366 k, 15,956 m

Just as I am a non-drinker and have no problem with people who are - (in fact many of those drinking people are my very best friends and family) - so too I am a non-religous person and have no problem with people who are - whatever the religous belief they follow (in fact some of those religious people are my friends and family - but not as many as the drinkers I would venture to suggest i.e. without polling you all and even then I couldn't be sure of the results of the poll as you can never be sure when is the correct time to conduct a poll of drinkers. Anyhow, I digress and have strayed from my travel blog. Today I could have felt as if I were riding down a road straight out of the Bible. On one of tne side there were vast paddocks of wheat and on the other side vast Vineyards - (my disclaimer - "I do not claim to have read or know what is in the Bible". However from the limited bit of theology that I have picked up from being around some of my religous and drinking friends (yes some of drinking friends may also claim to be religous or after some drinks sound as if they know some religous type stuff). Anyhow, again I digress on to my friends and away from my travel blog. So, where I'm going with this? It sounds like, in some parts of the religous and Church going community there is a big deal made out of drinking wine and eating bread - (clearly 2,000 years ago when they began writing the book there wasn't the pressure on hosts to be "resposnible" as only offering bread doesn't seem like much and of course it is totally non-inclusive as we non-drinkers' are not catered for. Anyhow, again I digress. (yes, I belive they're is also some mention of fish being offered s well). So Bread and Wine both require first of all wheat for the flour and grapes for the wine and that is why I could have felt like I was riding along a biblical road. Now, if you put all of the above aside and consider that for probably for the last 2,000 km's I have on most days been beside a vineyard at some stage and probably beside a wheat field (other than riding over the Italian/Austrian Alps) then there is probably an explanation why at Epernay they say there are 200 million btotles of wine and I won't even try to estimate the volume of wheat/flour I have ridden past. Let's just say that both the viineyards and the wheat fields are on a scale that little old NZ simply does not even rate registering. Back on to the vineyards, they all lack any definite boundaries as in "no fencing" and appear to managed on a totally different system to the highly mechanised vineyards we see back home. The wheat fields are similar without fences and some are huge and at the same time right inside a village there will be a very small area of wheat being grown - again quite a different management system to our cropping farms. Tonight we are staying in Chateau Thierry which is about 100 km's ENE of Paris (tomorrow's ride) and we have a "Cottage" (Booking.com's description) - well the "Cottage" is a thrid floor attic apartment with one communal door serving the other four apartments and leading on to the commercial street below. How they get to call it a "Cottage" has us all wondering and as per usual more often than not our accommodation ends up on the top floor and while we all may be considered fit (after all we have just ridden 2,400 km's in 31 days) to then ask us to walk upstairs after a ride certainly gets the old ticker pumping. A random and nice and thing happened today in that two of us were parked up in a village waiting to regroup after a hill climb, when one of the locals saw us and offerred to fill up our water bottles - all with simple verbal and sign language as neither we, nor they could speak the others language yet we had a lovely interaction which ended with "Merci" from us and "Bon Voyage" from them. Everyone felt the same afterwards I am sure in that we met someone new, we interacted with them and we're all the better for doing so. These are the nice things I enjoy about our rides through foreign lands. My drinking friends might also enjoy the local tipple and my religious friends might also enjoy all the wonderful and very beautiful Cathedrals and Churches. While my drinking religious friends may get to enjoy all three.




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