Day 6: More Champagne...

Thanks to an Internet connection, we upgraded to TripAdvisor’s top choice in Epernay. Luckily we could check in early to the lovely small inn, which was the former home of the founder of Mercier Champagne, which we toured next door after lunch. It was a very different tour with a laser-guided tram ride through the cellars, although we only saw a small portion of the 11 miles of tunnels. The giant cask above took 15 years to build; it can hold 200,000 bottles of Champagne and was used for blending until 1947. As the world’s largest wine cask, it was brought to Paris for the World Fair in 1889. The journey took eight days, destroying two bridges and several houses along the way.

Day 5: Happy to Arrive in Epernay...

When we finally pulled into Epernay, the tourist office had just closed. After a frustrating attempt to find a cute inn or B&B, we settled for a functional Ibis. We splurged on a nice dinner in a former bank with a bottle of, you guessed it, Champagne.

Day 5: In Search of Food...

Silly us, we purposely didn’t bring a picnic with us because we thought we’d have plenty of opportunities to stop along the way. We went through most of our snacks as we slogged up the hills, eventually walking the steepest one. We finally came to this farm that sold jams and apple juice. The sweet farmer sold us the bread off her table so we could picnic amongst her chickens.

Day 5: Champagne & Grapes at Every Turn...

We didn’t start our 43 mile ride until noon. Jimmy found a GPS track to take us along a ridge of the forest and down through the vineyards to Epernay, the heart of the Champagne region. It was an especially challenging ride through the hills since village after village were completely shut. Apparently, despite it being high tourist season, most of the region goes on holiday for the last two weeks of August in anticipation of the harvest in September. We found the Maille Champagne tasting room open, which we really liked, but couldn’t find food.

Day 5: A Visit to Mumm...

There was a bike shop not far from the hotel. It was huge, but had no touring supplies (only one double pannier!) After playing some charades, we managed to buy two bungee cords that did the trick to tie the front bags to the back. Stopped by a patisserie and headed for a tour at Mumm, one of the world’s largest producers of Champagne . We visited the cellars containing 25 million bottles of Champagne and had a glass afterwards. We were unable to see anything of the actual production, supposedly because it is too dangerous.

Day 4: Hurry Up and Wait...

We woke up early to catch a 7:30am train to Reims, home of many famous champagne houses. Unfortunately, our 3.5 hour journey turned into 6.5 hours due to train cancellations and heavy delays. After a nice lunch, we went to GH Martel for a tasting. On the way to the hotel, I had a major scare when I heard metal crunching and turned to see a Volvo right behind Jimmy. Luckily, he hadn’t been hit, but instead his front luggage rack had fallen off. We were especially lucky that this happened in a city rather than in the hills and that he was able to carry the bags to the hotel. It had started to pour, so we were glad there was a good restaurant just across the street.

Day 3: Heading South

The bellhop had a good laugh when he pulled our bikes out of the storage room for the 2nd day in a row. We had a full day of train rides ahead of us. Taking two bikes on a train in mid-August proved much more of a hassle than we anticipated as the trains were extremely full with bikes, passengers and luggage. We took a quick detour to see the Flower Carpet in the Grand Place in Brussels, consisting of one million begonias covering 19,000 square feet. After five trains, we only made it as far as Lille in Northern France. Lille was a ghost town, but managed to find a restaurant for a nice dinner to celebrate my birthday.