2019 Bike Ride - Day 4: Chartres to Saclas

So I decide to head back into the old town of Chartres this morning and have a look around, rather than setting off early which I had planned to do. I also want to get a stamp for my credencial, since the one I got at the cathedral gift shop yesterday was not actually the correct one, and on top of that it was badly stamped. The tourist office doesn't open until 10:00 so I have a couple of hours to kill, although of course there's plenty to see. When I finally get to the tourist office, there's already a queue of people waiting for it to open. Finally it's my turn, only to be told that the pilgrim stamps are given at the Café Serpente opposite the south door of the cathedral, and not at the tourist office. Only in France. Of course this should be obvious: in one of the main pilgrim destinations in France, it's at a local café where you have to go for the stamp that proves that you, as a pilgrim, have passed through the town. And had I known, I could have come here earlier and been on my way hours ago. Very French.

Chartres - Self Portrait

Chartres is putting on a light show tonight. Perhaps if I'd known, I might have planned my trip differently and stayed another night. Perhaps not, since light shows are hardly the reason for my journey. Last night I'd already seen some of the installations set up, each one with a security guard. This morning the guards are all still there. For some reason, the security guards are all black. Whether this is by design or just coincidence is probably a politically incorrect train of thought. But there it is; they're all black.

I'm sitting on the grass on the Place de l'Eglise at Allainville having my lunch picnic. There's a stop sign on the road that passes the square. A pretty pointless one it must be said, since there's actually no side road, just the square. But all the cars passing are dutifully stopping, most impressive. Allainville is not a big town, in fact it's hardly a little village. But of course it has a church and so it has a Place de l'Église. It seems that in this part of France whoever invented the names of the towns must have had the idea that the name of each town should include the word 'town', perhaps just to emphasise the fact that it is indeed the name of a town. So we have Morainville, Roinville,  Francourville, Houville-la-Blanche, and so it goes on.

Chartres - Trompe l'Oeil

The ride is longer than I'd planned, partly because it's rather hot today and I'm riding fully exposed through open fields for most of the day. And little roads, which I try to take to avoid the traffic and make life more interesting, tend not to follow the most direct route. I'm tired by the end of it. Near the end of the day's ride I pass by an airfield and am entertained by a couple of planes doing circuits over my head. The road I'm following meanders around enough for both planes to complete three circuits in the time I've ridden under their approach path.

Marthe, my host for the night, is a sprightly 90 years old. She's lost her husband 5 months ago but seems to be the sort of person who just gets on with life and although she mentions the loss it's more by way of explanation that she been a bit busy with arranging things "paperwork and so on" and hasn't really had time to keep the guest house on order. She doesn't normally take guests, but the owner of the B&B I had tried to book suggested I give her a call. His place was fully booked, but he said that his neighbour (using the term rather loosely as it turns out) might be able to help out, as a favour. And so she did; making a small house next to hers, essentially a two-story "granny flat", available to me for the night. Wonderful.

Chartres - Cathedral reflection

When I arrive we spend a while chatting and I admire her garden, which is obviously a labour of love and stretches up the hillside above her house. It reminds me a bit of Wendy Whitley's secret garden in Sydney: lots of little paths zig zag up the slope, unexpected little bits and pieces all over the place, and the whole thing at once ramshackle and planned. She takes me on a tour of the garden and we climb up the meandering pathway. I'm amazed at how she manages this since the path is steep, full of slippery bits, and the strong stones are all at odd angles.

The guest house is very lived in, being used by her granddaughters as well as herself (her artist studio is upstairs). It's full of all sorts of clutter and collections of things acquired over the decades. Shelves of books, paintings covering the walls, lots of large mirrors - she must have a thing for mirrors. I see myself walking throughout the house, climbing the stairs, getting into and out of the bed. There's multiples of lots of things, like people have brought something with them when they last visited forgetting that there was already one there; toasters, coffee makers, cleaning products, saucepans and so forth.

After doing my chores, with the help of a rather recalcitrant washing machine, I head back into the village and the restaurant.

I had asked Marthe whether the restaurant in the village is any good (a rhetorical question, really, since there's only one so that's where I'm likely to have dinner, good or not.) I know there's a restaurant since I've both seen it in my research about this town, and I've ridden past it on the way to her house. Yet she says that as far as she knows, and she's lived here 35 years, there's no restaurant. Just the "Arabe du coin" which is a colloquial expression for the local corner store, which in this case proves accurate, since the shop is indeed on a corner, and the owners are Arabic.

Before I go to the restaurant I visit the Arabe du coin, to buy a couple of things for breakfast. At the restaurant I ask the owner how long they've been open; they've been there for 1 1/2 years having taken over from the previous owners. Marthe probably doesn't go out much, and I can imagine she's not someone to spend time in the local restaurant.

The restaurant is not a busy place; there's only one table occupied when I arrive. A younger couple and what might be the mother, or mother in law (probably both).  And under the table is the dog. Only in France. It's a big dog, but it's well behaved it must be said and I only realise it's there when I see that what I at first thought was a large handbag or something, had paws. Still, I am sitting in the outside courtyard and they, complete with dog, are sitting inside, which seems a bit counter intuitive. Smokers are made to sit outside in France, but dogs still get to be inside. Both the woman and the man are on their phones. The mother and the dog just look bored.

Another young couple arrives, he's a smoker so they sit outside. Then an older foursome arrives, they have a dog so they sit inside. Theirs is a small dog and luckily neither dog seems interested in the other. Probably good restaurant training.

I appreciate my bike's good headlights during the ride back to my little house. It's pitch black and there's no street lights for much of the way.

Roinville - Yellow on Yellow