What a day! Marre to Dun-sur-Meuse

Fri 18th

We woke to a wet day.

And we'd had interrupted night's sleep with the phone going off in the middle of the night with messages from our bookkeeper wanting info to do the BAS.

And the heating has failed at home where we have a young couple house-sitting and looking after the dog.

And my back tyre was down this morning.

And MF1 found his back wheel nearly completely off.

And, as I said, it was raining and MF2 found he'd left his (new!) rain jacket at the BnB in Verdun.

Oh yes, and did I mention that we managed to short-circuit the power to our room with our immersion heater which had worked a treat when we arrived yesterday heating up supplies of water but this morning it was so calcified that we think this caused the problem. Fortunately MF1 found the circuit board down the corridor and restored the power ...

'C'est la vie' I told myself.

So the day started with a very quick pep talk along the lines of 'this looks like being one of those days so we all need to support each other!'.

We left (finally!) our cutesy accommodation and had a damp ride VERY UP to the dramatic Mort Homme Monument at nearby Chattancourt which commemorates those of the 69th Division who fought and died here during WWI; it is estimated that 10,000 Frenchmen lost their lives here. On the front of the monument is the famous phrase "ils n'ont pas passe" (they did not pass), which came to represent the need and desire of the French to hold onto Verdun.

Back down the buzzy descent to the main road and then another lot of climbing before we turned off through the Fôret Domaniale du Mort Homme to reach Montfaucon d'Argonne. We are now in the Argonne battlefield area.

The rain by now had become somewhat unpleasant and we reached this town as 'wet as shags' - and cold (today being only about 15 deg C max).

We saw a boulangerie but I knew being after midday it was likely to be closed, almost EVERYTHING in France being closed between 12 and 2. But the girl inside opened the door and I saw she had large bottles of water so we bought 2, being lowish by now - and she confirmed our worst fears that they WERE COMPLETELY OUT OF BREAD, CROISSANTS, ANYTHING!

We had parked our bikes in the shelter of the carport attached but the boulangerie van returned just as we bought the water so we exited in a hurry, apologising to the owner 'je suis désolé'. After he got his van in, he kindly invited us to use the left-over space which we did so as to change into dry, warm clothes; fill the water bottles; and eat the chocolate David had wanted to buy at the supermarket a few days ago - lucky it hadn't been eaten! It was delicious!

We moved on and would you believe it, finally there was a bar - with an OPEN sign AND a picture of a coffee on the blackboard outside! We couldn't believe it!

As we rolled up, I noticed my front tyre was well and truly flat! Drat!! But a perfect spot! We had coffees and the owner enthusiastically got a bucket and went to it: taking the tube off the wheel and immersing tube in water looking for leaks. We all thoroughly checked the tyre. The verdict of our Belgian friend was that the valve was loose. On went the tyre. He is an ex-cyclist but we couldn't get much info from him about his past.

We were aiming for the nearby American Memorial. He gave us directions after we had another coffee (with biscuits!!) and sadly it was UP a steep hill. But it was SO worthwhile! The monument commemorates the American victory during the Meuse-Argonne Offensive during the period 26 September to 11 November 1918 when the American First Army forced the enemy to conduct a general retreat on this front.

It comprises a huge granite column which towers more than 60m above the ruins of the destroyed village below - and 234 stairs take you to the top for panoramic views of the surrounding area. I felt every one of those stairs I can tell you!

Our Belgian bar owner had told us we could ride directly from the top across country to our next destination which was not obvious from the signs - so we are grateful to him for this. 

But his enthusiasm with 'fixing' the slow leak of my front tyre had not been successful and each hill required stopping to pump more air into the tyre until we reached our next destination: the Meuse-Argonne American Cemetery 10 kms away. 

This is a 130.5-acre (52.8 ha) WWI cemetery near the village of Romagne-sous-Montfaucon and where are buried the largest number of military dead in Europe, a total of 14,246. Most of those buried here lost their lives during the Meuse-Argonne Offensive of WWI.

We had a good look around and the Visitors Centre had some excellent displays. We also spent time changing the tube in my front tyre!

It was by now 4:30 p.m. and we still had 15 kms to go. Fortunately we made quick work of it as the descents outnumbered the ascents going down to the river Meuse - and we were really looking forward to getting to our accommodation! I have to say though, that staying at a town on the river (Dun-sur-Meuse) but at an address in Rue de la Remparts (meaning 'battlements') can probably mean only one thing: a climb!

And MF1 made a real 'meal' out of this by selecting the most direct route UP which was in fact a walking track (need I say, that I DID suggest the road might be easier, even if steep??!). The bloody track was steeper than anything we'd climbed to-date (almost vertical) AND pushing the bloody bikes was back-breaking. I WAS NOT HAPPY!

Anyway, despite the 'remparts' address, our accommodation is divine. There were (cheap) beers in the fridge, much enjoyed after a good shower - and would you believe, the sun peeped out for a beautiful evening. The views from the remparts - on which the house is situated - look out over the village below and the countryside for miles.

Vincent booked us into a nearby restaurant (which matched my TripAdvisor review) and we had a terrific meal. I had yummy Alsacienne tart for dessert, Tracey!

Ride: 50 kms MF1 tells me (a tad longer than the 40 kms I had calculated, so not sure where those extra kms came from!!?) AND he tells me we climbed 799 m.