Last day before we head home.

Cathy has been diligently attending the conference gathering useful data and making global people contacts for her ongoing advocacy work on making Saskatoon a more livable city by volunteering about 70 hours a week on various projects.

Meanwhile I have been doing the important work of wandering Nantes with my camera.

I spent many hours in Les Jardin des plantes de Nantes, a famous garden in the centre of Nantes populated by plants from all over the world. In 1726 Louis 15th ordered all ship’s captains to bring back to France seeds from the colonies and foreign lands. They obliged and this amazing garden was created.

 

Being somewhat of an expert on frequenting les toilettes I can report that virtually every facility in all the countries we visited was considerably cleaner than a toilet in almost any prairie town.  They may not all smell like Chanel N°5 but the French in particular add this colorful touch to the toilet paper.

Many of you will be surprised to see a bus load of bird pictures coming up I’m sure.

This Eurasian Wren was singing up a storm just above my head. Wren's have a pretty large presence for such a small bird.

Click here for a YouTube Video

The waterfowl are unusually tame and afford many chances for close ups. Many of the ducks and geese sport a wrist band visible in some pictures. These birds are mostly new to me and could even be hybrids so looking up descriptions may not have yielded accurate results. 

Note leg band on this Bar-headed goose.

Eurasian Teal.

Mandarin Ducks (Male)

Barnacle goose.

Red-crested Pochard.

Only this ones mother knows for sure who it is.

Tufted duck.

Northern Pintail (same as on the prairies)

Unknown goose.

For anyone interested you can see more pictures of this garden by clicking here:

Goodbye and thanks for following along.

Trent

Day 29

The European Cycling Federation meeting has started. This was the initial reason for the whole trip as Cathy attended this meeting in Vancouver three years ago and planned then to come to Nantes.

Decorations in the conference hall.

 

We both took part in a bicycle parade around Nantes on Wednesday evening.  Police mounted on horses started us out as a long line of cycles snaked along, alternately starting and stopping for no apparent reason. Today Cathy found out there were 7000 participants in the parade as the whole community had been invited to join in.

Day 28 Exploring EuroVelo 6

I rolled out of bed and began my job as hunter/gatherer. The search culminated in a superb catch as seen in the following pictures. If you can guess the contents of the paper bag you win a big fat French Croissant and a Pain au chocolat. When in France you must oblige and consume a daily fat treat.

 

While on my hunting expedition I spotted this visual clue solving a lingering question about how furniture and large goods are moved into apartments accessed via cramped, narrow twisted stairways.

With our map and bikes in tow we headed out to find the EuroVelo 6, a trail mapped, marked and maintained taking adventurous cyclists from Nantes to Budapest. Some years ago we had ridden a portion of this trail and wanted to see the origin here in Nantes. On the way we encountered an area of Nantes suffused with large-scale art projects intended to engage the viewer in an active manner. It seems much of Nantes was closed on a Monday morning so this mobile elephant was being maintained and not moving people around this park.

A restaurant created with a theme of triangular painted plywood panels and chairs seemed to pop out of the walkway. We could imagine such a feature prominently displayed along the Saskatchewan River in Saskatoon.

 We cycled for a 6 hours round trip exploration featuring city streets, public pathways, bubbling streams, forest rich with bird song, ancient stone walls and ended with a coffee shop overlooking Nantes.

Day 25-27 Leaving Belgium for France

Our last day with Anne and family was very special. We toured Brussels in the morning, gathered our TGV tickets for Nantes and had a delicious supper spiced with splendid conversation.
Some pictures of the beautiful city of Brussels.

 

There are just a few spectacular differences travelling on European trains compared to VIA rail in Canada. They leave on time, arrive on time and don’t wait for freight trains. However they do not have lovely bunk beds, dining cars with linen table clothes, silver service and delicious meals and hours and hours of sitting at a crossing with nothing to do but chat with other travelers or read a book.

The TGV at a slightly faster speed than VIA rail.

 

Our train arrived in Nantes (Western France) without incident and poured us onto the platform. Armed with explicit instructions from our apartment rental host we made our way to 19 Rue des Carmes, about 1.5 km away. We arrived with instructions to use an access code to enter the building.  Much to our wondering eyes should appear but a properly marked door with no keypad to let us in.

You try entering 74852A on this keypad.

Somewhat confounded we sought help by calling a phone number given to us in case of emergency.  The rapid fire French language spewing out of the IPhone speaker was not one bit helpful.  We resorted to plan B and accosted a women coming out of the building from the very door we were supposed to enter.  After numerous attempts to charade our way to an understanding she called Lucy, her English speaking daughter, to come from the apartment above and help us.  Lucy was born under the star labeled “Angel of Helpfulness” and she proceeded to extricate us from our dilemma.  We found an apartment and entered using the key code given to us via email.  Immediately it became obvious that this domicile was intended for another couple as a welcome message was on the board for them, a bottle of wine was waiting and it did not look at all like the pictures of the place we had rented.

Lucy, once again came to our rescue and was able to telephone Patricia, the property manger, who soon was groveling for forgiveness with apology after apology for mixing up the address.  It turns out we were supposed to be given the address 9 rue de l'hôtel de ville with the identical access codes.  Pondering upon this series of events later we were grateful that none of this occurred at 10:00 in the evening.

Today was a bit rainy so we donned out rain gear and headed out for bike rental, exploration and food provisioning.  We found a superb market with all the goods one could desire and loaded up with food for the next few days.

Day 24 Bike ride around Belgium

Fortune smiled on us again today as Anne arranged bicycles and a 50 km. route for us to experience cycling to a local castle through a tangle of trails that tested the acuity of any GPS unit.

Our route is outlined in red.

Cathy waiting for the cycling to start.

It was intriguing to see the European concept of public trails in private spaces truly in action. Every few kilometers Anne would lead us through what appeared to be a farmer’s field with crop on each side and a public right of way through the middle. It was a delightful way to experience local locomotion for non-vehicular traffic.

A right-of-way trail between two houses, leading to a farmer's field.

Barley getting ready for one of the 400 types of Belgium Beer.

It was quite wonderful traveling along this paved road with fields of barley, wheat and beets so close to the road.

Here is a short video of this area. Click here.
 
Our first stop was a castle with all the trimmings of turrets, beautiful gardens and grounds and even a moat.

The vagaries of Belgium road signs can be challenging to learn.  Here are some we mastered.

Straight forward---speed limit sign.

 

This one means:"watch out for crazy cyclists taking pictures."

OK to ride a horse straight up.

If you have consumed more than 5 tonnes of Belgium Chocolates do not ride on this road.

Avoid more than 5 tonnes at a time.