We had a fairly quick start as we had to return the car in Reims by midday. Unfortunately, the roads in the town centre had changed, and the GPS, and consequently us as well, were totally confused and spent a fair bit of time finding a hotel and returning the car.
Because we’d taken longer on our Italy and France tour, we didn’t have enough time to visit Epernay, the centre of the Champage growing district.Reims is an extremely historic city and plays an important part in the history of France – where French kings were crowned and where the Germans surrendered after WWII.
We spent the afternoon exploring the centre of town, looking at the historic buildings, and marveling at the wide streets that rival the boulevards of Paris.
In the evening we found ourselves outside the cathedral as the light faded and the floodlights came on. This was quite spectacular, and there were many people who had come especially to see it. The building is a huge gothic structure with many sculptures on the façade (in the process of being restored as is the case with many that we’ve seen), and during the day there was an orchestral concert inside. The acoustics were fantastic and the sound was exceptionally clear, with just the right amount of echo for the classical music.
For dinner we settled on the Tokyo Japanese restaurant, surprisingly one pf three Japanese restaurants in the centre of town. There are no Chinese ones, apparently there are some in the industrial suburbs, mainly to service local workers.The food was great, and we had ‘coupes’ (glasses) of champagne to accompany it. Unfortunately Frances seemed to have an allergic reaction to something (possibly MSG in the miso soup) that was disorienting and so she couldn’t enjoy the meal.
