Sunshine, skinks and a welcome lemonade

Monday 24th April. Reporting in from Hotel Rond Point in Digoin (not to be confused with Dijon, which Google always does!)
A lovely sunny day with temps. hitting 22C around 2pm so off with the jackets & out with the sunscreen. We took it easy today as there were a number of places we wished to visit so planned for cycling only between 54-61km; at this pace we can afford to lie back at lunch time, stretch our cycling bodies & watch the world go by for an hour. Not much point anyway doing anything apart from eat between 12-2pm in France as everything else apart from cafes/restaurants is closed, fermè, cerrado - all is quiet in these small towns & villages, nothing moves ...... except skinks, flitting between various nooks & crannies of buildings, walls and pathways.

As an aside .... I can't imagine what it must be like to be in a wheechair or sight impaired round the streets in the towns & cities we've visited so far. Most of the footpaths are munted with few having shaped curbs to allow ease of transition from footpath to roadway. Many footpaths are also quite narrow, often made narrower by signs or poles making  them potentialy hazardous in areas where cars are allowed. The curbs & gutters are also quite high so not easy if wanting to get off the road when cycling!

Anyway, back to today. We headed away from the Ibis around 9.30am & took the D974 along the La Bourbince River rather than the longer 'offical EV6 route' as we wanted to be sure to get to the Museum in Genelard before it closed at 12 noon. Along the way we saw quite a bit of old industrial achitecture. The brick/ ceramic works at Ciry-le-Noble wasn't open but we stopped to look through the fence & take some photos. Waved at a couple mooching along the canal on an beautiful green English narrow boat from Norfolk - wonder how they got it across the channel?

We arrived at around 11am in Genelard but I misread a sign to took a left turn into town, ending up at the supermarket rather than the Museum of the Line of Demarcation so only had 45mins to look over the displays. Well worth the time - we needed the full hour really as it is most comprehensive AND interesting. Everything explained in F, E, & G. I hadn't realised the free Vichy Govt.was quite so compromised by, & compliant with, the Nazi regime.

 

Lunch was eaten in the park next to the museum where we could watch the boats come through the lock. Saw an Aussie couple on a hire boat flying their flag next to their drying knickers!

Taking the 'official route' after lunch saw us roll into Palinges (not a soul around). Lovely small Romanesque church & a memorial to those who died during the wars; Caroline posted her p/c FINALLY) then on the D128 & D25 rolling over farmland toward the Chateau de Digoine. SHUT - only open May to November, 3 days a week, 2-7pm. We'd particularly wanted to see the gardens but heho!! Took some photos anyway.
The hills got a bit stiffer after that and on one I failed to change down in time so didn't make it quite to the top before I gave up!! Spying an open pub at Volesvres saw us downing a cold Cassis lemonade under an umbrella. Lovely church there but looked a bit more Protestant in style! Bloody good woodstacks in the area, too. Notable too were the hedgerows full of life but again saw a number of Charolais cattle in the streams.

Have caught a bit of sun. Will have some odd lines on my legs depending on which cycling pants I wear. My GroundEffect gear is so comfy when riding commando.

Paray-le-Monial was our key target for sight-seeing today as it has been a pilgrimage site since the 17th C when a woman had visions of the sacred heart of Christ. There was a large party of pilgrims visiting when we were at the Romanesque Church of Sacre Coeur; one could tell as they all wore orange scarves & carried rosaries. :-)
Wandered around the narrow streets of the town taking a few photos & looking for an open cafe (no luck .... realised it is Monday so most places closed).

Final leg of the day saw us back on a greenway spinning easily along for 15km (having to avoid a few pelatons hoofing along) to our destination of Digoin.
Had a lovely walk through the town this evening looking for an open restaurant - only seem to be pizza, burger, kebab & Chinese places open so settled on Chinese, which proved interesting!!! As we walked back to the hotel the lights came on under the aquaduct that takes the Canal Lateral over the Loire River. At least it made the river a little more romantic looking than the green, sluggish thing we saw as we cycled in. Not at all the image of the Loire I have in my mind.

Thinking of it being ANZAC Day in NZ already - plenty of memorials in French towns to remind us.