Reims Cathedral

The day started (for Annie) with a trip to the Veuve Clicquot winery for a tour and champagne tasting. It's a tough job, but someone has to do it. Sadly, as I was driving, very little was actually drunk there, but the caves under the winery where they age the wines are fabulous.

I'd set the address of the winery into the SatNav - it was only 2km away in Reims, so no big hassle. But when the instruction comes from the Sat Nav: "At the roundabout, take the 7th exit", you know you're in for something exciting. Now I'm quite good at navigating normally - our mum gave my brother and I maps to read on car journeys to shut us up - but it took me three goes at getting this roundabout right. For it was no simple roundabout: it had sub-turnings and sliproads. I kept spinning off in nearly, but not quite, the right direction. As a happy biproduct of my misdirection I did a good tour past many of the other famous wineries in this champagne region. Oddly, just as I approached my nemesis roundabout for the third time, the Scott Mills podcast I'd been listening to was talking about it being illegal to go round a roundabout in the UK more than three times. I took this as a sign, and successfully got myself to the right road intact.

A quick stop at the fabulous Reims cathedral to take this blip. It's a beautiful city, but must press on...

I took what might be described as the "attractive" route. I spurned the 130kmph autoroute for the at times 50kmph N-roads, so I could drive over the Route des Cretes. On this road I had a bit of a Euphoria moment where all I could do was grin madly. All through my childhood I spent summers in the Alps, as my mum worked as a programmer for some physicists in Grenoble. So somewhere deep-rooted in my synapses are triggers for carefree happiness with alpine flowers, mountains and winding roads. At one point, when a particularly euphoric song came on the iPod, I felt like a child again: but one that was allowed the use of a car and could play their music loud on the stereo. You can't ask for much more, can you? :)

The evening was spent with two close friends who used to live in the UK, but now live near Zurich. I miss them being in the UK. So wonderful to see them, chat and relax in their beautiful flat here. Thanks for the lovely dinner guys, and use of your WiFi for blipping!