Ronchamp, Dijon, Vezelay and Besancon

Ronchamp

We left Colmar Thursday morning to make our way through France to head towards our friends in Nantes.  Even though Boris, our GPS, likes to take highways we confused him by taking any number of sideroads that we could.  The first night we were aiming for Dijon and on the way stopped at the town of Belfort and to Ronchamp to see the famous Chapelle Notre-Dame-du-Haut by Le Corbusier. 

We got to Dijon mid afternoon and after checking into our hotel went on a self guided walking tour.  Dijon is a wonderful city to wander around.  There are lots of beautiful medieval and renaissance buildings and in the morning we found a vibrant marketplace.  Malcolm climbed the tour to have a look over the city whilst I found mustard shops to try different wine and herb flavoured mustards.

We were then on the road and headed for Vezelay, a small hilltop village with a medieval basilica.  The town is surrounded by vineyards and sunflower fields.  The basilica has a crypt with what is believed to be one of Mary Magdalene's bones.  We stopped in the gardens of the basilica for a picnic lunch of the usual baguette and cheese. 

After this we headed west to the Loire Valley.  A week later on our return to Colmar we stopped in Besancon for the night.  The old part of town is encased by the curve of the River Doubs and was pretty to wander around.  We saw a statue that was the spitting image of Malcolm's brother Ross.  We visited the Museum of Time which was full of historical time pieces and were fortunate to see the extraordinary Astronomical Clock.  A very pretty town and well worth the visit.

More photos