Day 9 (Oct 10th): Les Andelys in Paris and Normandy travel log

We docked at Les Andelys in the morning, to visit Chateau Gaillard’s ruins. It was a long walk up a steep hill, and there were many elderly guests, so our guide (who happened to be our program director) paused at many points along the way to give us ‘context’ of what the fortress was about. He is clearly a medieval history enthusiast, and gave a long talk about the politics of William the Conqueror to King John, and he also went at length at the tangential matters too - he described the crusades (because Richard I was in the third crusade), the formation of Portugal and Spain in the Iberia peninsula, and clearly enjoying giving the lectures. He was good with them too, and managed to weave facts and events together into a coherent narrative. That way history makes sense, consisting of human beings making human decisions.

Anyway, after the third or fourth lecture, we reached the chateau, and the ruins were nothing much to look at - a bunch of crumbled down limestone walls. However, because it is so high up, it gave us a beautiful view of the Seine valley, our ship, and the little town of Les Andelys, and we took lots of pictures from it. La Professeure’s parents did not come with us on the walk - it was difficult walk for her mom, even with the breaks in between - so it was just us two. Although, she started to feel under the weather, so we didn’t push it very hard either.

After the tour, we departed Les Andelys - I would have liked to explore it more - the view from the chateau is that it’s a quaint little medieval town with lots of interesting architecture, and headed back toward Le Pecq. The afternoon we had a water-painting lesson, which established that I am not a good water painter, and then a lot of scenic cruising in the Seine Valley. The weather was nice - it was cool, but not freezing, and the sun was out. So it was beautiful to see the fall foliage in the setting sun along the Seine. I noticed some of the cliffs have structures built into them - a cliff face with doors or garage doors right on it. When we went through a lock, I got to see the whole thing in action above deck. It was a falling gate, so when we passed through it, water was still dripping down from the gate, like a car wash, and I had to duck under the canopy to avoid getting wet. So it was a very lovely afternoon of scenic cruising. La Professeure unfortunately stayed in the cabin to nurse her cold.

Tonight we are docked in Mantes (probably because the docking fees here are cheap??), and I was disappointed we don’t get to pop out to see the Notre Dame here. Overall, I felt like we could have done more in this cruise. I know that other river cruises go to Honfleur, a quaint little town by the sea on the English Channel, which would have been a cute place to visit, and a better base to visit the Normandy beaches - it would have cut our bus ride from 2 hour each way to 1 1/4 hours.

Anyway, because La Professeure is on the verge of getting sick, we opted to skip the cruise-arranged tour of the Louvre in the morning in favor of a shorter visit to Conflan. (I’d been to the Louvre before so I’m not too heart-broken, though the last time I only had 1/2 hours and did not have a guide). I think having a low-key morning would be good. In the afternoon we’ll to go Versailles.

Last updated October 24, 2015