The City of 100 Bells

Wednesday

Well God decided we needed to sleep until 10 am. To be honest in our 43 years of marriage do I ever remember sleeping that late. We did have a seventh inning stretch at 3 am for Janet. She woke up about ready to go and was reading a book when Tom woke up at four o’clock and asked if it was seven? After finding out the real-time, we realized that more sleep was needed. However, we did not realize it was another six hours. Okay, we got a late start, but that would not slow us down.

The Plan-of-the-Day was to walk the city and take it all in. Janet had studied the tour books and after some breakfast we explored the cobblestone streets of history. Breakfast is hard to find at 10:30 in the morning in France, so we settled for a croissant and an espresso with Calvados for Tom and a cappuccino for Janet. 

Now fully nourished, we were ready to tackle anything. We headed down to the River Seine and enjoyed the sun along the promenade. There was a AmaWaterways riverboat tied along the city wall. Memories and flashbacks of our Christmas Market boat ride up the Rhine brought smiles to our faces

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We have friends getting ready to get underway on the Danube in a week or two and we hope their journey will be safe since they will be much closer to the ongoing hostilities in Europe.

After walking along the river, we decided to head to the old market. Our stroll brought us under the famous clock tower of Rouen, Gros Horloge Astronomic. Hundreds of years old, the clock was a sign of nobility of Rouen that they were in favor with the king. Notice that it only has one hand to tell time. Hey, I guess 500 years ago that was close enough. At some point in time the nobility lost their favor with the king when they failed to pay taxes to him. Somethings never change.

We walked the market looking at all the amazing fruits, cheeses, and seafood.  The selection of cheeses filled multiple display cases.  Creatures from the sea, some of which we did not recognize, were laying on beds ice  looking at us like they were saying, "please take us home".  The availability of fresh foods of this quality would be so nice  to have at home.   We wanted to buy everything, but we only bought some Camembert to enjoy later.

 

By then we were working up a appetite. Not far from the market we found a nice bistro named Can Can that was simply amazing. The food preparation and presentation were only exceeded by the quality that we put in our mouths. Janet chose a risotto dish that had shaved asparagus, saffron, and herbs. Tom went with a pork dish that was in a bed of mashed peas served with micro-greens – Unbelievable! 

The restaurant is known for their smoked dishes. The table next to us ordered two of those dishes. It was amazing to watch as they lite off a fragrant straw and closed it under glass flavoring the dish. With lunches like this there was no doubt we were in France.

We strolled around the square where Joan of Arc was executed. Today, there is a boxwood garden and two stakes remaining that supposedly were in the ground the day she was burnt. Very close by is a very modern church that was built next to the site. 

The stain glass was from an ancient church that was destroyed in WWII. The windows had been removed for safe keeping so they would not be broken by bombing. 40 years after the war these 400-year-old windows found a new home and fill the church with colors and light.

 

A very nice place to sit quietly and feel the inner peace. There is power or an aura of Joan one feels when they walk the street.

We walked the city discovering more hidden treasures and old churches. We spent time walking in the huge gothic Saint-Ouen Abbey which was started in 1300 and completed 250 years later. Currently under heavy renovation, it was being used to display art. The size of the edifice was simply overwhelming.

Wandering the gardens behind the abbey, we popped out into a section of Rouen where the Seine River was channeled down through the streets. The water still runs freely, but today I think it is more for beauty than a practical purpose.

The Cathedral of Notre Dame of the Assumption in Rouen can be traced back to 260 AD. We are talking old! It has been rebuilt 8 different times since its beginning. The famous front façade may be recognizable by art lovers?

Correct Claude Monet painted the church forty times in the early 1890s.

Returning to the hotel we enjoyed a wonderful Rosè with Camembert Cheese in the lobby. It was good to get off our feet. Good walking shoes are a must. Almost every road and sidewalk is cobblestone. Five miles on cobblestones is a long way.

Back to The Place du Vieux-Marche for dinner. Our hope was to go to the oldest restaurant in France ( La Couronne), but we did not have reservations and they had no openings. Just a few steps down the street, we found a nice bistro whose menu caught our eye. We had two different starters but enjoyed the same main course, a wonderful fish dish with vegetables in a Normandy cream sauce. Our dessert was an amazing chocolate mousse in a jar garnished with a kumquat, and yes, a glass of Calvados for Tom.

Dinner was over at 10:30 and we slowly walked back to the hotel taking in all the sights we had seen throughout the day. Our hopes were to walk off some the calories we had just consumed. Coming to the square in front of the Cathedral, we once again stood in awe of this building.

Good Night All – from Rouen