27 September 2019

Le Mans wasn’t far away and the revving of engines, the squealing of tyres and the smell of oily rags were calling our name. (I lie!!)

Now you will be surprised to learn, that Le Mans has a cathedral! And it’s beautiful!

The stained glass windows were breathtaking.

But the highlight for me was this ceiling.

The surrounding historic quarter called Cité Plantagenêt, was one of our favourites, so far.

An Autumn festival occurring on the weekend, was fast approaching and the area was being tizzied up. It looked so pretty.

Even the drain / sewerage covers were impressive.

Now, we couldn’t visit Le Mans without doing a circuit of the track.

Yes, we could apparently, as the track was closed in readiness for a 24 hour Truck Race on the weekend!

It’s ok. We had a back up plan! The town of Champagné wasn’t far away. We’d go there and drown our disappointment.

Now, if we were well researched tourists and if we’d had our wits about us, we would have known that this was also going to lead to disappointment.

There were no vines to be seen, we were nowhere near the Champagne region, and there are lots of places with Champagne in their name. (Last nights accomodation was in Domfront-en-Champagne for goodness sake!!)

So , I had a refreshingly healthy orange juice in Champagné and we were on our way!

To Chartres!

Yep, another Cathedral!! (We’ve certainly lifted our average back up).

Now Chartres Cathedral has a famous stain glass window dating back to the 11th Century and was quite the draw card! As stated in the English Tourist Guide, “No 12. (very famous)”.

The others weren’t as “famous” but looked pretty good too.

But the best was yet to come. We had stumbled into Chartres at the right time. They have a light show using various monuments around the city and it’s brilliant.

We caught a little tourist train and visited the sites. It was a bit cramped and sometimes viewing was a little tricksy but it was well worth it.

But the best of all was on the Cathedral. We sat mesmerised for 20 minutes or so as the light show unfolded.

And to think we might have missed all this, to watch a truck race!!

Winners!!!