Friday was our visiting Langres day. We left at 10.00am which was early for us but just as well as we avoided climbing up the two-kilometre steep hill in the heat of the day. We then walked anticlockwise around the walls which vary in length between 3 and 3,5 kilometres depending upon which literature you read. Halfway around we went into the town for a while and then continued our walk on the walls. The walls, other fortifications and the views were stunning, but obviously photos couldn’t do them justice.
Langres has been fortified since Gallo-Roman times, over
2000 years ago, but rebuilt and improved over time. There are 12 defensive towers and seven towers
still in existence and the gates had drawbridges and although they were removed
in the 1850s during major military re-engineering work, the drawbridge wheels were
left in place.
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| Drawbridge wheels at one of the gates |
We joined the walls at Porte Longe-Porte where the original Roman arch can still be seen with the wall built around it.
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| The 2000-year-old Roman arch |
All the gates allow road access into the narrow streets of the town:
The housing inside the walls was a mixture of age and style:
Here are a few shots of the walk around the walls and some of the towers:
The main road through Langres runs around the outside of the
walls. We found that that’s a much
better way to take in the walls rather than walking around the
top of them!
A campsite and motorhome park stood just inside the walls at one part, ideally located for exploring the town. As expected, it was busy with French campervans but there were only a couple of tents.
The windmill gate was rebuilt in the mid-1600s
and guards the main route into town, down the high street to the cathedral.
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| Portes des Moulins |
A thriving market was in progress by the Portes des Moulins so we couldn’t resist having a wander around. As we’d gone into the town to visit the market, we took the opportunity so look around more of the place before continuing our walk along the walls. Judy & Bob Evans on Mon Amie had recommended finding a café around the statue of Diderot, the famous 18th century French philosopher. A man after my own heart with many of his now famous quotes including:
"The most dangerous madmen are those created by religion"
and
"Man will never be free until the last king is strangled with the intestines of the last priest"
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| Little & large Diderot statues (well I’ve assumed the modern bronze is Diderot too) |
We thought about stopping at one of the cafés on Place Diderot, but it was far too noisy from the nearby renovation works in progress, including the cleaning of the outside of the 12th century cathedral just past the square.
The rear of the cathedral afforded a
good view of its Burgundian style roof:
The views from the walls were amazing but it wasn’t clear
enough to see the Alps when we were on the western side but apparently, they
can be seen under the right conditions.
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| Looking over lake Liez to the west |
Lake Liez is one of four reservoirs built at the summit of our canal to keep it supplied with water. Our next mooring will probably be alongside the lake.
Every so often we came across a numbered stone and couldn’t find
out their origin, but they were probably used for location identification as
they were in sequence (well, many were missing) but not uniformly spaced.
The railway reached Langres in 1858 when the
Paris-Mulhouse line was built. Being by the Marne
and the canal in the valley below meant the station was a couple of kilometres from the
town. In 1887 a steam driven rack and
pinion railway was built to link the station with the town and was electrified
in 1935. This operated until 1971 and
one of the carriages is on display at the top.
The French word for that type of railway is crémaillère and
as we’d practically circumnavigated the town when we reached it, we visited a
bar of the same name for a well-earned beer.
French bars and restaurants had opened up the previous Wednesday but
only on outside terraces and this place seemed popular with the locals. After a couple of drinks, we thought the food
smelt so good that we decided to stop and eat there too. We’re not used to a big three course meal at
lunchtime, even though we were there for 2 ½ hours, so we were unable to eat
later in the day.
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| It started with a beer and a coffee |
The other guests were all clearly locals as they all used the traditional French greetings even with the restaurant owners. It must be a strange time for them as it seems that they will shortly be getting foreign tourists which will change the look and feel of many towns. For example, Langres has those ‘tourist’ car trains that are seen the world over, although it must be quite hair-raising for walkers and cyclists when they do the circuit of the walls.
I must admit that when each of us went inside to use the loo
that we both forgot to put on our masks and, in retrospect we realised we weren’t
picked up for it either. Mind you, it
wasn’t surprising as there were some guys eating inside which is against the current
confinement regulations.
Saturday promised to be another fine day but before going
anywhere we did some planning for the next few weeks. After an early lunch, we set off to walk to
the lake that we saw from the top of Langres on Friday. As well as plenty of butterflies, including
our first wall for a while, we saw a western whip snake sunning itself on a
large log. It soon disappeared when it
became aware of us but we earmarked the spot so we could walk slower and
quieter when we came back.
When we reached the reservoir, we had a quick look around
the information boards before walking across the top of the dam. One of the boards helped put the water supply
to the canal in context. It showed the
four reservoirs that were built to feed it in relation to the points where the
feeder channels ran into it.
The ‘E’s are the lock numbers leading up to the summit. Langres, is between E2 and E3 on the left
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| The lake would be teeming with water-sports in normal times |
Looking down the other side of the dam we could see a house built along the same lines as the lock cottages on the canal. No doubt that was where the guy lives who works on the various sluices along the dam.
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| Dam keeper’s house |
The canal feeder or rigole can be seen leaving the dam and heading off to the right in the picture above.
Every week, each VNF region sends out a report on the state
of its waterways and the water reserves.
We are nearly at the southern end of the North-East region and the state
of play looks pretty good over the whole area:
The orange length of the Canal de la Marne au Rhin Ouest in the middle
of the map indicates that the depth is restricted to 2 metres. The picture was completely different over the
last two years with many orange stretches and by late summer there were a few
red ones too.
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| Information relating to the reservoirs |
Again, in previous years much of the green would have been orange or red.
To avoid walking back to the canal the same way we'd come up to the reservoir we thought we would follow the rigole which, by definition, must take us back to it. It joined the canal just above the top lock into the 10-kilometre-long summit pound.
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| Following the rigole from lake Liez |
We remembered to take it stealthily when we reached the log pile again and this time we were rewarded with an adder sunning itself. Unfortunately, it skedaddled really quickly so there wasn’t time to fully identify it as there is more than one type of adder/viper found in this part of France.
When we got home, we did a bit more planning and then joined
Buddy who loves nothing better than lazing outside in the weather we’re
currently enjoying.
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