Dijon - Is this the home of Mustard??????

Elona typing

As always in France, a lovely scenic drive brought us to our next destination: Dijon. Again we reminded ourselves that it is important when travelling to actually ascertain how big a place is and how many people it contains as we are well and truly over the cities and find ourselves staying in one but travelling out of them to see sites – thank god for the car I guess, otherwise this would not be available to us! Therefore we were quite shocked to see the immense size of Dijon in comparison to the wee villages we had been visiting but none the less we thought at least to grab some mustard!!!! Well blow us down – this was no easy feat people, we’re telling you!!! Everybody knows Dijon mustard even if they don’t eat the stuff and in all the places we have visited, the locals make sure to market their well-known product/s to the tourists. Not so here in the beautiful Dijon.

Our first night in Dijon we were faced with an electrical fault in the entire street which left not only our hotel but every hotel and restaurant in the close vicinity out of power!! Not great when we both had been driving all day and it was getting late and we were a tad hungry but after a sizable walk we did find ourselves an Italian restaurant that not only had power but was still cooking food!!! Now Italian restaurants are a little like Irish Pubs, we’ve decided – they are just bloody everywhere!!!! Handy though – what was nice about this one was the lovely olives we got given to have with our wine – what was not so nice was that they were taken away with our empty glasses and we hadn’t finished them L

Our next day in Dijon we left Dijon (LOL) and went into Beune – sometimes spelt with an ‘s’ at the end – depends on what sign you are looking at. Anyway this is a glorious little historic town that has all those wonderful cobbled narrow roads that our GPS just LOVES to take us down!!! I did manage another nifty park – you may scoff but I’m telling you this whole reverse park thing when you’re on the wrong side of the car and the wrong side of the road kinda played havoc with my head for awhile so when I managed a perfect reverse parallel park in a tight squeezie spot I felt mightily proud and hence there is a photo or two LOL.

We shared a fabulous lunch and wandered the streets a little but this day was dedicated to the blog apart from this little venture out for lunch. We find if we get too far behind it becomes very difficult to remember all those little quirky things that happen so we decided to ensure we give ourselves a half day every so often to do just the blog.

On recommendation from the lady in Montmiral we ventured out again to Beune to find the Hospice and once again we are so very thankful to the people who have given us these wonderful recommendations because they never fail to impress and this was definitely the case for the Hospice. An amazing Flemish tiled building built in 1443 hidden from the streets by a very boring façade but on entering (and a fee I’m afraid but well worth it!) you are faced with a fabulous courtyard that presents the beautiful building in all its glory. See photos. The Flemish tiles were such a hit here that they are now dotted through the surrounding areas. This Hospice is still has a section running as an aged care facility and the rest is a museum to show you what it used to be like as ‘The Palace for the Poor’. We will put more details with the photos to explain certain areas but basically as the name suggests it was a hospice for the poor people who were unable to afford medical care when they were sick or dying; they had a separate room for the palliative care patients. Interestingly when King Lois 'the something' came to visit he was horrified that the males and females were kept in the same room so he funded an extension. Having said that this place was never in need of money because when they purchased the land they also it included the surrounding vineyards – all of this was owned by monks so maybe at the time they needed the money who knows….but anyway through selling wine from the vineyards and the ‘gifts’ donated from well to do people over the centuries, this place has never been short of money and has been dedicated ever since to caring for the poor and needy.

I must say though that I think the retirement village side of things isn’t free and is a very ‘la di da’ place to stay, so you never know Mum  - have a look!!! LOL You know, when you’re old and decrepit (long time yet) but worth a look. He he he.

In the museum of the hospice they also had one of those rooms that keep the temperature constant to preserve paintings and certain artefacts from decaying. It was really amazing - they had a large painting rigged up with an automated, large magnifying glass that glided slowly across the painting to show intricate sections of the painting. Very clever!!!

As usual Megs and I have some bizarre conversations to keep us amused and one of those conversations was on pigs tails. Now we started this on the road somewhere in France where we saw sheep with tails and of course the comment came up about how we in Australia dock the lambikin’s tails and this was then followed by the question of why not here?? Then naturally the flow of the conversation took us to other farmyard animals – I know this is bizarre but I think it’s important for us to look back on this blog and go – OMG that’s right how weird was that!!!

Anyway back to the pigs – Megs brought up that our HOD at the Agricultural Farm at school said they had to dock the piglet’s tails due to them being bitten by the other piglets and getting infections etc. So here we are in this museum looking at these hell old paintings and tapestries and ‘voila’ there are pigs and yes every one of them portrayed have tails! Doesn’t answer our question as to why but this information is then added to the ‘ever growing’ list of things to ask Miss Google.

Now due to the fact that I have just written those 'little bizarre conversations paragraph' and Miss Google I need to tell you about the Flying Fish on the Transatlantic Cruise. Now I’m not sure how dumb we are going to look after this but I’m going to share it with you anyway. I’m sitting having breakfast with the view of the Atlantic – that’s stupid in itself because it didn’t matter where you were there really was only the Atlantic to look at no matter where you were on the cruise!!! But anyway I saw this shiny little…what I thought was a bird flying very low to the waterline and just gliding over the calm waters when the damn thing dived into the water. Now I know this is not unusual, we also have birds that dive for fish but the little bugger did not come up!!!! And I sat and watched and then there was another one but it came out of the water did the same gliding thing and then went under and didn’t come up!!!! Freaked me out and of course when I brought it up with Megs the bloody little things would not show up which made me look like a complete dufus who was suffering some form of Cabin Fever!!!! But hallelujah eventually Meg’s did get to see them and was just as amazed as me. We promised to look these up in Miss Google and didn’t until just very recently in Cornwall and yes they are ‘Flying Fish’ they have wings and can go long distances for bloody fish!! How’s that?!?!

Ok so completely off track….where was I? Ohhhh Dijon: well we did eventually find some mustard – in a supermarket would you believe?! Maybe because Dijon mustard is so common they don’t feel the need to advertise or take advantage of the tourists – who knows – one thing that was apparent was every supermarket in France has at least a few aisles of wine!!! And why not – they have sooooooo many different varieties of wine – fantastic!!! Now, also as good little tourists that we are we went in search of the area that the movie Chocolat was filmed – yes people the gorgeous Mr Johnny Depp. It did not take long to google and find out that Flavigny was the quaint little village that not only hosted the entire film crew but is also the place of the even more famous Anis (lollies/candy) of Flavigny. We had been seeing these wonderful coloured tins – you know the whole bon bon tins??!! – that had the lovely old picture on the front of young love or French courtiers and filled with different varieties of these lollies. Well apparently they have been making these wonderful anis lollies since the monks arrived way back when!!!!!!! It is still made traditionally today and is obviously the draw card to Flavigny because it’s not the chocolat shop – it is still there but is closed and has dust all over the windows where people have used their fingers to inscribe their undying love of the movie or of course Johnny!! Now if you have the money this would be a fabulous money making adventure – buy the shop and open up a chocolatier and decorate the shop with paraphernalia from the movie – you would make a mint!!! You can see on Miss Google that there are enough loonies in the world like us who would seek out this tiny village for NOT what it is actually famous for LOL!!

Overall we have to say that Dijon seems to be more interested in their wines than their mustard but we did learn that a lot of mustards created here use the sediment from the champagne bottles that is taken out during the gorging process – read the next blog on Champagne to get the details of this amazing process J Thank you Dijon for your accommodation and sorry that we didn’t spend a great deal of time in the city itself but your surrounding areas are just too enticing!!!!

This is our little Toyota Aygo - smaller that a Yaris with way less grunt especially on the up hill.  This is the car we got when we thought we had ordered a medium size car that would fit 5 adults and 2 full size pieces of luggage? Maybe they meant 5 adults OR 2 full size pieces of luggage!

Elona - proud as can be with her perfect parallel parking efforts.

Notre Dame - Beune!

This is not the first time we had visited a Notre Dame church and we were a bit perplexed why all the towns would name one church (usually only if they have more than one church) Notre Dame.  So further investigation was required - translator app on the Itouch - Notre Dame means "Our Lady". 

escargot anyone???

Terrines and Fois Gras

Ahhhhhhh - real champagne and you really can taste the difference! 

Cheers!

What's better than a glass of Champagne?

A glass of Champagne and an authentically made carbonara with separate egg yolk!

Have noticed that different regions and types of road works use different coloured barriers

Dijon was using a lovely shade of Purple here!

Flavigny for people who don't read the blog (Sarah) and just look at the pictures is the town used in the Johnny Depp movie Chocolat!

Look at that little door in the background!!

One of the older signs with modern above.

Some amazing buildings that are still lived in.

This is the now abandoned Chocolate Shop from the movie - if we could actually get photos close enough you would see people have written their undying love for Johnny Depp in the dusty windows.

The shop front is vacant and ready for anyone with the start-up capital and chocolate making knowledge to make a fortune from tourists just like ourselves!

Inside the window of the once famous Chocolate shop

You can see how easy it is to get two cars down this street - that is only if  they

are going in the same direction!!

One of the houses of Flavigny with a beautiful much loved vintage car out the front.

Church of Beaune - Notre Dame

This is where we had a lovely lunch :)

Lots of restaurants use these cutlery packages with a napkin.

Good idea for advertising

Yes shocking I know but at least it's a little coffee - believe it

or not it is a latte just in miniature!!

Now that does not say Aspergers, it says Asperges - meaning asparagus. 

Have to say we did a double take or two when reading the signs.

M and Ms can be hard to find on occasion - 

but never any shortage in the range of available wines in a French grocery store.

Quick Megs stand in that arch so I can take a photo!!

Actually this is what you have to do when a car comes down the road as

there is not enough room for the car and you!

Beautiful flights walking around Flavigny

There is always at least one Virgin Mary in every town

Lovely arch

that lead to this lovely garden

Always, always cats in medieval towns!!! Must be the rats and

mice?!?!

And another

Notice the barred window - this is something that obviously is unavoidable

in these modern times - it is to stop the stained glass being broken by vandals

Flemish Virgin Mary - how do I know you ask?? If the child is on the

right arm of Mary not the left it is Flemish...there you go!!

Town square - and if you have seen Chocolat - this is where the statue of

the Comte de Reynaud was located

People really only have the ability to garden in pots - and most do an exceptional job.

This one is lovely

This is the tourist sign for the Anis lollies/candy - notice no Chocolat signs.

There was only one sign that mentioned the location of the shop

This is one of the gift bags of the goodies we bought for family

McDonalds here in France is a lovely green and gold in comparison to the gaudy

red and yellow we have

Driving on country roads gives you the most wonderful opportunities to

witness lovely little towns like this that we would never normally see travelling on the motorways

This is Flemish Tiling - started when they built the Hospice of Beaune and

was so popular that it is found in the surrounding areas as well

It's quite ornate in comparison to the straight stonework you

usually see or plain tiles

This is the facade of the Hospice of Beaune

This is in the courtyard

Amazing building

Wonderful tiles

This building held not only rooms for the poor but had

a palliative care area, chemist, monks, nuns and old people.

They still to do this day have a retirement section - I'm not sure whether that

is free anymore!

Very impressive though - this place is kept immaculate

They have kept the rooms as they were and you can see the beds

and what was available for the sick and poor that stayed here

I'm sure for the time this was absolute luxury for some people

This is one of the original beds with the rope hanging down to assist the

patient in raising themselves up and the lovely mannequin there

showing you how the nuns looked then

Each bed had a little table and shelving space and a private area behind the back curtain

and they could pull the curtain in the front to give full privacy

There was a lovely chapel within the building as well

Virgin Mary - not Flemish (due to the child being positioned on the left)

This is actually a cleaner working on the windows!!

Palliative Care Room

Some amazing paintings 

This was a wooden/stick representation created by a patient of the hospice many

years ago

The kitchen in this place was enormous!!!!

Lots of rotisseries and plenty of oven space

The swan heads are actually taps - they were referred to as the long ducks -

quite a luxury for the time

Very large oven

This is the retirement home - looked really nice!!

A little garden we saw on the way home from Beaune

You know you're in the country when you have to share the road with tractors

but here in vineyard country the tractors are only as wide as the space between

the rows of vines - very funny looking:)

Can't find bloody Dijon Mustard but hey wine...what kind would you like??

This is local supermarket with three aisles dedicated to wine only.

Aha we found mustard!!

Our snack come dinner come we have spent too much money today dinner

Love these gothic churches - they just have that whole medieval thing down pat!!