cross country again, to the east, from Chateau-Thierry through Epernay, Montmiral, and on to Verdun

So back to traveling again. A couple of hours is all, which is typical for us, we have not had a travel day yet take over four hours and that day we were seriously lost. Most are about two. So this day, Chateau-Thierry to Verdun about a two hour drive —  Google maps will not draw our trip, none of the map drawing programs draw our trips. We go a more straight line than those programs draw and we do not use the big roads or we do a bit of a jog north or south then straight. And we do try to avoid a big town, though we do get a beltline or two around a town.

This trip we did drive through Epernay, not one of your bigger towns, though Epernay will show up on a map as it is more than a cross roads. Montmiral is a crossroads and if you add a hyphen and a historical marker you have yourself a Napoleon victory site over the Prussians in 1814.  Found the marker quite by accident, just there by the side of the road, had to back up, but no one was back there so that part was easy.

There it is - February 11, 1814. Two hundred and two years ago and there was no bicentennial celebration that I was aware of. According to the historical marker on the other side of the road, this victory illustrated Napoleon's military genius and also his ability to lead the French people as this came just two years after his retreat from Russia.

There was another marker in the crossroad in the actual town of Montmirail. Four buildings and a crossroads with another marker with about half dozen cannon. The town must had had some pull to get their own monument when the actual battlefield site was a couple of miles to the west!

Montmirial also has sign posts. We stayed on D933 for a good distance, also D22.

Forget just which of the two roads we were on when we came upon this WWI French Cemetery the Dombasle en Argonne.  It just appeared as we were driving along the back roads up against the trees.  The wind was quite strong as it has been this past week and was whipping the flag flying over the site.

And looking back over the farm land at our car and the road over which we had come and obviously the land over which these soldiers fought and died in some 100 years ago. In this part of France you are never far from a reminder of the "Great War".

It is not all country-side as noted from above crossroads with sign post. We even found a town with a full fledged restaurant that was OPEN. These places are present but open only select hours of the day --who knew? We stopped and went in ready for something to eat. Well a couple of guys are drinking beer in the bar side of Clermont en Argonne's only dining establishment and an elderly couple are eating lunch in the dining room, three guys also eating, and whoop-dee-do, in come strangers. Yeup, that would be us'uns.  

Our little spoken French, the waiter/cook/cashier/manager 's little spoken English means we are on our own. I selected— from the menu, plate de jour and coffee. Pleasantly surprised, it turned out to be quite good. Some kind of pork chop, potatoes and peas. Patt chose something else, it turned out to be a trip to some kind of a salad and cold cuts bar. She was somewhat unpleasantly surprised. The coffee came in a thimble - we were not surprised. We have had two sip coffee before.  

Citizens of Clermont seemed glad to have us in town.  We were glad to be there.