Cat's gone riding: From Cambridgeshire to the Cevennes

The three of us left Cambridgeshire in the night of the 28th of March. Meet the team!

Axle

Ruby

Our first stopover took us to Troyes, a town of medieval architectural interest and also famous for the episode of the ‘Cheval de Troyes’ from the Greek mythology. The Greeks having besieged for 10 years the town decided to resort to a stratagem of war to invade Troyes. They built a giant hollow wooden horse which contained soldiers. The citizens of Troyes accepted the offering of the horse and consequently fell victims to the Greek army led by Ulysses. This is in this episode that Ulysses gave a valuable advice in that stratagem unlike trickery and crime, is a lawful evil in society, game and international relation.

On our second leg of the journey going south, we drove on National roads (as opposed to motorways).

Plane tree lined National road

This is a great way to travel if time is on your side. National roads took us through splendid countryside, plane tree lined roads and enables us to experience the famous ritual of the baguette which always takes place by the boulangerie on every villages and towns you drive through. This is how it goes ~ Double park your car alongside one which is already parked, let the engine run and don’t use your hazard light, run in the bread shop and on your way out ignore the queue of car which has formed behind your Renaud, don’t be apologetic and drive off with your baguette. It sounds such a cliché but is so true and amusing again, if time is no object.

We carried on the deserted motorway through the vast and beautiful Massif Central’s North regions also known as the volcano region. This led us to our second stopover, the Cévennes, region of the Southern part of the Massif Central. We laid camp for three nights. The Cévennes is wilderness France for those who take their escapism seriously and hiking there is something not to be missed. Here are a few snaps.