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Graham & Jane
Today was a day of a couple of short visits with a fair amount of cruising in between.
We started the day in Tournon which is one of the wine towns on the Rhone, possibly most famous for being directly across the river from the original site of Hermitage, where on the top of the hill can be found a small chapel which was the home of a monk who had decided to become a hermit to contemplate his faith. Hence the name Hermitage.
The hill produces some of the most expensive wines in France with some bottles recently selling for over US$8000 per bottle. Above the town was the St Joseph winery which by comparison was much more reasonably priced at between E20 & E50 per bottle.
It also claimed as it its most famous son Marc Seguin, who was an engineer in the early 18th century and worked with Stephenson on improving the performance of the tubular steam engines. He is also responsible for designing the bridge thought to be one of the oldest steel cable bridges in the world.
However all in all the town was a little run down, it was obviously a stopping point at one stage when roads were not as well built as they are today.
On returning to our cabin we found the caps had been having fun with some new found friends to compensate for being left alone on the ship.
We then cruised down the Rhone for a few hours passing among many pleasant views, including something you don't see very often, a nuclear power plant. France supplies some 80% of its power usage by nuclear power, and given the wealth of uranium we have in Australia you have to wonder why we are not doing the same. Renewables are obviously working as SA found out.
We docked around 5pm in the small town of Viviers which again as a town was quite run down, however like lots of these small towns has a magnificent cathedral, situated high up on the hill above the town with the most magnificent views down over the Rhone valley. Once we had made our way through this medieval town to the cathedral (Jane went on the bus) over deeply cobbled and steep streets we were treated to 1/2 hour concert on the magnificent pipe organ. This is in wonderful condition, mainly thanks to Sony, EMI and various chamber orchestras who come here to play thanks to the fantastic acoustics.
We started the day in Tournon which is one of the wine towns on the Rhone, possibly most famous for being directly across the river from the original site of Hermitage, where on the top of the hill can be found a small chapel which was the home of a monk who had decided to become a hermit to contemplate his faith. Hence the name Hermitage.
The hill produces some of the most expensive wines in France with some bottles recently selling for over US$8000 per bottle. Above the town was the St Joseph winery which by comparison was much more reasonably priced at between E20 & E50 per bottle.
It also claimed as it its most famous son Marc Seguin, who was an engineer in the early 18th century and worked with Stephenson on improving the performance of the tubular steam engines. He is also responsible for designing the bridge thought to be one of the oldest steel cable bridges in the world.
However all in all the town was a little run down, it was obviously a stopping point at one stage when roads were not as well built as they are today.
On returning to our cabin we found the caps had been having fun with some new found friends to compensate for being left alone on the ship.
We then cruised down the Rhone for a few hours passing among many pleasant views, including something you don't see very often, a nuclear power plant. France supplies some 80% of its power usage by nuclear power, and given the wealth of uranium we have in Australia you have to wonder why we are not doing the same. Renewables are obviously working as SA found out.
We docked around 5pm in the small town of Viviers which again as a town was quite run down, however like lots of these small towns has a magnificent cathedral, situated high up on the hill above the town with the most magnificent views down over the Rhone valley. Once we had made our way through this medieval town to the cathedral (Jane went on the bus) over deeply cobbled and steep streets we were treated to 1/2 hour concert on the magnificent pipe organ. This is in wonderful condition, mainly thanks to Sony, EMI and various chamber orchestras who come here to play thanks to the fantastic acoustics.
- comments
Bruce and Anne That's an improvement?
Bruce and Anne With a window??