Cathedrals, chicks and Coypu.....

We had the most wonderful day yesterday. As I write we are staying at a campsite west of Strasbourg at Molsheim in the Alsace region of France, we are surrounded here by dedicated cycle tracks, so yesterday morning we all set out in the direction of Strasbourg. The cycle path followed the Canal de la Bruche  and is completely flat, passing through the beautiful French countryside, along the way we saw storks, ducks with their ducklings, swan and signets, moorhens with their chicks and swimming serenely along the canal - a coypu! ( we thought it was a beaver but when we looked it up in the book we realised it wasn't as the tail was long and thin)

John & Ann left us early to get back for their dog but we just pedalled along this lovely track until we found ourselves in the centre of Strasbourg. A beautiful and peaceful city with little traffic but for the cycles. We cycled to the Cathedral de Notre Dame - a most amazing example of medieval stone lacework. It's just incredible the work that goes into creating these magnificent buildings often over hundreds of years, you can't help but wonder as to how it was all done without our modern technology. The rest of the inner city is full of well restored old buildings and bridges over the network of canals and we spent an enjoyable afternoon sightseeing and people-watching the tourists!

By the time we pedalled back to the campsite we had clocked up over 33miles - we were a bit saddlesore but it was a lovely way to spend a day cycling in the countryside and sightseeing in the city.

We had arrived here in Molsheim on Sunday having spent two days in Luxembourg, still with our friends John & Ann doing our usual thing - cycling! We stayed at Camping Krouniberg at Mersch where we had stayed last year on our way to Croatia so we knew our way around a bit - where to buy coffee and a cake and where to find the local supermarket..... And luckily our weather is keeping fine in fact, it is set to improve until later in the week when we might expect wet snow when we move on into Switzerland! 

It's now over a week since that wet and miserable day we crossed the channel, we have cycled over a hundred miles on various cycle tracks, we have enjoyed the company of our campervan friends John and Ann (with their dog Boots) but now it's time to part company and head further south into Switzerland whilst John and Ann head east to Germany and Austria.

So it's off to the supermarket in the morning to stock up with food and Switzerland here we come!