I am in a fancy hotel, shaped like a big chalet, in the tiny village of Goumois, half of the village is in France and the other half is in Switzerland. I’m in France at the moment.
A few miles of boring suburbs get me out of Montbelliard (which has a Peugeot car factory, and associated industries) and the route goes off the roads and into the forest and uphill steeply. Further up there are pastures with cows, cow-bells tinkling, but here drowned out by the sound of screaming motorbike engines.From a bike track where they are doing some quite spectacular jumps.The route keeps climbing, up at about 700m here, valley down there is about 400m.Lovely day, though hot and humid, nice in the dappled shade, great bike, what?Later in the afternoon this Church appears, it is the oldest in the area, dating from 11th century.It’s other claim to fame is the tombstones of glass-blowers, which was an industry around here.I imagine that the glass blowers were more skilled than the stone masons.Wine and bread and the Holy Grail, isn’t it?The fine art of stacking firewood.After climbing all that way to the top of the hills the route dives down and down to the river bank. A lovely deserted road winding with the river, evening quiet, mellow.But then I have to climb half a mile up to the hotel, which has this view from the window.And this view in the other direction. Dinner is good, best bits a soup of Girolles to start, local white wine, and a “Chariot de Fromage”.
