The is part two of day two of the Euro road trip 2025, day part one can be found HERE.
As roads go, the A6 was pretty dull. The traffic was surprisingly light, the kids fell asleep after a busy morning of well, nothing really, and so Dad was left to drive with just his own thoughts. My main thought was, what the hell has happened to all of the frite vans that, back in the 80s and 90s seemed to be parked up at every rest stop and in every layby in France.
Often inside old buses, they served red hot frites in plastic trays with generous helping of mayo. Did they ever exist? Maybe I just dreamt them but, real or not, the memory of them made that journey much more exciting for me.
Maybe the answer was to be found at our next stop. We pulled off the motorway just south of Venoy, in the very heart of the Chablis wine making region. With no wine drinkers in the car, it was a bit of a waste, but the car was thirsty for petrol and so we had to stop. The only food available was the McDonalds, the Americanised alternative to the roadside friterie.
The quality was poor but the fancy French touches were nice. Their “Creamy Delux” sauce was ideal for dipping your chips in, it almost hid the fact that they were cold, limp and disappointing. Mayonnaise like but the undertones of garlic and onion, I hope that they make that a regular back in blighty!
Daughter child had the veggie chicken nuggets and the boy child went for Poutine and I don’t think either of those passed the test to make it back home. The chips, however, did arrive in a red plastic version of the famous McDonalds packaging and so that “accidentally’ fell into the tote bag and made its way into the car with us.
It was maybe another hour and a half down to Dijon, which gave us a total of 385 miles of driving in the day, just 5 miles further than yesterday and those 5 miles were all around and around the Arc de Triomphe! At just over £40 for the road tolls, you couldn’t really complain (but I did).
We managed to park right opposite the hotel which was a very nice Ibis, just on the Place Jean Bouhe. We checked in, refreshed and made the short walk into town which was no more than a 10 minute stroll through town.
Now, the reason why I picked Dijon was simply because of the mustard. I am not a massive fan of the stuff, but I just thought it might be nice to see where it comes from. I also thought it would be nice to go to a place that is a little off the beaten track yet somewhere where people might have heard of. I knew nothing else of the place.
Do you know what, I fell in love with the place. It was an absolute gem of a place to stay. It felt safe, clean and very stylish and pretty. It seemed like with each corner you turned into a more picturesque view. The details and the features on the buildings were just beautiful.
Maybe it was the warm evening sun, maybe it was the fact we were perfectly relaxed on holiday or maybe it was the seemingly endless happy and smiling families walking through the streets, but it was such a lovely place.
All of this pottering about was fun, but we needed a beer and so we picked a lovely little spot called Le Saint Nicolas, which sat under a Tudor style frontage and, inside, there was a pool table and positive vibes. We were well looked after and enjoyed a few cold beers, but they didn’t serve food, so we headed back into town to look for dinner and promised the barman that we would come back. He didn’t believe us.
We eventually, after much picking and choosing, decided to go for Le Menuiserie. It just gave off really nice vibes and looked to be filled with happy and cool locals so we sat outside and made ourselves comfortable. We were warned that there was a limited menu, I forget the reason, but were told that there was ‘only’ Cream Cheese with Garlic, pork and mustard terrine, hummus, bread and cheese biscuits. It was all they had and it was all we needed, simple, done perfectly.
We laughed. We joked. We broke bread. We smiled. We drank. We petted a French dog. Tres Bon.
With a lining on our stomachs, we made good on our promise and walked back to Le Saint Nicolas. We had been away an hour or two and, when we walked back in, I swear that the two guys sat at the bar had not moved, even their beer was still at the same levels in their glasses.
Emboldened by drink, I decided that I would be able to speak perfect French now, so we joined the guys at the bar for a jovial chat. The two guys didn’t look like they were drinking at the bar, they looked like they were a part of it, moulded into the seats while their elbows sat in their hard earned indentation in the wooden bar. The sort of place where, should I have walked in and sat at the seat, I would have been asked to move as that seat is taken.
I asked the barman if he had any calvados, an apple brandy local to Normandy, but something that I have never tried. He looked at me like I was insane. He pretty much demanded that we take a shot of the local stuff and, as a testament to how strong it was, I have very few memories from that moment on and no idea what it was that we all ended up drinking. Shots were lined up on the bar and I bought a drink for everyone in the bar. THAT is how strong it was.
We had such a great time and made some good, if fleeting, friends.
They seemed rather stunned that a family would want to visit Dijon and make the effort to come all this way to be in their town, apparently blind to the beauty of the places around them. I guess you can become blind to the places that you become used to, maybe the people too. We should all take a moment to appreciate the places and the people that we have around us and maybe take for granted.
Right now, I just wanted to appreciate my bed. Tomorrow would be another long drive.
Itchy Feet and Titchy Feet 