Day 27 – Sun 06 Jul 14, Saint-Quentin to Amiens

July 06, 2014

Forecast: 8-20 deg C, mostly cloudy with some showers; Listed distance: 75km; Actual distance: 78km; Cumulative distance: 1070km; Av speed: 18.3 km/h; St-Q: 14 deg C; Amiens: 17 deg C; Wind: WNW, 25 km/h; Start time: 8:25am; Stop time: 3:12pm; Ride time: 4h11m

After a simple but filling breakfast, we left a tad later than usual as breakfast only started at 7:30am because it was Sunday. As we left the city, the weather seemed to be closing in, but we think the 18-25 km/h side-on wind (sometimes a little more headwind and sometimes a little bit from behind) managed to push the rain clouds on before they could deposit their load onto us.

We sighted our first war cemetery about 20km out of St-Q at Villers-Carbonnel. It was a French cemetery and considering the fact that there are 2,000 purely Military and another 1,000 civilian cemeteries where war causalities were buried there are plenty of opportunities for us to pay our respect.

Our first stop was at a Commonwealth War Cemetery (Heath Cemetery) just outside Harbonnniers and 13km from Villers-Bretonneux (V-B), and was predominantly an Aussie cemetery. There were 7 Walkers and 1 Beswick but we don’t know if they were any relations.

The wind, by this stage, was really strong and gusty and Wendy said she was “wobbling” like a drunk down the road! The route was also a bit hilly and she started to have a sense of humour failure just before we got to V-B. We turned right at V-B and then had a definite tail wind all the way to the Cemetery and Memorial which was fantastic! V-B is the Australian National Memorial site for the Western Front with 779 Aussie graves. There is also a remembrance wall with 10,707 names of diggers who died but no trace was found. A very peaceful, inspiring and moving place to be. May God bless the soul of each and every one of these brave men and may they RIP.

Just as we were about to leave V-B, the rain arrived, and it wasn't necessarily vertical rain either. So, we retrieved the bikes and brought them under cover with us and dug out our wet weather gear - jacket and pants (Greg also put his booties on), waited for a while until the rain eased a bit and then left. Well, the rain got worse but it was only 20 km to Amiens, so we just got on with the job.

As it was raining we didn't have the phone on the handlebars and overshot our turn to the hotel. We had to back track a bit, but eventually found the Campanile Amiens Centre-Gare. Before entering the foyer, we stripped off the outer garments so as to not flood the ground floor of the hotel. Wendy didn't realise how awful she looked until we got in the lift to go to the room and saw herself in the mirror. She looked like she had been through the spin cycle of the washing machine so you can imagine the look on the face of the check-in chick. Anyway.. After shedding all our gear and unpacking we had a cup of tea each and then a shower to clean and warm up.

Greg decided he needed to go back out into the ghastly weather to have a wander. Wendy should have gone with him, as the sun came out not long after he left. Oh well, the time in gave her the opportunity to update blogs and reply to emails, etc. Amiens seems a nice place but it was a little soggy and quiet till the sun appeared about 6pm. There was another enormous Cathedral, Notre-Dame, 145m long x 70m wide x 42m high, but this one is full of fascinating artwork, religious artefacts and fittings. A great place to spend an hour or so. The Choir was practicing so it was a special time to visit.

As Greg didn't find any decent restaurants at which to eat dinner, we decided to eat in the in-house restaurant. We didn't have a booking and that made the waitress flap and ask us if we could wait 5-10 minutes. This was despite the fact the restaurant was only half full at the time and remained that way for the entire night. We were both quite hungry by that stage but we said "ok" and ordered a beer each from the bar, expecting they would summons us for dinner soon. We both had 500ml beers and finished them (almost an hour later) and still nothing. So Greg went and asked the male waiter who said in a lovely British or Irish accent "of course you can have a table, pick one of your choice". What the??? It then took them another 30 mins to cook a penne pasta and bolognaise sauce for me and trout for Greg. We would probably not eat at that restaurant again, but would definitely stay in the hotel again, despite some poor reviews.

After dinner we went for a short walk then home to bed.