Reggie, Henry (that’s the tent by the way; Henry Helium 100) & I arrived about an hour ago in Metz and it was very wet. Horrible, boring rain that depresses you, not the Wagnerian stuff that I so much enjoyed the other day in Meuse country. There was nothing dramatic about this downpour; it was just rain. It had rained most of the way from Thionville and as the route was mainly on fairly busy roads – there was no ‘voie verte’ to follow this side of Thionville – it made for a bit of a 30 kilometre trudge. Here are the stats for the cycling today by the way; Cycling time: 5 hrs 10 mins 30 secs
Distance: 98.28 kms
Average speed: 18.9 kms/hr
Maximum speed: 49.4 kms/hr
Eurovelo 5 distance: 931.3 kms
But things are looking up! The sun is kind of out and it has stopped raining. I paused in town for a beer and to ask for a map and directions to the tourist office (the lady who dealt with me had four flags on her badge indicating the languages she spoke and after dealing with me, in French, she asked me where I came from “pour les statistiques” – I was rather proud of myself for not being bleedingly obviously English) then made my way over to the site which, as you can see is on the banks of the Moselle. It’s very pretty from this angle; turn around 180 degrees and you have a view of the municipal swimming pool which is cleverly disguised as a nuclear power station.
There is now even blue sky. I’m off for a shower and then will pop into town to discover Metz in the time I have available; first impressions are good!