Sunday:  On our way to the north of France we stopped to see a gorgeous chateau in Sercy. This is Marie-Annick with me. Below Francis and I are standing in front of the cathedral in Reims. It was spectacular inside as well as outside. We also walked around the cathedral and through a beautiful garden in back.

 On Monday, April 23rd, we drove to Béthune to visit the morning market and the bell tower below.

 Later we climbed the 144 steps to the top of the tower, but first we toured the local church...not as grand as the cathedrale in Reims, but certainly impressive!

 This is a French version of Okemo...it is white plastic! When water is run over the plastic, you can ski down the hill! This area of France is flat, which is why bell towers were built to see if any enemy was approaching. But it was also a coal mining area until fairly recently and unusable coal that could not be separated from the dirt was piled up into hills as shown in the last picture so using a coal-hill for skiing is pretty ingenious.

 Below is the biggest music box I ever expect to see! This is above the 37 bells and it rolls every 15 minutes to make the bells play their different tunes. We got to hear them all, some before our tour and some while we were in the tower!

Change the colors and this could be the pyramids of Egypt...strange that dirty coal could become an interesting landmark. If we have time, we may tour one of the old mines. Tomorrow we head for Lille.