It's our independence day...

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...and we're in Reims, France, about an hour northeast of Paris. It is a gorgeous little town of about 200,000, and it feels good to be here after three nights in Paris.

Not that Paris wasn't a great scene, but Reims offers much of the same French urban experience -- charming sidewalk cafes, good wine, quaint shutter-and-wrought-iron-laden buildings, grandiose Gothic architecture, shopping -- with more hospitality and lower prices and without throngs of obnoxious tourists like ourselves.

Plus, this is where they make Champagne with a capitol C. You don't save any money on it by coming to the source, but it's exciting to drive through small agricultural villages whose whole economy is devoted to creating New Year's Day headaches.

Yesterday afternoon and today we broke out the Ford Fiesta (that's how we roll) for a couple of scenic drives around the vineyards south of Reims, and this morning we hoofed it through torrential rain to see the Cathedral here, a massive chunk of crumbling Gothic stonework that has been at the center of French history for 1000 years or so. Kings were coronated there for 800 years, and France and Germany kissed and made up there when, in 1962, de Gaulle and Adenauer prayed together. Awww.

Okay. Pictures.

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Photos

Chagall stained glass
Marc Chagall put together these stained glass windows for the Reims Cathedral in 1985.

Reims Cathedral
Looking down the arcade.

Vines on the Marne
Pinot Noir grapes, slowly becoming champagne, along the Marne river near Epernay.

Our car
A sporty little European . . . Ford.

Random Champagne monument
Most of the little towns in the Champagne region have corny monuments to champagne that wouldn't look out of place alongside the Trees of Mystery. Here's one.