Vaux-le-Vicomte and the Brie Region Bike Tour

Well that's the only urbanized area we are going to visit today since the rest of the ride will take us through the nearby rural, agricultural countryside and its numerous quaint, unknown centuries old villages. Once you exit the Melun city limits there is no doubt your are leaving civilization behind.




After a few minutes we arrive in the first anonymous town of Maincy. We'll take a little ride around town and then I'll tell you what I know about Maincy.






Here we see some typical ''maisons briardes'' (houses of the Brie region).




This reminds me that I need to tell you that we are in the Brie region, from whence is derived the name of the famous cheese. I should also back up and tell you that there are several varieties of Brie cheese with one being Brie of Melun, which as you might guess takes its name from the small city we just left.




The store on the left in the next photo is one of the three or four commercial establishments in town. When you get out into the countryside a town with three or four stores is a veritable metropolis.

Here we see one of the two or three old lavoirs (wash houses) which still remain.




Here is Le Moulin de la Chambre, one of four mills in Maincy.




I was finishing up my visit and getting ready to leave Maincy when I saw this sign, indicating a historic monument.




I can't tell you how many times I've seen one of these signs and then head off in the direction to which it points only to discover no further signage indicating how to find the noted attraction. Such was the case with this sign so I just moved on. Only later did I discover that the Pont de Maincy was a little bridge immortalized in a painting by Paul Cézanne which now hangs in the Musée d'Orsay. So I have no picture of what it probably the town's most famous attraction. Doh!!! I promise to show it to you, however, if you come riding with me.

Now it was time to move on to the most famous attraction on this ride, the Château de Vaux-le-Vicomte. Here is my approach.




If you've heard of Vaux-le-Vicomte before then bear with me for a few minutes while I explain a bit about it to those who have never heard of it. There are entire books written about Vaux-le-Vicomte and its ill fated owner Niclolas Fouquet so I'm going to be as brief as possible to give a general overview of why Vaux-le-Vicomte is so important and worth visiting.

Vaux-le-Vicomte was one of the most important châteaux built in the 17th century and was the inspiration for Louis XIV's much more famous (and visited) château at Versailles, as well as many other châteaux. Its fame was due to its architectural design and the layout of the gardens both of which would later come to define what was known as the Louis XIV style. At the time it was built it was the most elaborate and grand château in France. While this fact alone would make it famous what magnifies its importance is the personal tale of the owner, Nicolas Fouquet, whose spectacular downfall from a position of wealth and power to life imprisonment makes its telling worthy of comparison to a Greek tragedy.

Nicolas Fouquet was the superintendent of finances under Louis XIV and had his famous château constructed from 1656 to 1661. At Vaux-le-Vicomte the architect Louis LeVau, the landsape architect André le Nôtre and the painter/decorator Charles Le Brun worked together on a large scale project for the first time. Fouquet was a lover and patron of the arts and a lover of beauty and pleasure in every form. He showered many of the noted artists of the day with gifts, commissions and encouragement and thereby attracted other distinguished individuals, patrons and persons of the court.

On August 17, 1661 Louis XIV wished to visit the château to check on its progress as he had heard many wonderful reports about it from those in the court. Fouquet was not without ambition as he was seeking to inherit the position of First Minister from the previous First Minister Cardinal Mazarin, who had recently died. To win over the king Fouquet planned a spectacular festival in the kings honor that would become known as the party of the century. However Fouquet's underling, Jean-Baptiste Colbert, had his own ambitions and had been whispering negative things in the kings ear about Fouquet, including charges of embezzlement and that he was at the head of an anti-royalist plot. The king had his own reasons for wanting to get rid of Fouquet (I won't get into all the details) and was actually going to Vaux-le-Vicomte with the intention of arresting him.

At the party there was much celebration, pomp and grand display of all manner and Molière even performed a play. All of this was followed by a dazzling fireworks display to finish off the night. Fouquet was at the pinnacle of his glory, and on the precipice of his downfall. The king wanted to arrest Fouquet right then and there but was talked out of this by the queen, who advised him to retain his composure in front of the guests since this was a party in his honor. Since Louis had one of the biggest egos in history and Vaux-le-Vicomte was more opulent and luxurious than any of his residences he must also have been boiling with jealousy. A few weeks later Fouquet was arrested on trumped up charges and after a lengthy three year trial was imprisoned for the remainder of his life, which lasted until 1680. Voltaire later commented of the party, ''On 17 August, at six in the evening Fouquet was the King of France: at two in the morning he was nobody." Louis then went on to employ Le Vau, Le Brun and le Nôtre in the construction of his even grander (some, including myself, would say less tasteful) château at Versailles.

There's obviously much more depth and texture to this story than I am providing here but this is a report about biking, not châteaux, so if you want to learn more about Vaux-le-Vicomte here is the link to the official website:

www.vaux-le-vicomte.com/en/index.php

I didn't visit the château today so all I have to show you is a few pictures I took from outside the front gate, and since the sun was shining directly into the camera lens they're not even great pictures but it's all I've got.










I left Vaux-le-Vicomte behind and headed on to the next town of Moisenay.




If there was anything of great historical importance I could tell you about Moisenay I certainly would. But there isn't. Its two ''tourist attractions'' are the park by the little river with an old mill building, a bridge made of stone and the bell tower of the 12th to 13th century church, which is the only one in the Seine-et-Marne department made entirely of stone. I saw the church but I didn't visit the mill and bridge. Perhaps we'll take a little detour to visit them next time. Nonetheless, it's the kind of quaint little rural village I like to ride through so I did. And you will too. So let's see it.

The medieval castle in Blandy principally dates from the 13th and 14th centuries with later periods of alteration, destruction and eventual renovation of what was able to be preserved. It fits ones image of a medieval castle with high walls and towers and a now dry moat which surrounds it.

And on through the countryside to the nearby village of Champeaux.




Remember all the sports cars I saw at the castle? Well, the show must have ended and they were now free to do what they do best, and that's driving really fast.




Next up is Champeaux.














The town website for Champeaux has one fairly lengthy page detailing the history of the village as far back as the early 7th century. I'm not going to bore you with the minutia since it's fairly banal stuff that wouldn't terribly fascinate you. But it's still impressive to see how even the tiniest villages in France have such extensive histories.

Inside the church in Champeaux I noticed the same cartoon boards I had seen in the church in Blandy. I figured out what was happening and that is that a cartoonist was exhibiting his works in various churches throughout the region. Here's an explanation of the exhibit.




It says: ''Today we are the poorest country in Europe when it comes to religious culture. Let's accept to start over from scratch and get back to what is essential. This is the goal of this modest exhibition, which is brightened by the humor of Piem (the cartoonist). This exhibition can be interactive. You will find all the necessary indications to reach a correspondant''.

Okay, that last sentence sounds a little strange because I can't figure out a good translation so I just did it word by word.

A few cartoons.



The above says ''Jesus of Nazareth shares all our pain.''



Jesus asks for 1 bread and 1 fish and the woman asks for how many people.

And a couple final photos of Champeaux.





Next town, Saint Méry.

The next town I enter is La Chapelle Gauthier.






The church in the above photo dates to the 13th century and the château in the following photo dates to 1618 and is presently the town hall, although it appears to be under renovation at present. Both these buildings are classified as national monuments.










As you can see I am entering Saint-Ouen-en-Brie.

There is one final place to visit before our journey ends and that is a medieval fortified farm known as the Fief des Epoisses.



And up close.




When I got home I googled the name to see what this place was all about. Here's what their website told me:

Its name comes from the old French word “espesse” which means “thickness”, a dense forest. One can easily imagine the Fief, at the time, with its tower and crenels dominating the dense thickets, completely surrounded by a vast forest. Its origins go back very far ; it was cited for the first time in 1285, in the Partition Charter of the Viscount de Melun, between the two brothers Adam and Jean ; Jean’s share included the rent and income for the Epoisses.

Learning that this place was once surrounded by a dense forest gives one the indication as to just how much tree cutting has occurred in this region over the last 800 years. Today it is being used as a business conference center.

Time for a little rest under a nice shady tree.



Back to the road.






Perhaps you've committed some sort of felony offense and need a place to lay low for a while. This Gîte Rural is in the middle of nowhere and I'm pretty sure no one would ever think of looking for you here.



More open road.




And here are a couple of photos of Mormant where the journey ends and we take the train back to Paris.







Our bike tour day trip from Pairs to go biking in the French countryside is now over so that is all there is to show you today. Hope you enjoyed the ride. We'll head back to do some biking in Paris, sort of a mini bike tour in Paris, on our way to return the bikes before we part company.

Hi zefer. Leave Melun on the Boulevard de Maincy, which will turn into the rue de Melun once you leave the city. This brings you to Maincy. Leave Maincy on the D82 then the D636 and then take the D215 past Vaux-le-Vicomte. Continuing past Vaux take your first right into Moisenay and take the main road through the village and on to Blandy-les-Tours. Do the same in reverse to get back to Melun. Get Michelin map #514 for the Île-de-France and guide yourself. Take a train from Gare de Lyon to Melun and a return train from Mormant to Paris from Mormant. Use a Mobilis one day pass for zones 1-5 for your train ticket. Use www.transilien.com for train schedules. Have fun.

I don't know of any place that you could rent a bike in Melun so I would rent it in Paris and bring it on the train with you. Depending on how much biking you want to do you can return to Melun after Blandy or look at the map and find your way to Mormant and take the train back from there.