Magnificent Amiens Cathedral

Tuesday
Our stay in England came to an end today. We had an early start, since we needed to get Jen to Manchester airport by 8 am for her flight back to the States. Fortunately it's not too far from Janet and John's to the airport. Having dropped Jen off, we continued south to Dover where we took the tunnel back to France. We broke our journey in France at Amiens, as I had been wanting to see the cathedral for a while. Notre Dame Cathedral Amiens is the largest Gothic building in France, 145 m long and 70 m wide, and it has the tallest nave in France. It could contain two cathedrals the size of Notre Dame de Paris. Much of the building took place over a relatively short period of 50-60 years, leading to great harmony in its overall style and design. It is also remarkable, given its situation in north-eastern France, that it suffered relatively little damage during the two World Wars, whereas nearby Reims cathedral was severely damaged. We spent quite a while looking around, listening to the audio guide available from the Tourist Office across the road. Then we walked down the hill to the picturesque Saint-Leu quarter, criss-crossed by canals, and sometimes referred to as the Little Venice of the North. It looked beautiful in the golden early evening light. We wandered around for perhaps 45 minutes, then decided it was time to get some dinner and then finish our journey home. However we both decided it is well worth a longer repeat visit.