Return to Serre Chevalier pt2

If you stay in the Premiere Class hotel here in St Quentin, they give you a voucher for the Campanile restaurant next door, which gets you 15% off. This is worth doing. buffet starter + plat du hour for €13.40. Just don’t pig out on the starter like I did!

I had a drive around town earlier on and it reminded me of one of those German towns on the Rhine that England bombed to death in WW2, but in actual fact it was WW1 where all the devastation happened. Wikipedia says:

“The First World War hit St Quentin very hard. In September 1914, the city was over-run, and it endured a harsh occupation. From 1916, it lay at the heart of the war zone, because the Germans had integrated it into the Hindenburg Line. After the evacuation of the population in March, the town was systematically looted and industrial equipment removed or destroyed. The fighting destroyed it: 80% of buildings (including the Basilica) were damaged.
Despite national support, the reconstruction process was long, and the city struggled to regain its pre-1914 dynamism. The 1911 population of 11,000 was achieved again only in the mid-1950s, in the context of general economic expansion. This prosperity continued until mid-1970s, when the French textile industry began to suffer through competition from developing countries.”

So there you go, now all I need to do is try and get to sleep and contemplate the journey for the morning.