Laon and the Chemin des Dames

Two days in the Aisne, between early Gothic and the memory of 1917. The trip opens at Laon cathedral, one of the first Gothic cathedrals in France, whose towers hold statues of oxen in tribute to the animals that hauled the stone up the hill, then the upper town and its ramparts. The Chemin des Dames then follows the ridge where the Nivelle offensive failed in the spring of 1917: the Caverne du Dragon, an underground quarry occupied simultaneously by both sides, is now a museum, and the Plateau de Californie, birthplace of the Chanson de Craonne, still bears the trace of a village wiped off the map. Vauclair abbey, destroyed in 1917, closes the route. The Caverne du Dragon is guided-tour only.