France trip roadside engineering related

[nickk]

After my regular French road trip here’s some interesting sights that we don’t get enough of. The 2cv has a Stanley vice clamped to the insulator!

 

[nickk]

Some more,I wonder if the French have come late to railway preservation?im loving the observation hatch for the driver.

 

[galooph]

What a cool sheep sculpture - really clever in its simplicity!

 

[Dapph2]

What a cool sheep sculpture - really clever in its simplicity!

I must confess till you posted I thought it was a small rowing boat's anchor .

 

[jmp49]

Some more,I wonder if the French have come late to railway preservation?im loving the observation hatch for the drive

Not really... There's a tiny museum not far from me that under French regs to be a registered charity opens its doors for free once a year for a weekend (Journees du Patrimoine) that has steam trains much older than the above.

Journées du Patrimoine 2025 - Programme national des animations

Journées du Patrimoine - programme détaillé des visites et animations, monuments, musées, et lieux remarquables, horaires, plan d'accès, conditions

www.journees-du-patrimoine.com

I wandered in and was blown away to see a dusty full size steam loco taking up half the building amongst other steam and agricultural objects. I wouldnt have known by passing it was there as its a nondescript building with just a old laposte liveried 2cv van outside to show its not someones house and barn, I think its just someones mad hobby horde that they have to do this to gain status but it means you can go see it and people have donated things to. These weird little museums are dotted everywhere, also near me that I visited with the family is the shirt museum, which is about industrial clothing production rather than just fashion so I was gritting my teeth beforehand but all the weird old production machinery was interesting, and much more a professional museum with escape games at night round the museum etc.
There's a operating live steam train in martel if you venture that far south, that you can take a trip in open carridges on that runs through mountain tunnels around cliffs etc, its pretty spectacular and there's a few campsites really close to make a weekend of it, I've done this one with the kids when they were smaller and got them all suitably sooty faces in the tunnels. You walk past the resto workshops that are viewable from the walkway to get the platform.

Le Train à vapeur de Martel | Chemin de fer Touristique du Haut-Quercy

Découvrez la Vallée de la Dordogne à bord du Train à vapeur de Martel. Locomotives vapeur ou diesel, Chemin de fer touristique Haut-Quercy Lot

trainduhautquercy.info

The carts and stuff in little villages usually denote they had a decent sized involvement in mining. The councils tended to keep a cart or two on a verge as a art piece rusting away to celebrate it. For some reason our sticky fingered friends leave them be. In Calais they still have one of the tunnel boring machines on a roundabout in a similar way (named Virginie...), the UK had one too at the side of the M20 but Eurostar sold it on ebay for 40k to a scrap metal merchant...

Also not to be missed if your nearby one on holiday, the 2cv autocross series. Picture dirt race prepped 2cv's 4 abreast engines screaming charging into the first corner with high banks wide enough for two. Then the marshalls running out and rolling the ones that ended up on their roof back onto their wheels before the pack comes back round. I thought it was a bit of a joke when I first saw it advertised, but its pretty serious and seems like a lot of fun. Ive probably still got pictures from the few meets I went local in a old quarry, but they've stopped doing it now as they turned the quarry into a solar panel park.

Driving a 2CV on dirt tracks: inside the world of 2CV Cross

Discover the history, rules, circuits, and budgets of 2CV Cross — a fun and accessible discipline where drivers race a prepared 2CV on dirt tracks, under FFSA or UFOLEP regulations.

www.gotothegrid.com

Lots of interesting stuff to do here thats not poncy flower gardens, dusty castles, museums full of pretentious art and drinking wine on terraces and looking distant. Dunno about Paris though as I'm always looking forward to the second I get to leave when I'm there. Weird little villages and towns great, huge tourist traps, disney and urban areas bad.