At 8:00 A. M., on November 1st, the convoy of 29 ambulances left the park in a gentle shower, but before traveling very far it became a regular cloudburst, with a strong wind. The first day's drive was over very good roads, in a narrow valley, with high, rocky hills and peaks in the distance and an occasional village at the foot of the hills. We stopped the first night just outside of St. Aminol, a very small village, and being the first American soldiers who had stopped near there, we were enthusiastically received by the mademoiselles, and invited to visit the town.
During the next day we passed through Avignon, where we were given flowers by French children. We crossed several suspension bridges over streams flowing into the Rhone River, and drove for miles through vineyards, with their beautiful red and yellow leaves. We saw many wine presses, most of which were operated by women, in fact a greater part of the manual labor was done by the women. We stopped for the night near Valence, a city of many narrow crooked streets, beautiful squares and fountains. We saw there many patterns of Val lace.
Leaving Valence at 7 A. M. November 3rd, we passed through St. Symphone on a market day. The farm products and animals were lined up along the street; vegetables piled on the sidewalk, while the pigs, geese and calves were in excelsior-lined crates and baskets. We arrived at Lyons in the afternoon and drove down one of the main streets--and it was agreed by all that they had never seen so many beautiful ladies in a similar length of time, not even in America. We stopped for the night at a French Barracks, another prison, the city still being under quarantine. Lyons is built at the junction of the Rhone and Prome rivers, the different parts of the city being connected by many bridges, one the Pont du President Wilson, which was dedicated July 14th, 1918.
It was raining when we left Lyons the next morning, and the roads were very rough. As it was necessary to have the curtains of the ambulances up all day, we could see very little of the country until we got to Dijon, where we stopped for the night. From Dijon, we traveled over fairly good roads through a rolling country similar to Kansas, stopping on the night of November 5th at Chaumont, at which place is located Headquarters, A. E. F.