In the summer of 2005 Ruda paid her respects at the sombre war memorials of the Somme battlefields before heading south for the exuberance of the Champagne region, where she stopped off in Epernay, Reims and visited many other towns known to her from labels on bottles of fizz.
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She passed through the region again the following year en route to her second winter in Paris (2006/7) as the journey back from Alsace took her along the Marne au Rhin and Marne canals via the stunning Art Nouveau city of Nancy, the Arzvilliers Inclined Plane and the vineyards, this time filled with people picking Champagne grapes.