a bout de poufff

So after a couple of day's rest and wonderful hospitality from Daniela and Robert - including a look around nearby Auch and a delicious lunch in an old-fashioned family-run restaurant in a tiny village - we must continue our ride across France and back to Ye Merry Olde England.  It's about 1000 km from the Spanish border to the port and we have three weeks in total to get there.  If only we had more time.  Quelle dommage.

I think Robert's parting words are on the lines of "it's all downhill from here!".  At least that what I think he says as we wave goodbye and career down the hill.  He's directed us along pretty quiet lanes and tree-lined roads that take us through some pretty towns and deposit us on one of France's great cycle routes.  This one links the Mediterranean with the Atlantic and runs predominantly along canal banks.  Except when it doesn't.  After some steep climbs up and down slopes that are covered in vineyards it brings us into Bordeaux which looks rather glorious on a hot sunny day.  
 

camping in the first bit of hidden field we can find

pleasantly cool cycling

We continue directly westwards over a flat landscape directly out towards the Atlantic coast to join the Eurovelo coastal bike route.   It helps when you don't have to concentrate too much on navigation and worry about where to cross rivers.  We cross the large estuary by ferry and then continue northwards up to La Rochelle.  We pass through large summer campgrounds teeming with French families.  The cycle paths are hugely popular with holidaymakers.   Happily the cycle paths provide us with access to easy wild camping spots.
 

gps? pah!

a three metre drop-off on the right.......

a tap + picnic bench = laundry + dinner

in the middle of a huge pine forest plantation close to the Atlantic

We thought that getting to France would have brought us cooler weather but instead we ride into a heatwave that lasts a week.  We start rising earlier and taking longer siestas.  Some days the village pharmacy clocks display the temperatures over 40C.  It's enough to make your fromage melt.  As the days are long we also begin our summer tactic of cooking our dinner in one place and then moving on to camp somewhere else as the light begins to fail.  We have to do this because there are so many other people out and about in the evenings making the most of the cooler part of the day.   

easy cycling approaching Rochefort

crossing the Charente by ferry

One long day we find ourselves on a dirt track cycling across miles of flat farmland along a network of dykes.  It's never-ending. There's nowhere to hide a tent.  We reach a small town and the land is all fenced and locked up.  Finally we find a corner of a field where we feel okay and then a van pulls up on the lane just the other side of the trees we're hiding behind.  Zut alors. It freaks us out.  It's getting late.  We move away but quickly find another open field and duck in.  The sun has gone.  But the people keep on coming - teenagers on a late evening walk and then a car that crawls along the lane on the far side of our field.  It parks up for the night.  It's late and we have the tent up.  We can't be bothered moving on. C'est la vie.

 

he can't have been that bad if they named the street after him

At La Rochelle the marinas are so crammed with yachts, like sardines in a tin, that you could probably walk across them.  We turn inland here, away from the coastal bike route and weave a way up towards Rennes avoiding the bigger cities like Nantes.  Crossing the Loire, another cycling bottleneck,  we begin a real roller-coaster section through very peaceful and lovely farmland. One afternoon we approach a family walking towards us on a country lane.  They step aside for us and as we approach start cheering "Allez! Allez! Allez!" in mock-encouragement, as if we're doing the Tour.   

siesta

late afternoon 'ice-cream break'

"try and look like you're enjoying it"

We stop in Rennes for a well-deserved rest day and then continue up to St Malo along a winding canal-side bike path that we can ease along without breaking sweat.  And most importantly, without having to navigate and negotiate any tricky route-finding.  We stop to take a look around Dinan at the head of the estuary - this country's full of delightful towns.  The place is crawling with tourists, even though there's rain.  Ahh, rain.  No we're not complaining after all the heat we've had.  Clearly we're getting closer to England.....

nous sommes crevées

Imagine a rumpled bedcover.  That's what the landscape in France looks like on our map.  We are trying to link valleys to ride northwards but so many are crossing east/west that we soon find ourselves on one elongated roller-coaster ride. Let me describe this more accurately.  We crawl our way up to a ridgetop and then zoom down the other side.  These ridges and valleys are too large to actually get any momentum up.  We just have to grind it out.

grand houses in a village in Haut-Pyrenees

But don't get me wrong.  I'm a dyed-in-the-croissant francophile and I am really keen to make this ride work.  Our original idea was to cycle across Spain to Lisbon and then jump across the Atlantic from there.  But when we got the offer to house-sit for Andy & Kate, we then thought about other options. The clincher was air fares to Calgary in Canada. The cheapest flight in August is from Gatwick in England.  Not wanting to miss an opportunity to see a little more of France, I persuaded Gayle that cycling back to England in a short space of time would be the kind of training we needed in order to get fit for riding the Great Divide route in North America.   And so here we are.

Excusez-moi, ou est la boulangerie?

The landscape contrasts with the dry golden shades of Spain.  Here, the land is fecund.  It is being heavily farmed and much of the arable land is turned over to maize.  But there are other cereals too, vegetables and, our favourites, sunflowers.  Acres of them.  We start waving to them.  It's as if a crowd has gathered beside the road and is cheering us on.  Or turning their backs on us.  It depends which direction the sun is.  The Tour de France has already begun and we see signs warning road users of imminent closures for when the circus passes through on its way to Pau.  

a welcome tap outside an old monastery

We feel like we are now riding against the clock.  Our first objective is to visit Robert and Daniela who recently moved from the Alps to a new home and a new life in the province of Gers.  In the middle of nowhere, it seems.  We find the place on Google maps and mark it on our road map.  But how to get there? Gayle has a cunning plan.  First we cut straight up and through Montrejeau, which just happens to be on the top of a hill.  Then we follow a zig-zag route valley-hopping north.  The gradients are unforgiving.  Late afternoon we hit a long valley at the end of the day and sneak down a track into a field of maize to camp.  It's light so we cook first behind some trees.  A tractor enters the field and moves into the maize to set up a water cannon.  Of course the farmer then drives out of the maize and onto our track.  We go over to greet him and ask if we can camp here.  He happily agrees but warns us to stay clear of the water cannon which is firing water in pulsing arcs across the maize.  Pas de probleme, monsieur, merci beaucoup!  At about 10 pm a horrendous noise begins.  A combine harvester is hoovering up acres of wheat in the next field.  The hungry beast keeps munching until about 2am......... 

it was peaceful when we arrived

and it was still peaceful when the sun went down

mid-morning break

We pause for lunch in a village.  We're close now.  But none of the road junctions are matching our map.  Gayle's instincts kick in.  Turn right, up here!  We crawl up a mean-looking hill.  At the top another junction.  We phone a friend.  Robert picks up.  Keep going, he tells us, it's up and down all the way.  It is.  We finally turn a corner and see beyond a farm someone waving at us.  Robert.  He and Daniela walk down their track to greet us.  We're hot and tired and very happy to have found them.

we last saw Robert in Kyrgyzstan in 2014

so tell us Daniela and Robert, what attracted you to this house?

the only sound is birds

run for the hills

We ride away from Lleida train station in the mid-afternoon haze.  The light is bleached and the fields are straw yellow.  Up ahead lie the Pyrenees but we can't see any big mountains yet.  The valley road isn't too busy.  After stopping in a small town for supplies and a break in the shade we turn up and away from the main road and take a steep climb up onto the farmland that drapes over the long broad ridges like a pastoral checkerboard quilt of wheat and corn.  And then we ride past a pig farm.  At least I think it is from the stench and the screams. All very bucolic.  Our road stays up along a ridge and we finally find a camp spot in an open field next to a ruined barn.  A rural idyll.

We have taken a quieter road in the hope of avoiding some unnecessary climbs around two large reservoirs.  With mixed results.  We still have large climbs followed by big descents and eventually return to the main road.  The days are long but we try to take a real siesta during the midday heat. We get water by asking at cafe bars.

enjoying a birthday 'power' breakfast of porridge and ...... chocolate?

vrrrooooommmm!

We pass through a series of tiny villages, some wearing well and others looking tired and beyond care.  Riding due north brings us to the pretty little village of Llavorsi set beside a river.  We siesta here at picnic tables in the shade of a tree.  There are locked toilets here and we ask at the campsite cafe next to the park but they refuse to give us the key.  So I pee behind their cars, ooops was that the wheel??  The valley we're rding up is definitely climbing.  It feels like foothills.  There's forest on the slopes and the farms are now limited to the valley bottom. As the road steepens and the valley walls begin to close in we consider our camping options.  Miraculously a farm track appears in the trees and climbs up to what look like abandoned grazing fields for cattle.  The fields have collapsed stone walls and they terrace upwards. It's worth the push up the steep track.  Later we hear voices below on the road.  Two cyclists are weaving their way uphill and looking exhausted.  We wonder where are they heading and why haven't they stopped sooner. 

cooking the tea high above the road

 

early morning

 Our plan is to rise early, before the sun has reached into the valley, and to get beyond Esterri d'Aneu.  This is the foot of the pass over to France and we need an early start.  We start well but by the time we reach the series of hairpin bends that mark the pass I am fading.  We stop for a snack and watch a wiry old man in lycra zip past us on his racer.  At the pass is an ugly concrete ski-centre.  
 

looking back

We sit in the shade and struggle to eat our lunch.  Altitude? Heat?  The sun has been unforgiving this morning but now we can reap the rewards of a descent into France.  It seems endless.  

wheeeeeee

It is endless.  On and on through the ugly ski resorts and then the town of Vielha and beyond.  The valley we're descending northwards into is narrowing.  It feels green and lush after the barren mountains.  We find a shady and overgrown field with a chain across the entrance, down by a babbling brook.  It slopes steeply but there's a spot tucked away which will fit the tent.  We have crossed the Pyrenees.

cuida casa

Well, I guess if you ask some friends if they'd like to house-sit for you while you're away, you'd expect them to leave it as they find it.   I mean, that's the idea, right? So where to begin?  The pool is green, half the plants in the garden look parched and the car has a flat tyre which has perished beyond repair.  The bathroom shutter is down and the strap to haul it up has snapped.  The ceramic hob is cracked in two.  Oh, and where's the remote for the kitchen air-conditioner?? Bloody hell, we'll not ask them back.








Dear Kate and Andy,
Thank you so much for letting us house-sit for you for a month whilst you were away in the Caucasus.  We  hope you had a good time and caught some of the Cricket World Cup on tv.  We've had a lovely rest here and enjoyed having guests from England to stay.  

Mel and Andy came for a few days and we did a couple of the nice hikes you suggested and explored the old town of nearby Peniscola.  We also did a nice drive inland to Morella which was pretty, scenic and quiet - a million miles from the tourist hub-bub of Peniscola.  

Thanks for all the information about Benicarlo.  It was fine cycling to and from  the town until the heatwave struck.  It's noticeable how you catch the breeze up at the house, set back from the artichoke fields that surround the town.  The forestry people were working hard to thin out the pine forest next to the house - clearing all the scrub and brush.  Quite reassuring what with the forest fires springing up just north of here.  

You know about the blowout we had on the highway.  Luckily it wasn't too far out of town.  I didn't realise the Saab ran on tubeless tyres.  Anyway, we couldn't get the electric pump to work  but it would have made no difference.  When the mechanic arrived he took the wheel off and the tyre was shredded.  I went back to the garage and he put a temporary tyre on.  I went back the next day and they'd got a replacement, which they put on.  In the end I thought 100 euros wasn't too much considering it wasn't covered on the breakdown cover.  I'm disappointeded the tyre was flat when you got home - it mustn't have been fitted properly.  And perished too? Out of their guarantee period? The crooks.

It was Suzi and Dino who pointed out that perhaps the pool was a little low.  The water jets were above the water line when we arrived.  I guess the woman who was supposed to maintain the pool had too much other work on.  Anyway, we eventually got it back to normal.  The chlorine tablets helped turn the green to blue and we managed with the pump and filters and vac to clean out the algae that had gathered.  Our friend in France, who also has a pool, told us the once the temperatures reach 30 C the pump has to run constantly to keep the water clear, but we didn't learn that until later.  Our friends from West Sussex came at the last minute after we wrote and they realised that their planned bike trip to Wales would be a washout.  Of course, it was perfect weather here. Dino tried out the old brick barbecue and it works okay if you don't mind a bit of smoke in your eyes.

like all true antipodeans, Dino loves a barbecue

losing track of time

After a few relaxing days they had a mad dash to catch their plane in Barcelona.  We drove them as far as Tarragona and they hopped onto a train there, although Dino almost lost his bank card to the ticket machine.  When their connecting train didn't turn up they had to grab a cab. Made it in the nick of time.

It was also great that in our last week here Gayle's sister and her youngest came for a quick visit.  We visited Peniscola again but it was soooo hot.  Happily the pool was clean by then.  Having them here was a surprising bonus.

okay Kate, now we know why you love the convertible

The ceramic hob cracked when we were cleaning up.  I'm so sorry - I leant on it and the whole thing rocked on the counter join in the middle.  I guess the chip on one edge had weakened it.  We were literally heading out the door to catch our train north when the shutter strap snapped.  We knew we had to drop the shutters to secure the house but we didn't know that one was faulty.

It would be great to catch up with you when you're here next time,
love
Gayle & John
xxxx
ps thanks for the wine - it kept us hydrated.

Benicarlo's tribute to its artichoke heritage

"Mmm, do you think they'd want us back?"