Thursday 07 July 2011: in Dinan (Tour de France, Stage 6)
Up early and into the streets of Dinan and the huge crowds that had gathered. We walked the city route again and found a spot that was interesting, just above the roadway and with a small hedge in front, so after wandering some more and seeing the caravan come past we walked back to the spot for a perfect view of the tour.
We shouted at Cadel and got a wave and a smile back – Scott was so excited he stuffed up the video. Oh well. Of course as soon as they go past the crowds soon dissipate and we sit down in the town square and have lunch in the sun. We visit the tourist office and get a map and find a small supermarket for some provisions and continue wandering through the beautiful town. We walk down the Rue Du Petit Fort which is a steep cobblestoned laneway that leads down to the Pont and of course it now starts to rain but it is still a lovely walk.
Down at the Port there are loads of restaurants, boat trips and via of the viaduct etc, but the rain is increasing so walk back up the Rue Du Petit Fort and back into town. I found a hairdresser who after much talking and hand signals I manage to get my hair coloured, cut and blowdried for the bargain price of 29EUR (which seems to be the going rate here). It was nice to relax for a while and listen to everyone talking around me. For dinner we ventured back into town to a small seafood restaurant. The town is so quiet tonight after last night, but we had a lovely meal and another meander through the almost deserted streets. Dinan must rate as one of the most favourite places so far.
Friday 08 July 2011: Dinan -> Chateauroux -> Boussac (Tour de France, Stage 7)
We have had our day in this lovely medieval town but now have to push on to catch up with the Tour; they are travelling from Le Mans to Chateauroux (218km).
We packed up our pitch and waited for the council man to open the gates to the park to let us out. Whilst we were waiting, we had a chat with an English bloke who was camping out of the back of his car; he had decided to spend an extra day in Dinan too, so we weren’t the only ones taken by the town. We headed out, navigating the narrow cobbled streets, and through one arch (we thought we might not fit but made it without a scratch and the TV antenna still on the roof). We crossed over the old aqueduct high above the river where we were rained on yesterday, we were on our way.
We had a long drive ahead of us, so were well prepared with food, drinks and music available in the cockpit; we shouldn’t have to stop except to rest and to refuel. Much of the trip was on motorways and other main-ish roads so the drive was pretty boring, and used a lot more fuel than we liked. Eventually, we made it around the Tour diversions and into Chateauroux, finding a park for the motorhome is not the easiest thing to do in a city at the best of times, made all the more difficult when the Tour is in town. We found a spot (it might have been illegal, but it seemed everyone else was doing it today and nobody seemed to be issuing tickets) and walked to find we were 3km from the finishing line. There were crowds three or four deep at the barricades all the way to the finish. At 250m to the line there was the big screen, so we stopped there to watch what was going on, of course the commentary was in French, so we could only look at the images without knowing the full story until they flashed up timings etc onto the screen. As we waited, the Caravan came through, but we didn’t bother to move from our spot on the grass. A company rep was moving through the crowd giving away free samples of some sort of alcoholic cider drink (needed to be free, no one in their right mind would pay for it?) The Peloton was still a couple of hours away, so we just waited and chatted with an English bloke who was riding around France, not following the Tour per se, but seeing enough stages when he could.
Eventually, the race came into town. The breakaway was caught and team HTC set up the perfect sprint for Mark Cavendish to win the stage. We hadn’t heard so many English voices as we heard when he crossed the line, but then there were odd one or two voices that then started spruiking about English superiority over the French. Who said the English were rude and arrogant?
As we walked back to the motorhome, the crowds had already dispersed and the “machine” was in full swing taking down the advertising and the barriers. By the time we got back to where were illegally parked, all the cars that were near us had gone, and Vinnie looked very much out of place and obvious; thankfully we didn’t get a ticket.
We drove out of town, and as we pulled into a service station to refuel, noticed several Team buses and their support entourages at a small hotel on the outskirts. We didn’t have time to take it all in; we had to keep moving to overtake the Tour, but did ponder about why the Team managements selected a hotel so far out of the finishing town, and why more than one Team would book the same hotel? Maybe they weren’t going to stay there, but would just use the facilities and then move on?
We drove on for another couple of hours, eventually passing through the small village of Boussac and finding a nice spot on the side of the road where a few other motorhomes had already pitched. We settled in amongst them, no one giving us a second thought or speaking to us, until we hoisted the Aussie flag. Once we proved we weren’t British, people would chat with us, even though we couldn’t speak French!
Saturday 09 July 2011: Boussac -> Dienne (Tour de France, Stage 8)
Massif Central, first day of the hills; 189km Aigurande to Super-Besse-Sancy.
Our roadside pitch was not too noisy, compared to a few nights ago, so we were pretty well rested. After breakfast we walked the 1km into Boussac to find they were getting well and truly into the Tour spirit. Although it was not yet 10:00, the Gendarme was out in force and the roads were already blocked off. There were flower pots adorning the side of the roads, bunting as far as the eye could see and old crappy bikes were painted in bright colours as garden ornaments. In the centre of the village, they set up a small market with locals selling breads, cheeses and other assorted smallgoods. The pub across the road from the square was already doing a roaring trade in coffees and beers.
We had a bit of a potter around and bought some of the local produce, then found a supermarket for some general necessities. On the way back, Scott found a “sporting” store selling telescopic fishing rods which could be used as a better flag pole than the broomstick we currently have, so bought one for only 5 Euro.
Back at Vinnie, we ate some of the fresh produce we had just purchased and waited for the Tour.
As usual the Caravan came through first; they must have been running a bit late because they simply tore through and gave away very little. We did manage to get a couple of bits and pieces; whatever we didn’t want was eagerly (and gratefully received) by the French kids in the neighbouring motorhome. Finally the Tour came into view, down the small hill and around the bend in front of us. There were eight (or nine?) riders in a breakaway about 5 minutes ahead of the Peloton (we cheered again for Cadel and he smiled and nodded) then of course the cars following. We did not notice the “end of the convoy” truck and didn’t think too much of it, but it would be important soon.
We packed up and entered the next destination into the GPS and headed off (started in the wrong direction, thanks Tom-Tom). We approached the outskirts of Boussac again and tried to turn around in a side street, as we came back to the main road we were stopped by the Gendarme. We were held there with a small line of cars; eventually the Gendarme (in pretty good English) informed us there had been a traffic accident involving one/more of the Tour Team cars and the road would not be re-opened until the very end of the convey had been through. We couldn’t do much but wait. We watched as, much to the chagrin of our Gendarme, other traffic was proceeding up and down the main road. He looked a little bemused at who was letting the traffic onto the road when his orders were to hold us all there. Eventually, the end of convoy truck carrying the Vacansoleil-DCM car came passed and we were allowed onto the road to continue, in the right direction this time!
The roads were pretty good compared to what we had been on in the last couple of days. We weaved through the countryside, the roads lined predominately with pine plantations and other timber industry requirements. For quite a while we were the only motorhome in sight so we are hoping that by escaping the previous stage early, we might get a good position for tomorrow. We pulled up on the side of the road at the intersection where the riders will turn, but if we walk a further 3km up the road we will be able to see them a second time as the travel in a loop up and down these hills. Our spot is quite good and the people near us are quite friendly, especially when they see the Aussie flag.
After we got settled, Scott went for a run. We’re at nearly 1210m altitude so it took some adjustment; and it’s all uphill! Well it seemed that way anyway. As he was arriving back at the campsite, one French man (from the motorhome next to ours) was cordoning off the entire area with tape to prevent late arrivals from mooching on our patch! We should have unfettered access to watch the Tour come passed and to be able to escape as soon as they have come through. We spent the rest of the afternoon watching the constant stream of motorhomes coming up the mountain looking for their spot to park. When we arrived there only about 10 or so homes here, there are now more than 50 in easy view.
Just after dinner-time, a local chap drove up the line of motorhomes and campers selling cheese, yoghurt and other milk products. I have said for days that this is what the locals should be doing to make some money whilst the Tour is nearby. In the towns, the shops are mostly shut when the Tour is there; but when will they ever that many people walking by their shops again? There have been only one or two small markets set up in towns; again, when will there ever be so many potential customers again? Anyway, Tracy bought two tubs of goats’ milk yoghurt for just a couple of Euro; we’ll have these for breakfast.
Sunday 10 July 2011: Dienne -> Beaulieu-sur-Dordogne (Tour de France, Stage 9)
Today’s stage is the second hills stage in the Massif Central, 208km from Issoire to Saint-Flour.
Last night it rained, and rained. This morning there are two fast flowing streams under the motorhome, flowing down the verge passed all the other campervans, narrowly missing a tent! We had our goats’ milk yoghurt with some muesli for breakfast – it was ok, Tracy liked it but Scott thought it lacked zing. The local council have been around distributing rubbish bags and reset the rubbish bins, so the place should be nice and clean when it comes time to leave.
Its 10:30 and it has finally stopped raining, only because we are now in the clouds! The visibility is terrible; we can just see the other side of the road. Within 15 minutes or so, the cloud lifts and it starts drizzling again. Eventually, the weather improved and stayed “reasonable” for the rest of the day. The Tour Caravan made its presence felt in its usual subtle fashion; loudspeakers, blaring music and tooting horns. We managed a pretty good haul, giving away all the crap we didn’t want to some French and Norwegian kids, keeping the hats (for friends at home) and foodstuffs (snacks whilst driving). Within a couple of hours, the riders came through; the breakaway followed by the peloton. We saw a lot more of the “names” today, but no one was smiling in the miserable conditions.
As soon as the roads were opened, we drove the 3km to the next junction to watch the Tour come past again. We parked in the long queue of people doing the same thing; Tracy decided she would stay with Vinnie and Scott would walk down the hill to the intersection to see the riders. We had to wait about an hour for the first riders to appear, the breakaway was still pretty much together, but the peloton was strewn all over the place. We heard there had been a crash, but it took a couple of days for us to learn of the number of riders involved (just about everyone!)
The next day is a rest day for the Tour, so just about everyone is heading to Le Lorian Cantal, but we are going to visit Tracy’s cousin, Robert, in Dordogne so when everyone else headed straight through the intersection, we turned right and pretty much had the road to us. It was going to be too long a drive to make it to Robert’s, so we stopped overnight in a small municipal camping area in Beaulieu-sur-Dordogne. The campsite is off the main road and located between quite a wide river on one side and a sporting field on the other. There are a few other campers; one group had canoed here, one group had driven in a car and set up their tents and an old couple had towed an old, very small caravan. The site had power and the amenities building had everything we needed, including hot showers with proper taps! There were signs on many of the pitches they had been reserved for some time mainly in August to October, so we assumed the place gets a lot busier than it is now. We found a site and pitched up for the night. We went for a walk to try and find someone to pay, but the reception was closed, so we had a free night!
We walked the km or so into town and spent the time trying to decide whether many of the businesses were in the process of opening or closing. Some of the restaurants were definitely closing (it was almost 18:30) but some we just weren’t sure about. We found the TIC to be shut but the adjacent market to be open so took the opportunity to grab some more supplies. Just as we were paying, they shut the doors even though there were still people trying to get in for their last minute needs, so we had lucked in. With arms full, we thought we’d take a quick look up a “side street” (turned out to be the main thoroughfare connecting the two halves of this part of town) and found a square with tables and umbrellas; the jungle themed restaurant cum pub across the road served the customers. We got a table at the restaurant and watched, bemused, as the waiters dodged the traffic trying to serve the clients in the square. Our waitress told us she didn’t speak very good English and that we were the first English people she had actually spoken with; as soon as we said we were Australian she spoke even better English! We ordered a pizza each and some drinks. The pizza station was right next to us so we got to see our order being made from scratch, brilliantly fresh and delicious. Tracy, with the assistance of our waitress managed to get a bottle of nice local wine and Scott ended up with a (very) large bottle of local cider. The local cider is exceptionally dry (you almost need to wash it down with a glass of water) but quite low alcohol (less than 5%, which is why you see people drinking so much of it in one sitting). The whole meal came to less than 28Euro and was exceptional value.
Replete, we wandered back to the campsite, admiring the setting sun across the river and the walnut grove adjacent to the site.
Monday 11 July 2011: Beaulieu-sur-Dordogne -> La Coutance (Tour de France, Rest Day)
The Tour has a rest today, so we are going to Robert’s house in Dordogne to lend some support to renovations (even if it is only moral support!). In the morning, the reception was still closed so we still had no one to pay for the night in the campsite; there was a cleaning lady doing her chores, she didn’t even look up as we drove out of the gate onto the main road.
The drive through the small Dordogne region roads was pleasant at times, treacherous at others. The small winding roads and blind corners might be good training for what is to come when we get into the Pyrenees and the Alps, but Scott would have been happier on roads requiring less work!
Eventually we arrived at the town which the Tom-Tom said was the destination; all we had to do now was to find the house, there are no such luxuries as street names and house numbers here! We drove around a little and eventually found something close to what we thought we had seen in photos of Robert’s house. We were close, but it took final directions from a New Zealand couple to finally get us to the right house; we made it!
We needed to get some washing done, and pulled out our little portable washer. Much to our dismay, we discovered the little unit had holes in the drum and the water leaked through into the electric motor. When we had arrived, Robert and Ray were out, as it happened, buying a washing machine. As soon as they arrived home, we unpacked it and took it downstairs into what will eventually be the laundry room. We all tried to get the unit working, but the plumbing is incompatible, so we took the new washer upstairs and out onto the front veranda. We managed to plumb the washer into the outside water taps, but there was no power and further investigation there was no power anywhere in the house. Several people had looked at the fuses and all was good, but it took the workman from the power company to switch the main on/off switch on again! (Yes, our little portable washer managed to trip the power mains without tripping the safety fuses/switches?!)
The rest of the afternoon was spent doing loads of laundry on the front veranda, wandering around the house and grounds, looking at the renovation works in progress and learning more of the impending works. As the sun set, we sat outside with Robert, Kevin, Linda and Ray, drinking and eating too much, before finally retiring inside the house onto a real bed!
Tuesday 12 July 2011: La Coutance -> L’Isle-de-Noe (Tour de France, Stage 10)
We aren’t going to make the Tour today; they are going from Aurillac to Lavaur (158km) but they are a long way from us and we have a long way to go to get in front of them again.
In the morning, the sprightly people made those less-sprightly feel even worse! There was work to be done today, and hangovers or no, it had to be done. Scott was feeling good and decided it was finally time to get the roof of the motorhome clean (whenever it rained, dirt and crap on the roof would wash down the sides and the windscreen) He parked Vinnie next to the lower garage and from the balcony above, he could use the hose and broom to wash the van’s roof. With the roof cleaned, he took the opportunity to clean the rest of the outside of the van whilst Tracy cleaned the inside.
With all of our washing done, the van cleaned inside and out, it was time to head off and try to jump ahead of the Tour. We said our goodbyes and headed west to get onto the south-bound motorways. The drive through the countryside was as it had been the day before, slow, undulating and winding, until finally we got to the motorways, which are straight, wide, fast and boring. Tracy drove for a bit, her first time driving on the right hand side of the road in the motorhome.
Eventually, we had to get off the motorway and pulled onto the exit ramp. We had to pay our 28 Euro toll dues at an automatic gate, so we put in a 50 Euro note and waited to receive the change, all in coins. As we were no longer on the motorway, Scott was driving again through the narrow country roads. In some places the councils had planted trees right on the roadside; 50 years ago, traffic must have been smaller, slower and lighter because now fast moving cars, trucks and motorhomes barley have enough room to pass in these tree-lined roads. The rain and wind didn’t help matters much either. It was a tough drive, so we decided we would have a break for the night at a small town that appeared on the Tom-Tom, but not on any other of our maps, L’Isle-de-Noe.
At the entrance to the municipal camping park, there was a sign which said something about being permanently closed (or as best we could tell in our pathetic French). There was one motorhome in the park, who happened to be leaving as we arrived, and he reiterated the park was closed but you could stay here (just as he had). There were some old people sitting under the veranda of the amenities block, who signalled us it was ok to stay for the night, so we made our pitch. Once sited, we understood what the sign at the entrance and the other motorhome has tried to say about the park being closed; although there were connections there was no power, although there was a water heater in the amenities block there was no hot water, there were no large bins only small waste receptacles. We parked under some large leafy trees adjacent to a series of sporting fields. There were signs of impending festivities with a couple of marquees in the next field (or had the festivities been?) As soon as the sun went down, the old people left their conversation post under the veranda; we were the only people around.
Just after dinner, it started to rain again. The big drops of water fell from the leaves of the trees overhead and crashed into the roof of the van. Sometime later, we remembered we had left our shoes outside the door and of course they were fully soaked when we retrieved them. The rest of the night was spent trying to watch some TV on the computer, with the volume turned all the way up to compete with the rain and thunder, and making dashes through mud-puddles to the amenities building.
Wednesday 13 July 2011: L’Isle-de-Noe -> Col du Tormalet (Tour de France, Stage 11)
Up and out of the campsite early and back on the small narrow roads – oh joy of joys. We get close to the turnoff for the Tour de France route and stop in the town having a look around and also getting directions for a nearby Intermarche (huge supermarket) where we head off so that we can stock up the now empty cupboards. We are soon back on the road and decide to try and jag a spot on the mountain. As we are driving up and up and up, we find a spot about 5 kilometres from the summit and park up. There is a constant stream of traffic, so we decide to stay here as sure there can’t be many spots higher. We are parked opposite a New Zealand couple so we will have a competition for small flags tomorrow J We walk up into La Mongie the nearest town for a walk around, but the weather is closing in and we are drenched by the time we get there so decide to return to the van and do the summit tomorrow.
We invite the Kiwis over to watch the remainder of the tour on the TV. Scott and I thought we would have an early night after watching a DVD, but it didn’t help that every car going up decided to toot their horns and the traffic was constant still into the night.
Thursday 14 July 2011: Col du Tormalet -> Saint-Gaudens (Tour de France, Stage 12)
Up early – couldn’t help it as still there is a stream of cars, motorhomes, trucks, cyclists heading up. There was a small gap between the back of our motorhome and the front of the next motorhome and sometime during the dark of night a couple of Spanish guys managed to manoeuvre their campervan into it!
The weather is better and we decide to head to the summit, so up we went, and up and up and up. This is steep and brought reminiscences back of Nepal. The roadside and everywhere is covered in people and flags, with a great contingent of Aussie and Kiwi flags to be seen, although not that anybody could compete with the Spanish. We made it to Col du Tormalet which is just swamped with people and the Gendarme has little hope of keeping any sort of control over the crowds.
We walk back to Vinnie and wait for the caravan to come buy with Scott, Rueben and Clare sharing some sort of horrible ouzo drink with the Spanish guys who have advised they will be driving after the tour unless they are very tipsy, hmm seem to have reached that stage now. Anyway we scored big time on the caravan with lots of lollies and snacks and giving all the other assorted crap to the kids around us. We have a policewoman near us who is ruthless in keeping everyone behind the white lines and making all the cyclists dismount and walk etc – maybe they should clone her. Of course between the caravan and the tour itself, it is picnic time and the French have this down to a fine art, it is amazing what they produce out of the backs of their cars.
We then settled in for the wait for the riders to make it up the mountain to us. Eventually they came, slowly, very slowly, looking shattered and exhausted (made me feel better after walking it).
We got to see most of the favourites as they were going much more sedately today and were very spread out.
As soon as the main group had gone by we all jumped into Vinnie to watch the remainder on TV (although the commentary is in French, we can just guess at what they are saying). Eventually it is all over, so we pack up Vinnie and join the throng of people now descending the mountain. It takes us over an hour just to get to the bottom, painstakingly slow and putting us behind where we intended.
After a long tiring drive we made it to St Gaudens where we find a MacDonald’s and quickly do some emails etc before finding a camping spot in the town centre.