Day 30: Guéret to Chateauroux and...

86 kms. Details

For reasons I shall explain, I decided to exert myself just a little and make the fastest passage to Chateauroux that the initial hills would allow, and covered the last 50 kms, admittedly trending slightly downhill but into the wind, in under 2 hours. Trust me, that's pretty quick on the loaded bike.

The countryside for the last three days has been a series of variations on this theme:

Rolling hills covered by partly-wooded farmland, very beautiful to ride through but not especially spectacular photographically. And every few miles a village, the larger ones invariably provided with an excellent Boulangerie/Patissierie. I haven't made enough of the boulangeries, they are everywhere and simply perfect for the passing cyclist who needs sustenance. I've developed a passion for chaussons aux pommes and today picked up a superb tartelette de rhubarbe. 

So, why the hurry this morning? Because, dear reader, I have decided to bring this little voyage to a close. While riding between Limoges and Guéret I found myself planning my route back to Paris, and quite suddenly, the spell was broken. I realised that from then on I wouldn't be in the moment, just doing what the fancy took me, but would just be riding to get home, and that isn't the same thing at all. So I booked myself and the bike on a train from Chateauroux to Paris on Wednesday morning, and on the Eurostar to St Pancras on Wednesday afternoon.

Naturally, of course, it turned out not so simple. Within a few hours of my buying a ticket, SNCF e-mailed me to tell me that because of a mouvement social (elegant French euphemism for a strike) no trains would be running on Wednesday. However, my ticket from Chateauroux to Paris would be valid any day from Tuesday to Friday. Hence, a quickish ride to Chateauroux to make sure I could get a train to Paris today and be there to make the Eurostar connection tomorrow. 

As it transpired, I could have dawdled. I had plenty of time to have a look round the town before the train. Not especially remarkable, but the old part by the river is pretty enough.

I've decided to spare you a final picture of a cathedral...

So, tomorrow I should be back in The UK and re-enter real life. Or, possibly, exit real life; I am more alive, I think, when doing this sort of thing than when doing predictable things in familiar surroundings.

Thanks for reading. I'll be doing more tours, and they'll be recorded here.

Day 29: Limoges to Guéret

82 kms. Details


Belatedly blogging about yesterday's journey having been frustrated by a pitiful wifi connection last night.

Did I mention that I was in Limousin?

A fair bit of climbing today through quite substantial rolling hills which are, I suspect, the outermost ripples of the Massif Central. And the road, the D940/941, turned out to be a good example of what I mentioned yesterday. It's quite a major road, beautifully maintained - large sections of it so recently resurfaced they haven't even replaced the road markings - but it isn't the most direct route to anywhere and on this Whit Monday it was dead quiet. Actually, I can't pretend that the fact of it being Whit Monday influenced my choice, I'm completely oblivious to the date etc. I only know its a holiday because here in Guéret, which I suspect is a half-dead town at the best of times, absolutely everything is shut.

Fortunately, that wasn't the case everywhere. In a re-run of my experience at La Bagatelle south of Chartres, I stopped for lunch at a local café that can only be described as unpretentious. On asking for the menu I was told to sit down, and there followed four courses. No choice, and heaven help you if you're vegetarian. For starters I was presented with a loaf of bread and a thumping great chicken terrine and simply left to carve myself slices from the pair of them. Then more chicken, this time a breast of chicken, fried, with a huge heap of Dauphinoise potatoes. Cheeseboard, then a dessert that very closely resembled a Bakewell Tart. €14.

And today brought another example of the advantages of this rather undirected, exploratory mode of travel. About an hour out of Limoges I passed through a little place called St Léonard de Noblat. Never heard of it before, but it was obviously old so I had a look around. Yet another charming and very unspoilt mediaeval town, this time with a church (called, for a reason I was unable to fathom, a Collegia) of real distinction.

Nave and transept 1030-1070 (!), porch and tower a bit later. I know the eagle-eyed among you won't have missed the splendid flying buttresses.

And this is yet another little town on one of the St Jacques de Compostelle pilgrimage routes, a couple of which I seem to have criss-crossed several times without any such intention. I've been looking up the network of routes to Santiago, they extend right across Europe, and it occurs to me that there's a terrific bicycle tour to be created out of one or more of them...

Day 28: Périgueux to Limoges

102 kms. Details

An earlyish start and a slow day along an undulating route into a fairly steady, and surprisingly cold, north wind. Moved from the Dordogne to the Haut-Vienne, from the land of the Perigord goose to that of the Limousin cow.

I chose a major road today, the N21. It's the sort of road I'd usually avoid but I decided that since it was a Sunday morning the chances were it would be quiet, and so it proved.

Which reminds me that apart from commenting on the signage, I haven't said anything about the experience of being a cyclist in France. It's largely positive. I'd say the condition of rural roads is rather better, on average, than in the UK. Plenty of them could do with some work, but I haven't come across any egregious potholes or as many of the bodged and obviously short-term repairs that one tends to see at home. In one way, however, things are very similar - choosing routes on the basis of how the roads are categorised is a lottery. D roads - which seem to have a similar status to A roads in the UK - range from deserted winding country lanes to four-lane arterial highways, so it has paid me to do a bit of in-depth work with google maps rather than just relying on fairly large-scale paper versions. I've only once been caught on one that I regarded as really unsuitable, for the last 15 kms or so into Niort, so I haven't done badly.

Most importantly, my experience has been that French drivers tend to be more considerate of cyclists  than are their UK counterparts. Very few close passes, more preparedness to wait when visibility is restricted instead of trying to squeeze past, generally a greater willingness to share the road. It has been a good experience all-round.

I have to say, however, that so far I am not particularly impressed with Limoges. I'll see if I can find something worth photographing before I leave tomorrow, but my immediate priority is dinner.

Days 26 and 27: Fumel to Périgueux and rest day.

104 km. Details


I decided on a reasonably swift journey yesterday, to outrun the rain that was forecast for the afternoon. It worked - I was caught by only a couple of brief showers, and sure enough it rained for most of the afternoon after I arrived. But by the end of a 100km morning my legs were reminding me that I'd ridden for seven straight days, and I decided to linger here and make today a rest day.

Not at all a bad idea. Périgueux is an interesting place, with enough of the old town left to make it worth a day of anyone's time.

Those who like timber-framed houses would be in for a treat:

And the cathedral is unusual. Built on the pattern of St Mark's in Venice, with several (six or seven?) domes in a Greek cross, it was largely rebuilt in the 19th century and as a result is quite austere.

But however pleasing the architecture, what one has to talk about here is the food. To visit the Saturday morning market in Périgueux is to condemn oneself to a lifetime of dissatisfaction with supermarket shopping. It's a riot of colour and quality and sheer gusto. One almost expects the perfection of the fruit and vegetables, and the stallholder cutting chunks out of a melon so you can taste it before deciding to buy one, and the dozens of varieties of local cheeses you've never heard of, and the astonishing range of breads produced by the artisan boulangers, but it is still overwhelming. More surprising are the hundredweights of oysters tumbling out of crates, and the steaming pans of paella a metre across that are being ladled into cartons for queues of people looking for a takeaway lunch, and the guy cooking crepes to order - 6 for €4 - while you wait.

But even away from the market, this is a town that relishes its status as the capital of the Dordogne. Every third shop seems to specialise in a range of the regional delicacies. Foie Gras and Rillettes de Canard are everywhere. I half expected to be accosted on the street corner by a Perigord goose honking "please, eat my liver, it's delicious" after the fashion of the pig in the restaurant at the end of the universe.

So, entering into the spirit of the thing, I lunched in Le Chai Bordin which I am at present disposed to nominate as the best wine bar on the planet. Tiny, absolutely heaving with regular patrons, serving really, really excellent wine by the glass and plates of charcuterie and cheese. La vie en rose.

Day 25: Cahors to Fumel

62 km. Details

I shouldn't say au revoir to Cahors without posting a couple of pictures of its signature 14th century bridge.

Pont Valentré

Having crossed it, there followed a very leisurely saunter along the Vallée du Lot. The Lot is perhaps the most winding river I know, it absolutely snakes along. The valley, however, of which I knew nothing, is very beautiful;

Douelle

Albas

and was made more so by an absolutely excellent lunch in a café in Touzac, owned by a woman from Essex. Goats cheese salad followed by confit chicken leg with cajun seasoning, and frites. Ideal for the bicyclist. Dirt cheap, too.

Vineyards right and left today, and virtually all of them open for tastings and sales. One could spend a very happy couple of weeks here enjoying the scenery while making oneself an expert on the Cahors A.O.C. From what I've been reading, viticulture is very old here, having been started by the Romans. Apparently Cahors wine was being exported via Bordeaux long before the latter region started winemaking on its own account.

The vines were close enough to the roadside for me to have a good look at them as I rode by. Whereas a couple of weeks ago they were just coming into leaf, now the fruit is already beginning to set, I could see embryonic bunches of grapes forming. All happens pretty fast once the sun is shining.

I was thinking today what it is about bicycle touring that I like so much. Obviously, I like cycling. It isn't just that, though; after all, there's nothing to stop me spending 25 hours a week on the bike when I'm at home, if I wanted. And if it was just the cycling I could easily drive to the Pyrenees, say, and take a road bike with me to cycle to my heart's content when there. Nothing wrong with that, I may well do it sometime. So why use the bike as the means of transport as well as recreation? It's slow, it can be hard work, it's sometimes wet and cold.

It's something to do with the immediacy of the experience. A car or a train insulates you from the places you are passing through, everything is about the destination rather than the journey, whereas on a bike one is in the open and travelling at a pace that makes one aware of the surroundings. And, of course, being limited to a maximum of around 150 km per day means one can't just bypass chunks of the country to get where one wants to go - I feel that I connect with the places I ride though, and stop in for a coffee, and so on. The journey becomes the point, rather than just something that has to be got out of the way. On the bike I feel like a traveller rather than just a visitor, if that makes any sense.

Whatever. Tomorrow I shall start heading back north. 

Day 24: Rocamadour

Route and details.

The best day I've had on the bike in a long time, despite the fact that it absolutely poured with rain for about five of the hours I spent riding. Just a fantastic ride.

I wanted to visit Rocamadour. I'd considered incorporating it into the route, but it seemed obvious that it would be a climbing ride so I opted for another night in Cahors so I could leave the bags in the hotel and ride it unencumbered. Having bought a decently large-scale map of the district I was able to  work out a roughly 150 km loop.

This is a beautiful part of the world. On a nicer day this would have been a gorgeous route. Even today (rained for the first three and half hours, then hammered down for the last hour and a half) it was lovely, empty country roads winding up and down through wooded valleys and past numerous mediaeval villages and small chateaux. There was a hell of a lot going on around here in the 13th and 14th centuries.

And Rocamadour is beyond extraordinary. Here it is in profile, so to speak:

And a couple of views from the front:

The second one is the best, because it gives a truer sense of how the town and chateau sit in the landscape. It's quite a sight, I'm very pleased to have gone. Terrific day all round. Oh, and I saw my first Hoopoe. Very striking bird. Unwilling to pose for a picture, though.

Day 23: Moissac to Cahors

About 68 kms. Details.

A very easy ride to Cahors today, sun shining, pottering along, heart barely beating.  Stopped off to take a look at Lauzerte, a beautiful little hilltop town that is on the St Jacques de Compostela pilgrimage route (or one of them) to Santiago. Fierce little climb to get up there - the pilgrims didn't make things easy on themselves - but massively worth it, just a beautiful little 14th century town square.

I'm unexpectedly impressed with Cahors, too. A very old town, and the old town centre is very attractive. Nice views across the river Lot...

... and some exceptionally pretty old buildings...

I stopped for a beer before dinner in a bar next to this one and found it deserted except for a Frenchman of about my own age who was so exaltedly, royally drunk that he was unable to articulate even in his own language how much he admired the savoir-faire of the English and how I was, already, his greatest friend. It was necessary for us to embrace before I left. Reminded me of Sunderland.

Day 22: Grenade to Moissac

50 km. Details.

Don't you just love a good avenue of trees?

Still blowing 40 kph this morning so despite the fact that I felt good I decided to settle for an easy day. And I took the implicit advice proferred a couple of weeks ago by the most frequent commenter on this blog, and chose my destination so that I could ride with the wind, rather than against it. Didn't some Roman say something like "If you don't know to which port you are sailing, all winds are favourable."? He didn't mean it as a compliment, he was being scornful about equivocal leadership, but it struck a chord today with this aimless tourist. Things go easier if one does not struggle against the fates. Euripides had a lot to say on the subject, I think.

So, an easy 50km spin to Moissac, with the wind at my back. It says something about the psychology of touring that I'm now at the point of thinking that a 2.5 hour ride is barely worth getting kitted out for. A nice ride up the Garonne, which would have been pretty quick had I not got lost in Castelsarassin and circled the town twice before finding my route.

Moissac turns out to be a nice town. On the river Tarn it also boasts the Canal des deux Mers, the junction of the Canal du Midi and the Canal de Garonne which between them run from the Atlantic at Bordeaux to the Med, way south east of Toulouse. And it is home to the St Pierre Abbey. I won't give an extended description, because Wikipedia does it so much better. It is very impressive, though;

We're accustomed in the UK to think we have a wealth of historic buildings and monuments. And it's true, we do. But on balance I'd say there's a greater sense of history here, or more precisely, of continuity; and I think that is largely down the the Church. It's like the UK would be if the Dissolution of the Monasteries hadn't taken place. I'm not sure I've really grasped what a massive upheaval that actually was.

There's a very great deal to be said in favour of La Belle France. Not least the fact that they don't tax wine. I bought a really nice bottle of Lalande de Pomerol today for €9. £25 at home, easily...

Day 21: Mirande to Grenade-sur-Garonne

About 95 km. Details

Did I say I was starting to feel strong? Well it's a good thing, because today got a bit Darwinian. A glacially slow 6 hours on the bike to cover 95km through rolling hills in severe winds; blowing-small-branches-off-trees severe, the French weather people reckon 60kph this afternoon. Nothing to be done but just gear down, draw on one's experience and plod along. Mercifully, it didn't rain.

Rode from Gers into the Haute-Garonne today. Rolling hills all the way - nothing that you'd really call a climb if it weren't for the wind, but scarcely a flat kilometre for the first five hours or so, typically looking like this:

 

Beautiful, but not spectacular. I was trying as I rode along to think of a similar landscape in the UK. Herefordshire, maybe? Obviously great farming country, and lots and lots of horses - livery stables, riding schools, studs and La Clinique du Cheval, an obviously well-appointed equine veterinary practice, just up the road from where I'm staying. 

Rode through the very attractive old town of Auch (pronounced Aush, I think) this morning.

For the rest of the day it was mainly small farming communities. Having plastered this blog with pictures of churches and chateaux I reflected on how much I like a lot of the domestic architecture, too, some grand traditional houses but also attractive little shuttered terraces forming the main streets of countless villages.

According to the weather forecast it's going to blow a gale tomorrow, too, so I'll keep tomorrow's ride shorter, I think.

Days 19 and 20: Rest day then Argeles-Gazost to Mirande

90 km. Details

Decided to just chill yesterday. Beautiful surroundings, nice sunshine, decent food. Speaking of food, if you visit Argeles-Gazost, eat at Au Fond du Gosier. Really good restaurant serving the local cuisine at a very reasonable price, the €25 menu is excellent.

Possible that a rest day was a good idea, because today's ride was moderately strenuous. I'm slightly surprised to see that it involved less than 800m of climbing, because it felt like more - big climb out of Lourdes then a succession of rolling hills between Tarbes and Trie-sur-Baise, before a fast flat finish into Mirande. Lovely weather, again - I don't want to jinx myself by going on about the weather, but I've been amazingly lucky so far, just one wet day on the bike in almost three weeks.

I felt good, too. The usual things that happen when I put in really serious time on the bike are starting to materialise. I've lost a bit of weight; not much, nowhere near as much as I need to lose, but enough for the waistbands to feel just a little looser. Resting heart rate was down to 42 this morning from its usual 48 or so when I'm only semi-fit. I'm always surprised by how quickly this happens, I can't believe the stroke volume can change that much that fast, so there's something complicated going on there that I can't guess at. And most important, I'm starting to feel strong, I could easily have cruised on for another couple of hours today had the need arisen.

I don't think I've posted a picture of what the bike looks like when loaded up, so I'll rectify that now.

 

I see that it looks heavier than it feels. There's about 14kg there in total. Much heavier and I'd split the load between front and rear, but it handles very nicely as it is. 

I am in Mirande. I picked it as a stopping-point for no reason other than that it was in the right direction and about the distance I expected to want to ride, but it turns out to be quite a nice little town, with a cathedral that suggests it was a place of some importance six or seven hundred years ago. And much to my satisfaction, the builders knew a thing or two about buttresses.

And just to cheer me up further, I see that Sunderland beat Chelsea today. Yet another great escape may still be on...

Haven't yet decided where to go tomorrow, but I think I'll head east. 

Day 18: Hautacam

37 km, about 1400 metres of ascent. Details (I've set this to open in a new window, on the basis this might be more helpful than having to click backwards and forwards, as before. Opinions welcome)

Good grief, but I'm a terrible climber. I'm not built for it at the best of times, at 1.92m and broadish I'm never going to be a great grimpeur even at my racing weight, but carrying an extra 8 or so kilos of fat around just makes it ridiculous. This point was driven home to me today when a whippet-thin Frenchman on a nice Bianchi greeted me cheerily as he danced past me on one of the steep sections going at least twice as fast as I was.

Today was the Hautacam. Not used as often in the TdF as the Tourmalet and the Aubisque, but it has put in a few appearances, notably in 1996 when Bjarne Riis rode away from the opposition here, laughing, to win the Tour and prevent Indurain from collecting six in a row. Of course, we now know that Riis was one of the most enthusiastic dopers of that doped-up decade, they called him "Mr 60%" because epo use had pushed his haematocrit levels so high.

Anyway, I could have used some performance-enhancing assistance today on this brute of a climb.

Thirteen kilometres at an average of 8% is no joke, but it's harder than the bare statistics would lead you to believe, because the gradient isn't consistent, it's going from 13% to 6% and back again, so there's no point at which you can just settle into a nice rhythm and grind it out. Not until the last two kilometres, anyway, which are a relatively benign, and consistent, 7%. So if you fancy trying it, be consoled - most of the hard work is done by the 11km marker.

Similar to yesterday in that one is straight into the climb as soon as one is out of town. The first kilometre is hard, hard enough to put negative thoughts in your head when you think that there are 13 to go, but it does ease off in kms three and four. And as always, one just plugs away at it until one gets there.

And once there, just to add insult to injury one finds that there's another col, the Col de Tramassel, 1.2km further on - and 100m higher. So, being in the vicinity - and discovering that it's the location of the only cafe that is open today - there's really no option but to go for it.

By this point I'm absolutely crawling along, old ladies on zimmer frames could have comfortably outsprinted me to the finish line.

As usual, however, the views are something else.

That little smudge of a town is Argeles-Gazost, where I'm staying.

And in the other direction...

Another potentially lunatic descent, if you wanted to throw caution to the winds, which I most certainly did not. In that I was unlike the guys I encountered who were skateboarding down. Quite extraordinary, in leathers and motorcycling helmets and being followed down by a car filming them, these guys were doing over 40 mph. Fantastically skilful, as they flicked the boards sideways and put a hand down to brake through the bends, and it must have been exhilarating in the extreme. I won't be trying it, though.

There's so much good cycling to be done here, and the weather has been so kind (24C today) that I'm staying here an extra day, until Saturday. Tomorrow, something a little less challenging, I think.

Day 17: The Col du Soulor

39 km, about 1100 metres of ascent. Details.

I do these things for the journey, not for the destination. But were it the other way around, today's destination would still have been worth the effort.

The Cols du Tourmalet and d'Aubisque are still snowbound and therefore closed. After today I'm not sure whether to be sorry or glad about that, because the Col du Soulor, on the way to the Aubisque and from the summit of which these pictures are taken, turns out to be a pretty handy little climb in its own right.

Actually I'm sorry, because it would have been nice to do two of the most iconic climbs of the Tour de France, but there's an abundance of terrific cycling in the vicinity without them, as today's ride up the Soulor shows.

Starting from Argeles-Gazost the total climb is about 19 kms. As soon as you exit the town you're into fairly serious territory with gradients of 7% and 8%, and it isn't long before I'm thinking that 19 km of this is going to be interesting. But after a couple of kms it calms down a bit, and there's a section about half way that is level or, in parts, downhill, so there's a fair bit of respite.

Twelve kilometres in, at Arrens-Marsous, you get onto the col proper. As the sign says, it's seven kilometres from there at an average gradient of 8%. 

Not brutal, but no picnic either. From the 7k mark there's a sign every kilometre chalking off the distance and telling you how much climbing remains. These are helpful, because even when, like me, you're climbing with all the dynamism of a three-toed sloth, they come round quickly enough to keep the spirits high. And the cafes at the top are a further boost to morale - not that much of a boost is needed when you look around you at one of the world's beautiful places.

That 7k back down to Arrens-Marsous makes for a lightning-fast and highly technical descent, which, given that the road is narrow, open to traffic and, here and there, poorly surfaced, I took with extreme circumspection. I'm not sure I'd fancy it much in the wet, I don't have the nerves for that stuff any more; but there was no question of that today, the weather was simply sensational.

Incidentally, this charming little town is built on a hillside so steep that there's a lift installed to take pedestrians from the lower level in the valley up to the main square. No bikes allowed, though, we cyclists have to pedal.

And just in case you haven't had your fill of mountain views, here's the view from the terrace of my hotel this morning. 

Things could be worse.

Day 16: Pau to Argeles-Gazost

67 km. Details.

Blogging earlier than usual after a surprising ride.

I spent a good deal of the morning riding false flats. For the non-cycling reader, these are roads that appear to be level but are actually, according to your legs, uphill. They can be very demoralising, especially in headwinds, because your brain can't stop seeing them as flat and you feel therefore that you should be making rapid progress, but you aren't.

Today, however, they were a source of high morale, because they meant that I was gaining the height I knew I needed in a gradual, pain-free manner - considerably removed from the shorter, savage climbs I'd been anticipating. Until I got to Lourdes, that is, when in the space of a couple of kilometres I lost a chunk of the altitude that had been so painstakingly won. Now that is dispiriting, because one just knows that one is going to pay for it.

Incidentally, unless you're a true believer in need of a miracle, I'd give Lourdes a miss. Apart from a very impressive boulangerie at which I stopped to pick up a bit of lunch, it seems to have very little to recommend it.

Anyway, I'm descending out of Lourdes and bracing myself for a brutal last 15 kilometres or so, when I discover an absolutely superb cycle path leading to Argeles-Gazost and beyond. Laid out on what looks to have been an old single-track railway, beautifully maintained, and, incredibly, almost as flat as a board; following a little river valley all the way into the hills. So after pottering along this morning at positively geriatric speeds to save myself for the hardships to come, I find that the last section is one of the easiest of the trip to date. As a result I arrived so early that I continued a few kilometres past the town just to see what lay in store. And the answer, unsurprisingly, is this:

and this.

I'm staying here for three nights, so for a couple of days I get to leave the baggage in the hotel and just ride. That's where coming on the sportier of the two touring bikes comes in - unladen, this one handles pretty much like a proper road bike.

I'm in the Hotel Beau Site in Argeles-Gazost. Straight out of the 1970s, in terms of style, but clean and well-kept and run by an absolutely charming elderly couple. They must be in their 80s.

Day 15: Mont de Marsan to Pau

78 km. Details.

Now we see, I'm afraid, the limitations of a smartphone camera unaided by either clever software or any shred of skill on the part of the photographer. You're going to have to take my word for the fact that these views, from the Boulevard des Pyrenees in Pau, are orders of magnitude more spectacular in real life than these pictures manage to convey.

One first sees these from about 50 km further north than this, only visible because the sun picks out the snow on the horizon. Then as one rides towards them the white-on-blue makes it seem that the peaks are suspended above the earth rather than being part of it, so it looks as though one will have to ride into the sky to reach them. Quite magical, and not a ride I'll soon forget. I'll try to do better with the pictures during the next few days when I'm really in amongst them.

One rides through a couple of kms of modern sprawl coming into Pau, which is a pity because the old part of town is very appealing

with a rather nice chateau.

I imagine the place is absolutely heaving with tourists in the high season, but at the moment it's a very pleasant place to be.

Tomorrow into the Pyrenees proper. Just a shortish 60 km to Argeles-Gazost. Shortish in distance, but not, I'm guessing, in time. One can see what is ahead and it won't lend itself to my breaking any speed records.

Day 14: Bordeaux to Mont de Marsan

124 km. Route.

D'Artagnan was a Gascon, wasn't he? Well, he may have been a great swordsman, but if he came from around here I'm prepared to bet he wasn't much of a climber. As well as my longest day so far, this was easily the flattest - and that's saying something, because this has been a pretty flat trip up to now. Pretty much the whole route was through the Parc Naturel des Landes de Gascon. It was a beautiful ride, sunshine and quite warm, and the roads almost deserted. Not much use for blogging purposes, though, because while lovely to be in, it isn't especially photogenic - one piece of flat afforested countryside looking much like another. However, here's a section of apparently endless empty road for your edification.

Tonight in Mont de Marsan, a pleasant but not remarkable town. Without wishing to be pejorative, it's the sort of place one visits on the way to somewhere else rather than making it a destination in its own right. Unusually for a small town it has two rivers. It's at the confluence of Le Midou and La Douze, which come together in the centre of town...

... to become La Midouze.

Slightly difficult for me to believe that I've been on this tour for two weeks and almost 1000 kilometres, it has flown by. And today marks something of a watershed, in a way, because tomorrow I leave behind the flatlands of The Loire and Aquitaine and head for the hills. Tomorrow night I should be in Pau. Its view of the high Pyrenees is said to be one of the most beautiful backdrops to any town. And after that, the mountains. The next week or so will be all about the bike.