France - Writing

The descent into France from the Pyrenees was possibly the best hour of riding in my life. This winding, steady path changed my view on downhill riding. For over a hour, rarely touching our brakes, we cruised along deep curves that led us into the beautiful countryside of France. Forests and little towns surrounded us as we made our way toward Toulousse. Our first stop after 140k was at a family owned property/business with campsites, yurts, canoeing, kayaking, high ropes courses; something so similar to what Ryan and I talk about running ourselves one day. We would have stayed for a day on the river if the clouds hadn't rolled in, opting instead to ride when the sun wasn't so intense.

Our first city in France was Toulousse. To be honest, I was not very fond of this city. It is young and vibrant, but I did not find the people to be very friendly. Without any French, I found it a bit difficult and unfortunately due to rain, we got stuck staying in a hotel for 2 nights. Oh well, no harm, no foul. This did lead us to the Canal du Midi, our first true bike path that was actually easy to follow (unlike Portugal where we found ourselves constantly searching). We passed boats along the canal, people shirtless with a cocktail in hand waving as we cruised by. Bike paths lined with enormous trees maybe 300-400 years old, true beauty that we fully embraced. This canal was an engineering marble of its time. I don't know if you have ever seen boats in locks before, but it's pretty sweet. The boats tie up and wait for the lock master to flood or drain the lock, allowing the boat to equalize with the other side. We found ourselves oohing and aahing at these fantastic little lock master homes and of course the process of the boats moving along the canal. This was definitely a site to be seen.

Although we did hit a lot of rain, it was nice to just let our minds wonder and not worry about our next turn or sign to follow. One particular day, after already riding 90k, and fortunately hitting the best bakery of our trip thus far, we decided to backtrack a touch for a trail that led north, another 30k away. No problem we thought. Little did we know that this path was barely used, tall grasses to our knees, single track and an 18% grade awaiting us. Yes, I really did say 18%. Needless to say, we were forced off our bikes and used the last of our energy to push ourselves and our loaded bikes a kilometer or two uphill. Phew......but the hill did open to a breathtaking lake and campground close by.

We rode along the Canal du Midi for a week, stopping in random towns/cities once our legs were exhausted and found a campground. We spent 2 days in Carcasson, a beautiful city that sits below an enormous castle that looks almost as fake as a Disney princess' home. To this day, the old city remains inside the castle walls and is filled with tourists, ice cream shops and souveniers. After a day of getting ourselves lost in the old city and new, we joined the Europeans at the campground bar for a world cup game. Watching the World Cup here was quite an experience! Europeans love their futbol.....and why we call football football is beyond me.
The canal led us all the way to the Med, the city of Sete. With a city in between (sorry, I can't remember and this is why we need to update all the time), we made our way to Arles, an old Roman city. We spent a few days here and did our usual form of site seeing, used our feet for hours and hours each day. The coloseum is in the process of being refurbished, a few weddings were taking place around town, dogs spashing in the town fountain soaking the site see-ers by shaking off right when one stopped to take a picture. Ryan and I just laughed as people jumped a few steps back and then of course took great photos of this huge dog just wanting to cool off. Arles had an amazing farmers market that must have been at least 10 blocks, everything from fruits and veggies, to clothes, to kitchen supplies, to furniture to rabbits and chickens. That alone was worth the journey.

Our ride out of Arles greeted us with the mistral winds blowing down the Rhone river, of course right in our faces. 5k out of town, riding along a rode with no shoulder and cars whizzing by, Ryan said, "A train sure would be nice." "Yep," I responded. We turned around and made it back to the city in about 2 minutes flat with the winds at our back and caught a train to the furthest city north, Avignon. Now, this is where it gets strange. As we were trying to talk Spanish to the person behind the counter since he didn't speak English and we didn't speak French, we decided to wait for the next tennant who does speak English. We turn around to let the next people in line go ahead and hear, "Are you kidding me?" It's my friend Steph that I met playing rec volleyball in Boulder. What are the chances????!!!! She and her boyfriend Dane had been backpacking throughout Europe and neither of us had really planned on being in this train station. Wow! What a small small world!

We then caught the next train to Lyon where the winds weren't as strong and starting riding east toward Switzerland. East of Lyon was simply amazing. The rolling hills, lakes, rivers, flowers, people, and wide country side blew me away and changed my perspective on France as a whole. We continued to watch the world cup games every chance we had, mostly at campgrounds and often with the Dutch. People from the Nederlands are fantastic and just want to have a good time. They laugh and laugh and I'm pretty sure we have come across a few at every campground on our journeys. With a few days rest camping along a lake filled with families of swans and surrounded by the hills ridden in the Tour de France, we set for a few days on our bikes to follow the Rhone River to Geneva, Switzerland.