Distance cycled since Modbury 732 miles
We had a smashing meal last night in a small restaurant in town - Rob had oysters, I had a 'salade paysanne' and we both had chicken in a mild curry sauce with baked apple and chips(a funny combination but very good) followed by a selection of cheeses.
We were the first customers of the evening and we noticed that 3 young men were running the place. There were no waitresses. Rob and I sat down, then another man on his own came in, followed by 2 men together and after half an hour another man came in on his own. The restaurant was called Le Carrick. Not being men of the world we wondered - were we in a gay restaurant? I'm really not sure ......... but when I said in an earlier post that Rob and I may be holding hands when we come off the ferry on Saturday, I was only joking - honest!
We had a typical French working breakfast of coffee, bread and croissants and set off at around 9am. The weather was not the predicted 4C but 9C (Rob has a thermometer) but it didn't really warm up during the day, apart from the few times that the sun came out. For most of the day, the strong N wind kept temperatures down and at times it was decidedly bleak. Although I was wearing disposable filling-station gloves under my fingerless cycling gloves, there have been many times when I wish that I'd brought full gloves. Today, I had the lot on - jersey, shorts, arm warmers, leg warmers, buff, ear warmers and waterproof jacket.......and I was still cold.
We headed up the D769, passing through Poullaouen, and then north-west along a beautiful wooded valley, by-passing Huelgoat. Then we climbed steadily, non-stop, 4 miles to Berrien, where the scenery had become fairly bleak, reminiscent of Bodmin Moor. By this time it was 11am. The sky darkened and rain threatened so we sheltered in the ruins of a church (Chapelle Sainte-Barbe) as rain, sleet and hail came in. Sleet and hail in May in France?
After about 20 minutes, we pressed on, looking for somewhere to take a coffee break, but to my (pleasant) surprise (as I was map-reading), we came across signs for our destination for tonight, Pleyber-Christ, which is about 6 miles SW of Morlaix. We turned off the D769 and reached Pleyber-Christ at 12.15. We had a 'crepes and cider' lunch until 1.40, dodging more showers that were, by now, sweeping in quite frequently, then checked in to our hotel.
The bikes are safely garaged and we have bathed, changed and are now relaxing.
As I look out of the hotel window, I see how cold and miserable it is today. The French are as fed up with the weather as everyone else and we've been finding that many of the hotels that we've stayed in recently are half-empty. I even heard someone say, yesterday, that snow had fallen in northern Portugal!
For our last morning tomorrow, the weather forecast is a little better in that it should be dry. We're going to cycle along the side of the Morlaix estuary and amble towards Roscoff, aiming to get there by lunchtime. Our ferry leaves at 4.45 French time and arrives in Plymouth at 9.30 British time.
Photos:
Our hotel in Carhaix-Plouguer last night.
The wooded valley and river L'Argent, south of Berrien.
The long haul up to Berrien.
So that's it, you've done it! 700+ miles in the glorious French countryside in sweltering conditions, dry to the point of dehydration and collapse, bronzed to the point of being mistaken for having been down under, titanium piston like legs, teeth stained and pitted with French flies and gnats, tear streaked cheeks from the blistering pace, worn tyres and stretched chains from the power they've had to endure and champions to the last.
ReplyDeleteHang on, that's the one 1 wrote a month ago. Tell you what, lets just keep the last bit because you are even more champions to the last now that perhaps the elements decided to unleash a fair-weather cyclist's hell for 3 weeks! Big, huge, massive up to you both from a very humble, totally unworthy pretend cyclist.