Deux Biciclette and a French-Italian Whine

We're doing what...?!

[The following is a Travel Blog from our two-week/550km cycling trip through the French and Italian countryside in June of 2008. It was by far the single most spectacular vacation(?) of our lives. Hope you enjoy the ride! (and stay tuned for the long-awaited part deux - The Italian Lakes and Umbria!! coming spring 2010)]

This about a journey. It's about what happens when you're still saying, "I can't believe we're going to do this..." long after your trip deposit ceases to be refundable and you've submitted the most substantial vacation request of your 13 years with the company--12 days (together!) if you count the half-day Fridays.

For good or for bad this is mostly Damon's doing....his find (the article in National Geographic Traveler) and his suggestion ("hey, why don't WE do this?").  My response?  "Um, we're too ________ (busy, out-of-shape, uni-lingual....) to bike for two weeks through France and Italy....no, I'm serious...uh uhhhh...not gonna happen."

Well, eight months, "XX" number of dollars, and 12 spin classes later, here we are.  As I write this we are leaving in 18 hours.

OK, so I've assumed that you know who "we" are....if you didn't receive a link from either Damon or Steven and just stumbled upon this literary masterpiece, I'll give you the 2 byte tour. I'm Steven and my traveling/life partner-in-crime is Damon. I'm in Technology for a major publishing and internet company, and Damon is an exceptionally talented decorative painter (who can also be found on page 22 of the June issue of This Old House Magazine...yes a plug and yes shameless, but hey...someone has to pay for this trip!).

Now the trip....the trip is a two-week semi-guided bike tour through Provence and Tuscany on, yes...bikes (or "biciclette" as per R. Stone Italian - Volume 1 "The Basics"). Blue Marble is the travel group that puts these 'vacations' together, and they've been great to work with in getting everything coordinated.

What should really make this entertaining is the fact that we've spent close to four hours--collectively--on (real) bikes in the past, oh.... two years. But hey....we're young-ish and in reasonably good shape, so let's see what happens.  Worst case, you see some great photos of distant lands and get a chuckle out of how horribly we under estimated our abilities to ride a bikes for 14 days straight (without much practice).

Ciao....for now.

Day 0.5 - Nimes, France: the Arrival

Nimes, Nimes, Nimes..what to say about Nimes (besides "it took a plane, a train, and  about 12 hours to get here...."). Oh yeah, during the California gold rush, a Barvarian tailor Levi Strauss named "denim" for the traditional blue serge de Nimes found here. 

I'm sure there is more history here--like the huge coliseum in the center of town--but we thought we should conserve our strength for the first day of riding tomorrow and found some Pizza, vin rouge, and another southern French delicacy...Hagen-Das.  It's ok....(say it with me...)  "We'll RIDE it off...." We actually started saying that three weeks ago when we went to the Cheesecake Factory in NJ and it works...we were able to eat anything we wanted.

Today was basically a travel day, so nothing was really planned. We did have to switch hotel rooms because of the bunk beds (seriously)....and a running toilet (it unfortunately stopped before it got to the door). Ba dum bum. All is well now....much better room (it was a "mistake" we were told) and we're about turn in for the night.

Oh, and a note on the tools used for this blog....some updates are made on a borrowed MacBook Air, and some will be done from an iPhone. To post I'm using Wi-Fi where possible, and an AT&T USBConnect 881 broadband modem where there are no Wi-Fi options. Entries may also be emailed in vs. posted, so formatting may change going forward.  Thanks for stopping by.....tomorrow is the first day of riding, so should be interesting if nothing else.

Day 2 - Not Getting Lost and Eating Bull in Arles

It was our first day of cycling and there is only one word to describe it… rainyatfirstandthenlotsofpedaling.  It was great!

Started off not so great when we woke up and looked outside—rain. Not pouring rain, but enough to, ah…dampen our spirits just a bit. And then...it started raining...inside. Water from the room above us started dripping onto the bed…slowly at first, then picked up a bit (about the same as outside). And then parts of the ceiling came down. All we could do (after moving what we had on the bed) was laugh.

We then met rest of the group for breakfast.  Lyn is our coordinator/guide and we had met him briefly yesterday afternoon. There is also another couple—Mitch and Hanna—and John, who is doing the trip solo.  They all seem like great people and will be nice to get to know them.

By 11:00 am the bikes were ready, the rain had stopped, and we were on our way.  Because of the time it took to get the bikes ready, panniers loaded, etc. each group took off on their own.

Early on we discovered the most difficult part of the ride was not actually cycling for 40 kilometers, but reading the directions to get to the end of the route. It’s like following a complicated recipe if you don’t cook…you read three lines, but by the time you finished the first you’ve forgotten the next two (Damon's perfect analogy).

We caught up with Mitch and Hanna as Hanna unfortunately had the first flat tire of the group. They did, however, get to witness the escorting of a bull through the middle of a small town...the bull was surrounded by horses, and the towns people were signaling them to stay back.  Almost would have been worth fixing a flat if it would have put us on a different schedule to have caught that in person....oh well, my flat will come soon enough.

For lunch we stopped in Beaucaire.  The restaurant was across the street from the canal which runs through the center of town...it was wonderfully non-touristy. As we pulled up to our randomly chosen restaurant, we saw another Blue Marble looking bike--it was Lyn at the restaurant where were headed. He hadn't ordered yet, so we joined him for lunch.

Even with Lyn's translations skills--he was good enough to go though the menus for us as he did most of the rest of the week--I still ended up with a plate of whole shrimps (versus the 'prepared' headless variety). It was all delicious.

Somehow we made it to Arles by about 5:00 pm.  The city is heavy on ancient Roman ruins and scenes painted by Van Gogh.  Amazingly, the they have not tried to capitalize on this at all…just kidding.

The day wrapped up with dinner and a great local restaurant.  The food was terrific. The local wines were great. A few of us decided to brave the Taureau “bull meat”…funny, tastes just like chicken (of course not...it actually tasted like a tender pot roast). We finished with some excellent deserts...I had Mousse de Chocolat, and Damon had Mouse de Coconut (whatever that is in French).

Tomorrow’s ride is described as challenging (yes, it was underlined like this in the day’s description). Sounds like 60-70 k of hills, castles, fresh fruit orchards, and an occasional bug in the mouth (sorry).

Day 2 Stats:

• Ride Sheet - Nimes to Arles (42 - 74 k)
• Actual ride - 45 k
• Lunch - Beaucaire
• Remember - Goats, (Hanna/Mitch - Bull escorted through town and flat tire), Van Gogh Cafe

Goats in Provence

For a good time, Click the Pic above (check your volume!).... This was from our first day riding...on the way to Arles. We weren't sure if the 'music' was because we were riding by, or if they were always doing this....kind of the refrigerator light thing.

Day 3 – Les Baux: it was all hell…ah, hills today

I have to say the hotels since we left Nimes have been great.  Last night in Arles it was the Hôtel du Cloître, a family run hotel. It was charming and well maintained, in a great location, and exceptionally clean (and no rain inside!).

Tonight we are at the Hôtel Du Parc in Cavaillon.  This hotel can be similarly ‘adjectivized’ and staffs in both places were very friendly. We were not looking for the 5-star cycling trip where they do everything but wipe your…nose (where, per Lyn, they go out ahead of you and chalk route with little arrows so you don’t get lost—what fun is that!?), but we did expect to have a decent 2- to 3-star hotel stay in each city and they certainly meet/exceed that criteria.

Now, on to today’s ride… We were on the road by 9:30 and it started out perfectly—beautiful weather (partly cloudy…not too hot, not too cold), beautiful ride and landscapes—we were lovin’ it. Then rain...and not the couple of drops, great-it-will-cool-you-down kind of rain—it poured. At one point I had to take off my glasses because there was so much water running down my face I couldn’t see. We knew there was a town coming up, so we just kept riding.

After about 10-15 minute we pulled into the town of Paradou and took shelter in front of “La Poste” and started ringing out our shirts.  A few minutes later Mitch and Hanna rode up, and then we spotted John coming out the to grocery store—all were soaked. The funny thing is, none of us really cared.  It stopped raining 15 minutes later and the rest of the day was beautiful.

On to Les Baux! Now, we knew this was to be a “challenging” day, but none of us was prepared for how challenging—except of course Lyn who has led this ride before.  The first (major) hill was up to the town of Les Baux. It seemed to go on forever…just when we thought we were about to hit the top, we would find more ‘up’ around the corner. Of course even worse than the up was the speed at which two ‘real’ cyclists passed us near the top…"bonjour!....bonjour!" and then hey were gone.

Once we reached the top it was obvious the ride was worth it. Les Baux is an amazing—minus the touristy parts—medieval fortress. The views were spectacular and the history evident wherever you looked.

Back to the bikes—for some downhill this time. We met up with Lyn and rode (coasted!) down to the next town called Maussane. There we found a charming little square with a fantastic restaurant. The sun was out, a slight breeze was blowing, and the food and wine were delicious. We could have sat there for hours if not for the next leg of the ride.  Cavaillon, the night’s destination, was still 35 k away.

After a couple of wrong turns (“those signs were NOT there a minute ago…”) we were on our way to Eygalieres. For those of us who had assumed the difficult part of the ride was in the morning, we had quite a surprise when 5 of the next 6 k were uphill—beautiful, but challenging. We stopped in Eygalieres for pistachios, bread with Tapenade, and a very refreshing glass of beer with grenadine syrup (a Monaco).

Finally pulling into Cavaillon at about 7:30pm, we were all ready to relax.  The hotel for tonight and tomorrow night is great, as was Lyn’s choice of restaurants. It was traditional/regional cuisine with great atmosphere and better service.  We all shared stories from the day and learned some very interesting facts about regional cuisine in other parts of the world (special thanks to Hanna enlightening us on the unique (read: puppy and snake blood) culinary habit of the Vietnamese people.

Tomorrow is an optional ‘loop’ day…..hmmmm,  14 k or 40 k…..we’ll have to see how we feel in the morning.

Day 3 Stats:

• Ride Sheet - Arles to Cavaillon (53 to 77 k, Base Route is 63 k)
• Actual Ride - 65 k
• Lunch - Maussane
• To Remember - Hill to Les Baux, Rain in Paradou, Alpilles (little Alps), walking tour through Les Baux medieval chateau ruins, first Monaco