Page 18 - Hunstanton Town & Around - September 2013

18 Hunstanton Town & Around September 2013 Tel: 01485 533422 email: editor@townandaround.net

A Cycle Tour in France
Alan Smith
At dawn on the 25th of May with my Galibier and fined every cyclist 120
trike fully loaded with camping and Euros who made it to the top and
cooking kit plus my banjo, I set off for detained them there so that they
the South of France. My intention was couldn't ride back down and warn
to visit some of the Military their mates still on the way up! So I
Cemeteries in Flanders and then make had to turn back from the Iseran and
my way south via the Jura mountains took another route over the Col de la
and the Alps. Madeleine and the Galibier (2646m)
During the two days' ride to Dover which by now was open. The sky was
the weather looked set fair, but once in clear at the summit and the view
Calais everything changed, and I across the snow covered peaks all the
spent most of the following week way to Mont Blanc was unforgettable.
riding in the pouring rain or guerilla And at the top I by strange coincidence
camping in the shelter of out of town I met a group of riders from Norwich!
factories or supermarkets. But things I celebrated my ascent of this iconic
slowly improved as, having visited the mountain by taking out my banjo and
Menin Gate at Ypres and several of the rattling off a rendition of Foggy
Commonwealth War Graves, I turned Mountain Breakdown to the void
southeast towards Verdun. The site is before launching off on the freezing
sacred ground to the French, and the descent down to the Col du Lautaret
National Memorial contains the bones at speeds up to 70kph.
of 130000 French and German Over the next few days I continued
soldiers recovered from the battlefield, south into Provence, where the Alpine
as well as the graves of 16000 French meadows and timber houses gave
soldiers and memorials to the Jewish way to a more arid landscape with
and Muslim soldiers who died. It was stone farmhouses and the scent of wild
here that the famous photograph of thyme in the breeze. The last big climb where families have lived
Helmut Kohl and Francois Mitterand, on my list was Mont Ventoux, the in their villages for
hand in hand and pledging Franco- Giant of Provence. Ventoux has a generations and still take
German friendship, was taken. reputation for the fearsome heat their water from the village
With the weather continuing to reflected from its white limestone fountain. Regrettably, I had
improve, I headed towards Besancon surface in the summer months, but on to leave this lovely place
and the Jura mountains via a short the day I arrived at the foot of the and continue north, as I had
detour to visit the medieval town of climb the summit was covered in thick to be back in Norfolk by
Vezelay, a start point for the pilgrimage cloud driven by a fierce wind. Just the beginning of August.
to Santiago de Compostela, which I'd how fierce I found out as I covered the Besides, as July passed,
made some years before. The Jura is last few kilometres to the top. Riders campsites were becoming
one of the most beautiful parts of were being blown off their bikes, and more crowded as the entire
France, and presents a heavily-laden many were actually pushing their nation seemed to take their
touring cyclist with some serious bikes down off the mountain because holidays. And every French
challenges, with long climbs and fast of the real danger of being blown off family who take camping
descents through steep forests. the road and into a thousand feet of holidays seem to take a
At one stage I was overtaken by a thin air. Although the descent was at small yapping dog with
man walking his dog! But, after a first freezing, the temperature rose them....
week of fairly tough travelling I felt rapidly, and twenty five kilometres So I rode up through the there it was a short ride up to the port,
ready for the Alps, and so made my later in Malaucene I was back in the upper Loire valley and through the a night crossing to Dover, where I
way towards Val d'Isere to follow the roasting heat of the South of France. heat of the vast wheatfields, and again sheltered from the rain for the
Route des Grandes Alpes. After the By evening I was camped by the visited the magnificent cathedral at first time in weeks, and a fast
hardest winter for many years, many banks of the Rhone, looking across the Chartres, making good daily distances homeward ride through East Anglia in
of the cols had only recently been river at the Papal palace of Avignon. of up to 150 kilometres (sometimes in blazing sunshine, stopping off to visit
opened to traffic and I was riding For the next couple of weeks I the Alps it would take all day to make the Secret Nuclear Bunker near
through deep banks of snow. I arrived meandered through Laguedoc, one of 50). Normandy was beautiful, with its Brentwood. Shortly after passing
at the foot of the Col d' Iseran to find my favourite regions of France, visited restored villages of timber framed through Lakenheath I gave a little
the road closed due to eleven metres some friends near Carcassonne, and houses and small covered village cheer as I rode past the sign 'Norfolk -
of snow at the summit. The made my way northwards to the Cele markets. In the final miles before Nelson's County' and arrived back in
Gendarmerie take a dim view of valley, which in my view is the most Calais, I visited the War Cemetery at Holme in the early hours after a final
anyone who ignores the road closures beautiful place in the whole country. Etaples, which was a major port of day's run of 200 kilometres. The total
due to the risk of avalanche, and only This is a landscape of deep river disembarkation for troops during the for the whole journey was 4627
the week before had positioned gorges, limestone cliffs and oak Great War, and is described by Robert kilometres. Happy Days!
themselves at the summit of the forests. This is 'La France Profonde', Graves in 'Goodbye to All That'. From