Medieval VANNES, & Overcoming 🌉 BRIDGE FEAR!

Day 45. 107km (85644kms 8yrs)

Geneviève sent me on my way with a can of local pâté and a warning about the Saint Nazere bridge. After my last nasty bridge experience I was weary about this one. The alternate options for crossing the Loire – outside of the seasonal running of shuttle buses for cyclists – was a 90km round trip to a ferry, and yet further into Nantes for a bridge.

It was a relatively flat start to the day with a favourable wind so I arrived in Vannes, just 20 kilometres away, early. It was market day and the town was heaving with chatty & inquisitive people. Leaving Brittany behind today I enjoyed my final Kouign-amann before exploring the flower-filled gardens outside the historic walled town. But I didn’t linger too long; I’d decided I wanted to make 100kms today for which conditions were great. I had a nice sunset beach campsite in mind and the motivation to get out of the Loire flood plain after camping on the wrong side of a levee last autumn during some unusually high Loire levels.

And so mid-afternoon I arrived at the infamous bridge, edified to see two lanes of traffic going my way of the shared three lanes; motorists had no excuse not to give me plenty of room in the narrow bike lane. Wind socks indicated a cross wind that would blow me into the traffic, but it was not too powerful – at the foot of the bridge at least.

So I took a deep breath and got started on the climb. In fact it felt far safer than the Pont De Normandie during roadworks had been. A couple of gusts had me wobbling a bit, but being a weekend traffic was comparatively low. On the opposite side a cyclist sought my advice on the crossing; with only one lane of traffic heading her way I didn’t envy her trip at all.

I’d arrived onto a gorgeous stretch of beaches, holiday homes, and campsites. After 10 kilometres the road left the coast to cut through a forest separating a campsite from the beach. I waited until no passing vehicles would see me make the turn and darted down the track towards the sea. The sun was maybe half an hour from setting but it was so windy and exposed on the sand I reluctantly turned back around to find a sheltered spot amongst the trees, choosing to set up camp and eat dinner in daylight than stick around for sunset.

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