In this episode of the podcast, Andrew Sykes sets off with Tim Sanders to cycle the length of La Vélo Francette in northern France. After taking a ferry to Cherbourg, the dynamic duo headed east by train to Bayeux before mounting their bikes and continuing on two wheels. At Ouistreham on the Normandy coast they started their journey south along La Vélo Francette, a 600 km route that travels inland to La Rochelle on the French Atlantic coast. Would they arrive in time to catch their trains and ferries home? It’s over two hours of cycle-camping adventure (with two hotels thrown in for good measure) interspersed with the music of the incomparable Rob Ainsley. Put your earphones in, sit back and let Andrew and Tim take the cycling strain…
[Music] Welcome to episode 92 of the Cycling Europe podcast. My name is Andrew Sykes and if you’ve heard or just listened to episode 91, you’ll know exactly what this is going to be about. I’m in Werrom in northern France and I’m going to be cycling the route of Lavo Fonet which is a route that stretches from Wistrom on the north coast on the English Channel all the way down to La Hosell on the Atlantic coast. It’s about 610 km. It’s an inland route so we’re not going to be following the coast. We’re going to be heading due south from Werm and I’m going to be traveling with Tim Tim Sanders who you would have heard again in the previous podcast and we’ve just arrived in Werrom. Weather is not looking brilliant. Did think I was going to have a week, 10 days, two weeks of blue skies in France, but that hasn’t happened so far. We’re at the very end of the villa of Honet and we’re going to head well first of all into Khn which is just a few kilometers south and then we’re going to continue south over the course of the next week 10 days. Now if I look at the map it’s going to take us to Domro which I visited back in 2022. Looking forward to that. Great campsite. continue south to Oner Somure where I used to work many many years ago and then further south to Neor before heading west and linking up with La Hosell. And the plan is to get there well at the latest on Friday of next week which gives us uh about 9 9 and 1/2 days to get there. And from that point, the plan is to catch a train all the way back up to the north coast at San Marlo where we’ve got a ferry booked for the bank holiday Monday. That’s the bank holiday in August. So that’s the plan over the course of the next few days. And this episode of the Cycling Europe podcast is going to be all about me and Tim cycling. [Music] Wait. Okay. Okay. [Music] Oh, wait. Okay. Right, we’ve been going about 20 kilometers. We’ve just uh cycled through Khn and I remember that I’d actually spent a week living there. I’d completely forgotten about that on a school trip back in 2013. But anyway, um that was my lapse of memory. We stopped for something to eat, or at least I did, and also at the supermarket in the town center. Now, those of you who heard the previous podcast would have heard Tim. So, Tim’s with me again. Hello, Tim. Hello. Hello. Thank you. Right. How do you feel our ride is going so far? 20 kilometers in. Yeah, it’s it’s going well. Um, everything’s been reasonably well sized. I mean, good routes and it’s all been, I think, almost exclusively off-road so far. It is well surfaced in town. There were a lot of tree roots that made it quite bumpy. Very well signposted. Yes. Just like the um Vevel Marit team was yesterday and this morning. You can’t really uh if you go wrong, it’s really your fault, isn’t it? And lots of cyclists as well. Clearly lots of touring cyclists. we tend to see the ones who were heading in the opposite direction of course um approaching the ferryport there were lots not not surprisingly um but even on this stretch now we’ve you know we’ve just passed we’ve seen quite a few yeah um and I suppose we’ve pinpointed a campsite uh just to the south of Khn I think it’s about 10 15 kilometers south and it’s called La Compin Lu Davil, which for those of you who don’t speak French means the campsite at the edge of the town. And we’re just about to go over an old railway bridge. Yeah. But everything around me here smacks of disused railway line that has been turned into a voet. Although I think for the time being, we are actually following the route of the river, aren’t we? Yeah. Um but then again it’s not unsurprising because lots of railway tracks follow in the same direction as rivers. So next stop L compin Lu de Lavil. There’s been a slight sting in the tail of the day and that is that when we arrived at the campsite bonjour when we arrived at the campsite that we were planning on staying at which we hadn’t reserved outside it said compl. Now normally if you’re a cyclist and you turn up and it says comp play they usually find a corner of land for you to pitch your tent on and it’s not a problem. But we waited and eventually found the owner. She came out and was very apologetic. But I think she’d already kind of used up her space, extra space with people who’ already turned up and she was saying how busy it was uh along the road or along the greenway along the fronet. uh and she was very apologetic but she really couldn’t accommodate us which is a problem but what she did do she did telephone a nearby campsite nearby as in about 18 km further along the Vevel route and she’s reserved a pitch for us to stay there which is very kind of her but it does obviously mean that we’ve got another 3/4 of an hour at least of cycle But she did say it’s flattened. Well, so far it’s actually pretty been pretty downhill, which is quite nice along the diffused railway line that we’ve been following for much of the day since leaving KHN. So hopefully we should have a campsite by 6. But it is worth us perhaps reflecting on the fact that uh these campsites are going to be busy and we might need to book in advance for the remainder of the trip. [Music] [Applause] [Music] I was going to say those are the sounds of a nice peaceful campsite in Normandy. But I dare say you can also hear the car. Anyway, um it is a wonderful campsite that we found. We grabbed victory from the jaws of defeat last night. Um the woman had rung ahead at the first campsite we tried. She was very apologetic like I just said. And uh we arrived at the second campsite which is called Compine Lur Traspi T R A S P Y. It’s in a great setting um very wooded setting uh in a valley. Great facilities and a nice free camping area where you can uh pitch your tent and a few other cycle tourists here as well. So it was a relief to arrive here last night. But we ate on the campsite and then had a good night, well, a relatively good night’s sleep. So, the plan today is to head south, continue heading south. If I’m honest, yesterday it got a bit boring on that uh disused railway line. Didn’t seem to ever be ending. So, I’m hoping for a bit of change. And I suspect the route will change today cuz this is Las Swiss Nond, which everybody says is very hilly. So, I’m expecting some hills to climb today. We’re going to ring ahead to try and book the campsite at Don. Stayed there in 2022. Brilliant site. Only €4. Perhaps they put the prices up. Um, but that’s the plan for today. But it is 76 km. So, we need to have a good day of cycling. But the weather’s looking very promising. Blue sky, good temperature already. I dare say it’s going to be a hot one. We’ve done about 13 14 km and we’ve just left the railway line which is a relief. We’ve been on that railway line for the best part of a day and it can get a bit tedious. It’s nice and flat and easy cycling uphill, downhill, good surface, but uh problem is or one of the problems is that you don’t know where you are cuz you don’t tend to pass through towns and villages. So, you’re never really 100% sure as to how far you’ve actually traveled. And uh the good news, however, is that we’re now off the railway line and um we’re in the uh back roads of Normandy. The other good news is the fact that I did manage to ring the campsite this morning in Don from and book us in for tonight which is a re a relief and a weight of our minds. So there’ll be no repetition of turning up tonight and uh having to then cycle another 20 km to another campsite. So don here we come. Oh, it is very very pretty. You can see why they call it Lasis North. It’s just really beautiful green landscape, wooded. If I was on destination X and they asked me to guess where I was, I would probably never say Normandy. So somewhere else instead. Certainly somewhere a lot hillier. And that’s going to be the challenge for the day. the hills. Nothing as strenuous as the Alps, but there are certainly going to be hills involved. But when you’ve got nice scenery to look at, who cares [Music] back in? [Music] That’s a bulong jury that Pat said people should win awards. You should see what I thought it is. that will feed me for weeks. Well, we had a few root issues for the first time. We paused for lunch at a nice little spot called Pon Dwey and it was there really that the Swiss Nom was supposed to kick in. Now on my overview map of France, there were two possible routes that the uh Veil of France followed. The V23 it’s known as the spectacular one is further to the east by the looks of it. But inadvertently we started following the one to the west. I don’t think Tim’s too bothered about that. I think he was suffering a bit after this morning. Um, but it does mean that we’ve missed out the spectacular bit of last week’s snow on which is a pity. But there we go onwards. In the end, we were saved by some gas work deviation that took us off that road and sent us east. And actually, I managed to persuade Tim that uh we should continue cycling east until we met the branch of the Villa Honet that we’d inadvertently abandoned a bit earlier in the day. So, it turned out okay. That said, I think we probably did miss out on the most spectacular bits of La Swiss North. Um, and it is, I think, going to extend our day. I’m predicting probably 80 85 km. And we’re now on the final stretch down to Don Fr. I have history with Don Fron. I stayed there back in 2022 as part of the GR tour around France and it has an excellent municipal campsite. Very good value as well. Cost me €4 back in 2022. I’m intrigued to know how much it’ll cost me tonight. Um but we have booked a place as I mentioned earlier. So um the sun is shining. The cycling is relatively easy in the late afternoon sun and uh well all is well. Right Tim, we’ve arrived at Compine Don and the good news is that it’s still very cheap and also very good. Uh the price has rocketed to from €4 in 2022 to €5 in 2025. However, we got it a bit cheaper for some reason. We got it it came out as under €5 because we’re traveling together and he charged us €960, I think. Anyway, who knows? But it’s very cheap and very good. So, top recommendation, come here. Um, how did you find today? Today was definitely harder work. I didn’t sleep brilliantly yesterday. Um, we did the extra K. We did about 17 extra KM, maybe even 20 last night. Um, but on the other hand, we probably wouldn’t have made it to DMont if we hadn’t done that. So, um, yeah, this is by far the quietest site of the three that we’ve been to so far. Yeah. Um, there’s no road noise like there was last night. Yeah. Um the first one on the coast was quite heaving with people, but no one was particularly loud. Well, this one is just perfect for cyclists cuz it’s basically uh at the bottom of the campsite. Um uh there is a big field and that’s where everybody is. And basically um I don’t know whether they ever get to the point where they say, “Nope, we can’t accommodate you.” because you could have you could potentially have 100 people with their bikes on this area, couldn’t you? I mean, it’s barely a third full the bike. So, this is this is an excellent site. Now, we’ve done 80 km today, which is probably more than we envvisaged. Um, but that was, as we’ve already talked about uh throughout the day, we did take a well, we I’m not convinced we did take the wrong route. We just took an alternative route and then we got to that deviation. Then we lurched back to the original route which I was quite happy about cuz it meant we got to see a bit more of the spectacular area of Lormon Swiss but it did seem to add extra kilometers to what we did. It does seem that there are slightly different routes for the Vel franch in that I downloaded one from the website. Well, I I was using the website itself, just the live website, and I think I’m going to continue using that because yeah, that was easy to use. Uh I mean, we are in France and there’s a mobile signal everywhere, so it’s not difficult to to use and even it seemed to kind of memorize the map even when I was in a dodgy area for the signal. I say I think the route that we did towards uh before flare um that was flatter in the rather than going up and over and admiring the views. Yeah. We were in a valley. Um, yeah, that’s, you see, that’s my one regret that we didn’t get to that point where there’s a famous picture on the website where you’re looking out over this gorgeous view from on high and and and that was that was in the bit that we missed, which is a shame, but anyway, it doesn’t really matter. Yeah, it’s certainly a very beautiful area. It’s not too late for you to have a go at that on solo. Yeah, I’m not going to turn around and go back up there. So, anyway, so that’s today. So, a long day. Now, we do need probably both of us a shorter day tomorrow. Have you had a chance to look at the map yet? Not yet. No. Because the the next stage on the map or the next stage on the website is to go from where we are now, which is Don Fom down to Mayen and it is listed as being 50 km. And I think that would be perfect. It is a lot flatter I think than what we experienced and could have experienced if we’ gone the right way. Yeah. Today on the route I have which may is not necessarily the um routes on the website. A lot of it does appear to be on X row line. Yeah. Again the first bit and the last bit certainly are. This there’s that there’s a little bit in the middle that seems to be not, but I would imagine it’s going to be fairly flat. I mean, I I disused railway lines. They’re they’re good and they’re easy to cycle along, but you don’t see much. No, you don’t see much and they can get a bit tedious and boring. So, I do like to mix them up, but I think there’s going to be fewer and fewer of them as we keep heading south to Larelle. Um, I’ve also been looking at campsites and there is what looks on online to be an excellent campsite just in the northern suburbs of Mayen. I’ve tried calling them, but again had the same problem that I did yesterday with my phone. It doesn’t seem to want to connect. So, I’ve actually sent you the phone number on WhatsApp. Um, and tomorrow morning we’ll do what we did today. Yeah. And we’ll phone them just to kind of reassure us. Yeah. for reasons we don’t know. My phone works and yours doesn’t. But um now the other thing that could be a fact tomorrow is tomorrow is a bank holiday in France, 15th of August. Will that mean that the campsites are very very busy? Who knows? Could this be the first wild camp? Well, yeah. Or hotel. Yeah. Right. So that is the plan for tomorrow. So weather’s picked up. blue sky. I think it’s going to continue that like that for the rest of the uh hopefully for the rest of the holiday. It’s certainly forecast. So, um yeah, tomorrow is day three and hopefully we’ll see us arriving day four. Is it? No, day three. Today’s day three, is it? No, no, today’s day two on the francet. Okay. It’s It’s day three of our trip, but it’s day two on the Veil of Honet. So, tomorrow will be day three on the Veil of Honet, and hopefully we’ll be in Mayen by the end of the day. [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Music] [Music] There’s a chill in the air this morning. Blue sky everywhere, but uh there’s a bit of a breeze and it’s uh a bit chilly. But anyway, hoping it will uh be a bit less chilly and a bit less windy once we get off the hill upon which Donrom has been built. It’s quite an imposing position overlooking the countryside. There’s a ruined shadow here. I’m standing in front of the neocclassical town hall which is very pretty next to the fountain that you can probably hear. Um now the plan today is a shorter day, 50 km like we discussed last night. So, we’re going to go all the way down to Mayen. I’ve tried calling the campsite, but there was no answer. So, we’re going to try again in a few minutes. Um, hopefully we’ll be able to book that because it is a wait off your mind. Um, and today is a bank holiday and potentially very, very busy when it comes to people staying in campsites around France, especially with it being the weekend. People will potentially have gone away for the long weekend. It’s a slight worry, but I’m sure we’ll find somewhere. I always do. [Music] for [Music] [Music] [Music] tractor. [Music] Now, this is a first for me on a cycle tour. I’ve just had to pay to actually continue cycling along the cycle track or the cycle route. €6, but it’s with a good reason. And the reason is that uh there’s some kind of festival taking place in the town of San Frambo called Le Florton and it’s uh apparently old tractors, old cars, usual French kind of thing. I would imagine there’ll be a bar so opportunity to eat something, have a coffee. It’s only uh well past 11, so it’s a bit early for anything else. And we’ve got quite a few kilometers to cycle. So, uh, yeah, should be an interesting diversion for a few minutes or perhaps even an hour or so. We’ve just filled up our water bottles at the cemetery. Good place to fill your water bottles up if you can’t find a tap. And uh, well, what do you think, Tim? Well, I think it’s a good example of serendipity in that um if we hadn’t wandered into the tourist office at Donfall, we wouldn’t have known about this and it was a slight diversion from the Voy route to May but not Lao Francet. It is on the francet route. In fact, the the route goes straight through the middle of the town. Okay. So, the route deviates from the Voy. Um yeah. So, at the Well, I’m going to stop you there. This is Lavo Francet. The thing is that the woman in the tourist office said that there was we had a choice cuz it looks to me as though they’ve extended the um ability for somebody to continue cycling on the uh on the disused railway line. So, that’s when there was these two alternatives which don’t actually show up on the website um but they did on her version of the map. uh did explain the multiple route to the appear to be yeah but um but this is the official I think this is the original official one and it’s certainly signposted as such um so we would have come across it whether the woman had said it or not no doubt um but what do you think it’s a kind of slice of friendship to come in I don’t know whether if we had been if we chosen to take this route but didn’t want to stay for the um for the festival then um whether we’d still have been charged but at the festival there elderly agricultural vehicles, a load of classic cars, primarily Frank because well we’re we’re in France. Um seen lots of there’s a Peugeot 504 convertible. Yeah, there’s all gone in lots of of of Citroen DS’s. Yeah. Um and then lots of old tractors. It’s kind of a slice of French life, isn’t it? That you I don’t know. I don’t know whether you find these in Britain or not anymore. You do in the arches. This is the kind of thing that Linda Snell would we do get quite a few things in Somerset um various festivals where um so seeing tractors was like a not quite a busman’s holiday but um well my highlight was buying I bought 100 g of caramel which were very nice from a a nice woman on her stall and uh I’ve just scoffed a lot so €4 well spent probably about the same amount of money it would cost me to buy three protein bars I would imagine from the supermarkets I reckon And that’s money well spent. Yeah. So, um yeah, I spent 44 450 on um on a a two ball ice cream. So, that that was that was um that filled a hole that I need. Right. Okay. Anyway, we have a there’s a sign just next to us saying Mayen in that direction. And that’s our next stop. And hopefully I think what do you reckon in terms of I’m I’m I’m minded not to bother contacting the campsite bearing in mind what the woman at the tourist office said in um uh Don. She kind of had the same opinion as us until we arrived at that place the other day and they wouldn’t let us in. Yeah. Um I mean the impression also I think the office was closed when you phoned earlier. It did have quite limited opening hours. Well, not really. It was open from 8:30 till midday and then 2 till whenever. Okay. But I think it’s just they I don’t know for whatever reason they weren’t answering the phone. That could be that they’ve got no space and they’re fed up with saying sorry we got no space. It could be that couldn’t it wouldn’t be the first time but we can try anyway. Live fast e [Music] [Applause] [Music] So just a quick catch up on yesterday. The route after that fet that festival was through open countryside. Really nice. And then it did return to the greenway to the disused railway line for about another 20 km. And we arrived here in Mayen. Um at around I don’t know 5ish last night. I continued all the way to the end of the greenway, but Tim was cycling a little bit behind. So, he veered off earlier and managed to secure the campsite and then texted me later that he’d done that and I joined him here about I think 15 20 minutes after he’d arrived. I did see the outskirts of Mayan where there was a bridge. Didn’t look the most inviting of places, but I dare say we’ll probably venture in this morning to uh find out if that’s the case. Uh nice campsite, Compind Deayen. I think it’s a municipal site. Good facilities right next to the river. However, perhaps you could sense a however coming. However, last night after about an hour of some kids game being played at high volume over a microphone where it seemed to consist of people guessing what the next line was in a song. There was a film, an open air film that they played went on for ages, an hour and a half, two hours. Oh my goodness. Why, if you run a campsite, are you showing open air films at that volume in the middle of the uh summer season? It was something I think it was a musketeers film cuz I did hear a reference to Dantion. There was certainly lots of fighting, few horses in there, but my god, what a racket. Anyway, moving on. Literally today, in fact, we’ve booked and planned the next 3 days. So, it’s Saturday. Today, we’re going to cycle down to Chatau something that I’ve forgotten the name of 70 km. The day after we’re going to cycle down to that Sunday, Oner and we’ve booked a train from Oner down to Somure for Sunday evening. And then Monday, we’re going to take a day off in Somure, staying two nights on the Compin Il Doofar that I I used to work at way back in the 1990s, but it’s uh a very different place now than it was back then. So, that’s the plan. Cloudless sky, although the sun has yet to appear from the horizon, I think mainly because there’s a bush in the way. But that’s the plan for today. And hopefully tonight’s campsite. No open air film. The usual breakfast quason and something called un pistol which is a bit of bread with chocolate in it. Very nice for breakfast in Mayen. And uh I’m delighted to say that we’re not on a railway line. We are on a toe path. Bonjour. Yeah. And I’ve just learned a new word, the word for to path, which is all cuz there’s a bit of a deviation. Some walkers ahead. And there’s going to ping my pinger. got some strange looks there and ola I think because of the amount of luggage I’m carrying. Um right yeah back on a tour path or rather on a tour path and all and it is so nice to have a different way of traveling rather than on a disused railway line. Yesterday was a mixture open countryside railway line in terms of distance and ease of cycling. It’s gradually downhill all the way on a great surface. So, we should be in for a a good couple of days of cycling in the sun. Also, perhaps after 5 days of being with Tim, interesting moment perhaps to reflect on what it’s like cycling as a two people rather than one. I’m not yet completely bought on the idea of it being a better way of traveling rather than uh as an individual because I do like to make my own decisions. Uh and I do feel as though so far I’ve been kind of taking the lead. I wish Tim was a bit more forthright, I think, in terms of his desires to do things and basically just turn around to me and say, “No, Andrew, we’re not doing that. We’re going to do this instead cuz this is far better. He does tend to acquies quite easily which makes life good for me cuz basically I get what I want. But I do feel a bit guilty about it being the route and the cycle trip that basically is being dictated by me rather than Tim. Uh, how can I politely encourage him to be a bit more forthright and basically tell me to get off bonjour when I need to be told to stop taking charge? Wow, this is just beautiful. The open meadow to my left. Although it’s 10:00, the sun is quite hazy. And then the river almost motionless behind a bank of trees on my right. And then on the far side of the river, it’s not very wide river, a steep incline, heavily wooded. This is just perfect. Absolutely perfect. until that is I get to on and I’m saying get me off these tour paths. Death by toe path. Right, Tim, we’ve arrived at Chatau Gontier. Yeah. Um about 70 kilometers 70. No, what did you what did you register? about 81ish, but some of that would have been going into town for breakfast and equally a little bit in chat gone here for the um the shop. Yeah, officially it was 7 uh well officially it was 35 and 35 kind of a split between going from Mayen to Laval and then Laval to Chatau Gontier. So, but we we managed to add an extra 10 km somewhere to that. So, yeah, about 80 km now. How have you found today in terms of the cycling? Well, as 80 km cycle rides go, it was a lot easier than other 80 km cycle rides. I think you wouldn’t have been able to find an easier 80k. No. Than what we’ve just done. I mean, we’re following the river downstream. That said, it’s not that you really notice it’s going downhill because it’s kind of fairly horizontal with the introduction of the bargages that give you the lock gate. You do you you don’t notice it going downhill, but you equally you notice that you’re not going uphill. Yeah. um even a slight incline you notice but going uphill but when you’re going downhill okay we might not have detected that we were going downhill but you could definitely detect that you’re not going uphill and it was a very very easy ride. Now the thing that struck me was um basically we were following the toe path and I learned a new word today for the toe path that I’ve already forgotten. What was it? What was that word for to path? H A R Halage Allage. Yeah. Anyway, um and we were following the toe path for I would say over 95% of the route and the surface was identical all the way from Mayen to where we are now. Chatau Gontier. Yeah. And I I kept thinking to myself and and comparing that with the experiences of cycling beside canals back home in Britain, certainly in West Yorkshire, where it the surf if you’re if you can cycle for I don’t know 200 m on the same surface, you you’re in luck. And invariably, it’s a pretty bad surface. It’s not good. along the Oxford Canal from Cropodi about a week and a bit ago and even running or walking there were bits where it become so narrow and fallen into the canal. You could easily fallen in. Yeah. But this I wouldn’t have taken a bike on that but this was a good 2 m at least wide track of compacted gravel. It’s just perfect for cycling on. um and wide enough for multiple people to be passing in both directions. Yeah, that and the fact that they’ve invested and they’ve made that surface like it is for stretching over 80 km, probably more because basically we’re going to be continuing down the river tomorrow uh to dare say it’s going to be exactly the same. Um high quality really it’s just kind of wow. you know, you take your hats off to the French when they when they um make a surface like that because I really can’t imagine that happening anywhere in Britain. And it looks also that a lot of the communities that we pass through have stood to benefit from that. So there’s a there’s a fair bit of joined up thinking going on here that there were businesses there was a cafe we stopped at in one of the former lock house keeper. Yeah. We could have stopped perhaps another three times at those lockeper cafes cuz there were a few after that. Um yeah, it I mean it is seen as a real and one or two of them had toilets as well which I don’t recall seeing that in many UK canals. No, it is a real source of uh well they’ve identified it as a source of income in terms of tourism and it’s certainly working cuz it was busy with cyclists. Absolutely. Um, I mean, a good number doing what we’re doing with PAS and clearly have a having a tent on the back, but a lot of people who were doing it a little lighter, presumably staying in B&Bs or hotels along the way or just day cyclists who had just enough stuff to kind of keep them occupied for a few hours, although one recumbent with a trailer. Yes, actually. And I came across another chap with two trailers. A large trailer that his dog was in, right? And then a trailer behind the front trailer. And lots of ebikes. In fact, even tonight at Chatau Gontier, there’s a good number of cycle tourists, but a good number of them have got ebikes as well, which is uh interesting. It adds an extra dimension in terms of how to charge them. But the campsite seem quite amanable to people charging their batteries, don’t they? Oh, increasingly they’re making that available. Um, and so the plan for tomorrow is that we cycle to Orange. I would imagine it’s going to be a shorter version of what we’ve done today. And did we say it was 60 km? That rings a bell. Um, yeah. So, that’s the plan. That’s the plan for tomorrow. Um, I’m I’m I’m tempted to say tomorrow. Why don’t cuz we’ve got this train at 5. Is it 5:30? I think it’s that sort of time from Onier station. What we could do, I mean, we’ve been doing this increasingly, I think, over the week. We could cycle independently and just meet up in on how would you feel about that? Yeah. I mean, we’ve we’ve both done a lot of cycle touring on our own before, haven’t we? Yeah. We’re not going to get lost. Um, and I think it will give us the freedom to just kind of do what we need to do when we want to do it without I I dare say even if we set off at slightly different times, I dare say we’re going to bump into each other. Um, but it’ll just give us the freedom to kind of build our own day. Yeah. Um, stop where we want as long as we um make sure that we rendevous at that that train station. Do you know which train station it is? I have been to it before, but it was a couple of years ago. It did. It’ll be on the map. It is, but it it did specify on something. Yes. So, presumably there’s more than one station, but I’ll make sure that you are aware of that. And I have the tickets on my phone, so you’ll I need to be there and you need to be there. So, if we say meet at meet at 5:00 outside the station and then we’ll take it from there. Yeah. And head off to Sure. Yeah. And what what’s been your impression of the towns we’ve visited today? Of the towns we have looked at, Lavel was of the three major ones we’ve looked at, Lavel was um the only one that seemed to have life in it, whereas you um Mayan I’d expected more of that, but it’s just seemed close up. You went through Mayan on the way to the campsite and were somewhat um underwhelmed by it. And I don’t get the impression that changed much. I mean, I I don’t know why. I was just expecting perhaps I associate it with mayonnaise, and I don’t know if that’s correct, a correct association of not or not. It’s spelled differently, isn’t it? Mayon as opposed to anyway. Um, but I was just expecting something really a lot different to what we what we found. It was okay. We went in this morning. We got breakfast in that square and it was it was all right. It was fine. But Lava was was really I thought was really nice. that main square and then we come to Chat Gontier and you expect with a name like Chatau Gontier that um again is going to be some beautiful French town but actually and there was a nice shadow on the hill which whether that is the shadow that could be gone here because that was in a striking position that little building on the on the hill but the town itself I mean it just looked I turned right when we came at when we came when I arrived at the end of the greenway in in the town center. Just have a look in the town what was listed as S Trail and it it looked like a ghost town. It looked abandoned. Um it wasn’t that the clo the the shops were closed for Saturday afternoon. It was they’ve been abandoned years ago. It was a strange and you don’t tend to find that in French towns and cities which is strange. No. I’m going back to to Mayo. Um the um the painted bridge was a new one for me. So one of the bridges in the close to the center of town in in Mayon, they’ve painted the the top stonework and the stonework on the inside that you adjacent to the the roadway. It’s quite unique. I mean, and very ornately planted out with planters every Yeah. eight or 10 meters. Yeah. I I can’t imagine you get that past the planning committee and your average British burough council. But it it worked, didn’t it? It was very pretty. Yeah. Um very French. Um Yeah. But that said, chat gone to your campsite is is great. It’s quiet. There isn’t a from well touchwood. There isn’t a open air cinema or children’s entertainment going to be taking place early that will keep us up until 11:00 courtesy of the loudspeakers like there was last night. We’ve recognized a few people from previous camp nights. Uh have you Spanish lady and Oh, is that ah and the lady who was in reception at the same time as us. I I saw her in the uh I didn’t realize that was Spanish woman. Oh, I recognized her tent from Right. Presumably she’s headed into town for something to eat. I recognize her tent from what site was it? Um from Donform. Right. Okay. Either that or she’s listening to what we’re saying and thinking why are those two BS talking about us? Talking about me. Right. Okay. So that’s the plan for tomorrow. On and then a day off in Sio. Sounds like a plan. [Music] [Applause] [Music] It’s now Sunday morning and about 15 minutes ago I set off from the campsite. Left him there to uh continue packing up and pulling down his tent. Had breakfast together, coffee, and he bought some eggs. So, I had a couple of hardboiled eggs, which is no bad thing cuz uh the deserted town of Chatau Gontier or the abandoned town or nearly abandoned town didn’t appear to have a bulongi. So, that’s my breakfast for this morning. Uh Tim seemed happy with my suggestion that we cycle independently and then just meet up at the end of the day. And I’m going to probably suggest we do that again when we set off from SU on Tuesday morning. If you remember, tonight and tomorrow we’re camping at the uh Compil Dar on Somure or Insomure and uh we’re going to get take a day off cycling tomorrow. Certainly long distance cycling. There’s quite a few bits and pieces to do in Sure. So, it should be interesting revisiting. Bonjour. Uh there’s a chill in the air this morning. It’s definitely feeling ever so slightly I don’t want to overemphasize this, but ever so slightly autuminal. Uh my fingers are quite cold. And yesterday, or rather last night at the campsite, I did notice that some of the trees, most of their leaves were golden, brown, yellow, preparing to fall for the winter. That said, the sun yesterday it was very hazy sun, very beautiful. You could see this round globe of oreness in the sky. But today it’s your more traditional summer sun. Can’t really look at it blazing down. And I suspect it’s going to heat up considerably. But uh in terms of the cycling itself, I would imagine it’s going to be a bit of a groundhog day in terms of the quality of the route which has now returned to that fine gravel that I was cycling on yesterday. Very very comfortable surface to cycle on I have to say. Top path maintenance people in Britain take note. Bonjour. Few people are round and about a few cyclists and quite a few runners. Bonjour. There’s one of them. And um yeah, I think I’ll pause for lunch. This if you look on the Veil of France website, um we’re doing two of the stages that they recommend. 30 km to a place called Leon Don and then another slightly shorter stage to On itself. I’ll pause for lunch and perhaps to explore in Lion Don if it’s worth exploring and then I’ve arranged to meet up with Tim again at 5:00 this afternoon outside the train station to take our train down to Sumir on our day off. So that’s the planoo. But again this is just beautiful nice easy cycling and long mate continue. [Music] and the king of all [Music] just had lunch outside the church in a little town called Leon Don [Music] and I’m now standing outside the San Martand Veru in the Leon and presumably you can hear that [Music] the service has just ended. I think people are beginning to come out. [Music] [Applause] Even for a man like me with no religious bones in their body, it seems an apt place to have a bit of early lunch on a Sunday morning. Beautiful. [Music] Yesterday afternoon cycling down to Aner was pretty much a continuation of the morning yesterday and also the previous day cycling along the uh the river. Very beautiful, very easy cycling. Perfect really. Now we moved on. We caught the train yesterday after a couple of hours. Well, I having a beer in the main square in moved on and caught the train down to Sure. very very busy train both with passengers without bikes but certainly passengers with bikes. But um it was one of the trains that we didn’t have to book our bikes onto. They do make a big thing on the SNCF app reminding you you’ve got to look and check if you got to book your bike, but it wasn’t one of the bookable services. I don’t know why cuz it was really busy with bikes and I was a bit worried that the uh train might set off before we got all our stuff off, but we didn’t. Anyway, been for a run this morning. 10k run. didn’t get a great time but uh on the island where we’re camping the ilafar and then around Sure itself. Now I have history with Somure. I worked here for 4 months back in well way back in 1993. God that’s 30 32 years ago I was working on the campsite for Euro Camp and I’ve been back several times since. The last time was in 2015 when I was cycling from Spain up to Norway and I wrote in that book Spain to Norway how disappointed I was with what had happened. It just seemed a bit run down. But I have to say the impression this morning of running around Somir was that it is on the up. It looked very different, looked very smart, very lively, very colorful. And I’m now cycling over the bridge and I’m about to go for a wander and hopefully meet up with Tim a bit later to see what Sumur is like in 2025. Okay, we’re sitting in a restaurant in the middle of Somure. We just had a really nice meal and we’re thinking about where we’re going to cuz basically we’ve done about half of the trip. Is that correct? Yeah, maybe slightly further, but we’re we’re not we’re nearer to half than a third. I No, I I would I was hoping we were near nearer to 2/3. It is 260kish to Larelle, but the whole route is 630. So, so we are bit over half. So, we are more than halfway. Um, so we’re in Samur and the route um well, we’ve got four days in which to do it. Um, so four days in which to do how many did you say? 2 265 265. So what’s 265 divided by 4? So we’ve got 41% still to do. Okay. And what’s 265 divided by 4? You can’t 66. Well, I guess a quarter. Well, that’s pretty reasonable. I mean that’s less than the probably with the average of what we’ve done so far. Yeah. Um and tomorrow the plan is to get as far as well ideally which is 70 I think we worked out 7 about 75 kilometers. Um there’s a campsite there. In that case, it will bring it well down below 60 km for the remainder of the uh Yeah. So 76 76.3 km. Okay. Um and in terms of the route, I think it’s it’s going to continue to it’s not going to slavishly follow a river for the remainder of the way, but it does look as though it’s following the valley bottom cuz there’s a river somewhere near Yeah. So there’s no river immediately, but I think a bit later on once we go past, but if you look at the route there, it it follows the valley bottom because it it it’s not the tour path, but it is following the valley bottom, which means it’s going to be fairly flat. Yeah. It should be quite pictures, too. We go through some um some nice villages towns. Yeah. Um now this is the bit that I actually did albe it in the direction back in 2015 from Larashelle to Su but at the time the the route was barely opened. It it had literally opened at and in fact I think officially it hadn’t opened when I rode it. Although some of the signs were up but for much of the route I just did not follow the proper route. I went onto the main road. So, I’m looking forward to actually following the proper route, albeit in the other direction. Um, but we do have the get out clause of the railway again cuz it looks to me as though there’s a railway that goes from Sure all the way down to Neor. Yes. And then there’s a railway that goes from Neor to Larelle. Yeah. So for up to Neor we can very easily duck out to the railway but after Neor the railway which goes to Lar shell deviates or diverges from the route. Yeah. Um and that again from memory that final bit following the uh canal to Lar Roelle the final bit is not the most pleasant of rides. So I’m minded to say that we I guess see how we are when we get there. But if we do get to Larelle early, it gives chance to explore ill. Yeah. Or or shell cuz the logistics are that if we our ferry back to Britain is on the bank holding Monday, which is a week today. 8 a.m. Um what? 8:00 a.m. Yeah. So we’ve got to be back in St. Marlo St. Marlo by the evening of Sunday. Yeah. Um so if we arrive in Larashell on Friday of this week, that means we got basically two days to make our way back on the TER trains all the way back up to um San Marlo. In my experience of doing the journey from south of Na like like a a Bordeaux direction to Na and then onto St. Marlo, I’ve never yet done that in one day. Looking at the trains, the the trains to Na seemed to only exist in the afternoon, which then didn’t give enough time to get from Na to Len and then Len to some. But we’re giving ourselves time, aren’t we? Yeah. I And I don’t have a problem with that. I’m quite happy going from I’m quite happy say taking two trains on the first day on Saturday. Yeah. and two trains on Sunday in order to get us to Sam Marlo. Yeah, we should be able to get a direct train from Larishelle to N, but the next bit is normally two or three trains. Yeah, we’ve just got to be careful that we if those trains need booking for bikes. The yesterday’s train didn’t need booking, but I mean for goodness sake, there were a billion bikes on that train. Why it wasn’t a train that required booking, I do not know. um it made no sense. Um and that’s going to probably be a similar situation when we um when we get to Larash. Yeah. And previously when I’ve done I forget which one of those routes it was probably the journey from Bordeaux to Nand um I went via intera which cost more and the bike spot was €10 but I knew I had a bike spot and that that €10 plus a bit extra for the inter that that bought peace of mind. Right. Do those trains still exist? Intercity trains in France I don’t know. It seems to me from recent experience that it’s either TGV or T obviously which is not on the cards or TE. Those are the two there’s also the we trains but aren’t they aren’t they TGVs? No no I think some investigation might be yeah okay so yeah so tomorrow ideally to there’s a camera there. Um, I think we can stop booking in advance our campsites, which is what we’ve been doing for the first week. I think evident, apart from that first night when that woman turned us away and said she didn’t have any space whatsoever, albeit very politely, I think we could have turned up at every single campsite since then and just been given a space. Even even in Sio where it’s really busy. Yeah. It wouldn’t have been a problem. I mean, in retrospect, I think she did us a favor in that uh it meant we did get to Donfall. We did get a bit more advanced in time. Um it would be nice to have bed down there, though. Yeah. Yeah. I don’t think we need to worry about that. That said, we I remember going through um and camping at the Comp Municipal in La Hoelle back in 2022 and I phoned up earlier in the day saying, “Can I book?” Cuz somebody had told me it was going to be really busy and they said, “No, you can’t. You just have to turn up.” And at some point in the afternoon, we just put um full sign. And it was really really busy. I think they even turned away cyclists. So we do need to be careful and we do need to make sure that we turn up in Larashell in good time if we are planning on staying in the in the comp municipal. Yeah, I look at the site I stayed at some years ago. That was couple miles out of Lishelle, but that that was fairly quiet. Well, the comp municipal was great cuz it was it was very close to the center. um although the station will be although it did have the disadvantage of one there was a fireworks display and secondly the people in the tent next to me at various points in the night were having very intimate relations but uh and very loud intimate relations but uh great let’s hope that they’re not there this year they probably split up by now [Music] [Applause] [Music] Thank We’ve left Samuru and well, it’s Tuesday morning. It’s quite overcast and a lot cooler than it has been really since we started the journey. And I don’t mind that actually for a day at least. Uh it’s quite nice cycling without being covered in factor 50. Uh it’s quite subdued and dark. And this is the kind of cycling that I really do like. Up until now, we’ve had long stretches on disused railway lines and following the river, the Mayan down to Oner. But this is quite varied. It’s a mixture of onroad, farm tracks, quiet country roads, and a few bits of off-road, but not in any kind of extreme way. paths through woods that are easy to navigate on a bike. But we’re passing through south of uh Sure. We’re now passing through lots of vineyards. And it’s the variety I suppose more than anything else. Little villages dotted here and there. Few cyclists like that guy speeding past. Very few cars on the road. The sound in the distance of huh an aircraft up above, but also of the harvest. We’ve just seen some people harvesting big fat red grapes or preparing to harvest them. And I think that noise in the distance is a more automated way of harvesting something. Don’t know whether it’s grapes or anything else. And we’ve also passed in the uh middle of a off-road track. There was about seven or eight people, men in high viz jackets spaced out about 20 30 m apart. And it was Lash Shas Donju, the Anju hunters. And I asked one of them what they were hunting and they said songier. So wild boar is what they were after. They hadn’t seen it this morning. Uh and the chap I was speaking to was a man of few words but uh he was hopeful that they would manage to see one shoot it and presumably eat it before the end of the day. way. Okay. [Music] [Music] Okay. That was Montree. a ble I thought I knew the name and when we came into the uh little town it looked a bit dilapidated rundown I thought why do I know this name and the reason is that there’s a beautiful castle there beautiful shadow it’s got quite a spectacular setting just by the river um and we cycled into the town center village center next to the chatau had a coffee and I wandered around the market and had chat with that chap who is not local. He was saying he was from Savoa and he was selling his meat and cheese, but unfortunately he wouldn’t sell me any of his meat which was delicious. It was pork and it was so sweet because he was selling blocks of it rather than individual slices. Now, as we did the other day, we’ve decided to cycle independently. So, Tim is somewhere behind me. Um, probably not very far. Uh and we’re going to meet up at a campsite in EVO that we’ve identified. We haven’t actually booked this one in advance. Uh all the previous ones after the experiences at the beginning of last week, we booked in advance, but this one we haven’t. We kind of reasoned that they’ve got plenty of space. And all the sites that we’ve been to so far have had plenty of space. It was just that one right at the beginning where we were turned away. Um right, and I’ve kind of arrived at a fairly creepy place. It’s by a lake. And it’s a bit abandoned. That was a car going past. There are a few people dotted around. There’s a few fishermen. There’s uh some shalets behind a wood. Oh, that makes it even more creepy, that sound of crows. But it’s all a bit abandoned. There are some goats behind a fence just next to the uh toilets that I’ve just used. I went into the toilet, the door slammed shut. I thought, “Oh my goodness, hope I’m not locked in here forever.” So, h middle of the French countryside. It is a bit creepy. And I suppose I’m not used to cycling by myself. Not on this trip anyway. Uh I took a wrong turn in just shortly after coming out of uh Montre Bal and passed this farm and there was a massive black dog in the farmhouse just in front of the farmhouse and I thought don’t move and thank God it didn’t. And then I passed another door and there was another dog and it started barking. It set the other one off. Initially I thought few I’ve got away with it. But then I realized I was going in the wrong direction so I had to cycle past them again. But I survived. Bonjour. There’s a cyclist. He’s heading in the opposite direction. So, better get back on the bike. Next stop, Tuah Tuah. And then about another 30 km to Elvo where I should be later this afternoon. I suspected Tuah was at the top of a hill because when I looked at the profile earlier, it was flat apart from right at the end and there was a big well relatively steep bit on the profile. Now the route itself is blocked because there’s been a land slip. And my goodness, I’m off the bike and I’m pushing, I defy anybody to be able to cycle a fully laden touring bike up this hill into the center of Tuis. I’ve arrived in Tuis. What a bizarre place this is. It is. Wow. It’s very unfrench because it just feels abandoned. There are some beautiful buildings. The church next to me has got an amazing facade, but street after street of abandoned shops. There are some businesses. There’s a few bars and restaurants and they seem to be doing good trade. Most towns like this that you stumble upon, they are really wellmaintained, pristine, and the tourists are well coming in their thousands. This could be one of those places, but it’s hit hard times to say the least. They’re doing bits of work here and there to try and rejuvenate the place, but goodness me. This is a a creepy abandoned town. That’s kind of the theme for the day. I’m just about to cycle down. I think I’m Yeah, I’ve just seen a sign. I’m still on La Veet. So, I’m just going to cycle down this road. There are timber framed houses on either side. That looks a little bit nicer, but goodness me. Ervo, 27.5 km. That’s my destination. I was hoping to get some lunch here, but I haven’t even seen a bulongi or a epiceri where I can buy anything from. Whoa, creepy town. [Music] [Applause] [Music] Messi. Messi. [Music] I found me. Right. Okay, Tim, there’s your coffee. Oh, thank you, Andrew. Change of plan. If your French is up to it, you probably understood what I just said. So, we’ve got a change of plan now. We need to be in La Hoelle by the end of Friday. And today is Wednesday morning. Um, and I think you were, how would you describe your physical state yesterday? Somewhat racked. Right. Okay. So instead of continuing down the veil of Fronet south, which I suspect is probably not the most interesting bit of the route, it’s the bit that I did back in 2015, albeit in the direction, and I didn’t really stick to the route. I don’t think I took the roads. But anyway, so we’re going to take a train from Puatier down to Neo. Now, the reason why we can’t take a train from where we are now, which is a place called Ervo, is there a train station in EVO? I don’t think there’s anymore. There’s a there’s a train line that goes all the way from well it looks as it goes from Somio down to Neo. But um despite there being level crossings and things like that which all look very modern, there appear to be no trains whatsoever. They’re all buses. Perhaps they’re just perhaps it’s just maintained as a freight route. Yeah. Yeah. And certainly looking at the tracks, they weren’t completely rusted, but they weren’t as shiny as you often see them. Yeah. So, that’s a bit of a mystery. Anyway, so in order to get a train further south, we’ve got to lurch over to Poatier, which will be about a 3 4h hour ride. Um, and then catch the train down to Neo. We’ve booked into a hotel in Neo, um, our first of the trip. And then I reckon we should be able then comfortably to get to La Ho Shell. There are loads of campsites in the Mah Puettova uh that we can hopefully use on Thursday. And then there’s the Comp Municipal hopefully in La Roelle on Friday night before we start thinking about heading back up to San Marlo and the ferry home. Um have you ever used cycle.travel? travel. I’m aware of it, but I’ve not looked at it for a while cuz I just plugged in the I I thought it was just a UK thing, but I’ve just plugged in from here and it’s given me a route to follow. Okay. Um, is that far different from what we had initially? No, I mean it’s basically from here straight across country, but it does presumably the algorithm in cycle.travel travel keeps you away from anything that might be remotely unpleasant. Yeah. So, that’s worth a shot. Yeah. I’ve never actually used it before. I don’t know exactly how it works in terms of following the route, but but we’ll we’ll try and use that. Um, one other thing I wanted to ask you about was the saddle. Yeah. Cuz you’ve got a Brook saddle there. I have. And I’ve always had a Brook saddle on my touring bikes and I I swear by them. But when I was preparing the Koga to come on this trip, I noticed that my Brook saddle, my B17, of which this one was really sagging there in the middle. And however much I tightened the nut on the end, it wouldn’t repair it. Have you ever had any problems with your B17? No, I’ve got a B7 on on both bikes, the the Doors Galaxy and this Sly Troll. Initially, when I got this, I just swap the saddles over and I thought that’s stupid. So, I bought another saddle. I’ve done very little in terms of coating with proof hide and leather feeder and tensioning it. They they do tend to shape, too. Yeah, oneself. Um, well, mine was definitely sagging. So, I was in um Allterrain Cycles in Bradford a few weeks ago and I there’s an alternative Brooks which is not made out of leather. So, presumably with the um Cambon the C7. Yeah, the C17 which is what I’m using on this trip. Yeah. And you can probably hear it’s a pretty solid thing. Now, when I bought this, I messaged you saying, “Oh, I bought a C17 and you messaged back saying I tried one and I did not take to it. Um, I tried a short ride on it. It really ate into my sitbones. Um, but it just I mean, every every backside is different and I didn’t pursue it because it didn’t I did a short ride with it. Maybe should try again. I did a short ride with it and worked on the basis that that doesn’t con conform to you like the leather saddle eventually will. Yeah, I have to say I found this really quite comfortable. Yeah, very supportive. It doesn’t sag one bit. Um the reason I went for it was that I was aware that it’s best practice not to leave your leather saddle out in the wet. Yeah. And I thought, well, let’s try and get a saddle that works that I don’t care if it gets wet. I wonder if that’s the problem. Cuz back in 2022 when I had the saddle that I’ve just replaced, the one that’s identical to yours, the black Yeah. B17, there was some pretty torrential downpours and I didn’t protect and I left the bike out. That was in the Alps. He could I remember talking to my chap quite a few years ago to CTC birthday rides who said he’d had his saddle for 50 years and kept it out never protected it never fed it never watered it and never stopped it getting wet. Yeah. Um yeah. Yeah. Anyway, but I’m I’m I’m pretty happy with my C7. Um I think if you can do the mileage that we’ve done without severe pain I and and comfort well that that proves that one works for you. And also there’s nothing to adjust and you don’t have to remember to wax the underside. Yeah. Which most people don’t do anyway. Yeah. I I have I have done it with that one just not recently. I mean it’s a hide feed that you’re giving it. So, it’s a it’s a living thing. Yeah. Right. Or maybe not living, but it’s um in the same way with leather car seats, you might feed them to keep them soft and supple. I drive a Mini. I don’t think it’s got leather. No. No. I think you need to drive a Rover or a My 20-y old Audi has leather seats. Yeah. I don’t think my Mini does. Well, the Mercedes I had a while ago had some fake leather, which is really nice, but um you didn’t need to feed it. Yeah, that I feel as though we’re diverting away from Yeah. cycle touring. Yeah. We’ll save that for the uh for a car podcast. Yeah. been cycling for about 20 kilometers now. As mentioned earlier, we’re not following the Veto Fonet for today. We’re making our way over to Puier to take the train. And I’ve never used cycle.t travel before, but I thought I’d plug in Elvo, where we were last night, and Poetier, and it came up with a route. And so far it’s been brilliant. It’s taken us across country on good quality but bizarrely quiet roads, well-maintained, very little traffic, beautiful scenery. It’s quite open here. Um, so the scenery you get is pretty vast. There’s something Italian about the landscape. little villages dotted here and there. Um or perhaps even the prairies of North America, these vast fields on either side of where we’re cycling. But so far so good. I don’t want to attempt fit. We still got another 35 km to go to Quatier. So I hope it continues like this. But cycle.travel, I think at the cycle touring festival a few years ago, there was a talk by the chap who created cycle.travel. He’s clearly doing a better job than Google. Uh last night coming into Elvo trying to find the campsite, I thought, “Oh, I’ll switch on Google bike directions.” Of course, it sent me down a path that I couldn’t cycle down. In fact, a path that uh disappeared. And even this morning, Google directions to the local Bulonerei in Elvo. We got to a point where there was a great long flight of stairs where you couldn’t go down. Uh, zero marks to Google, top marks so far to cycle.travel. Download it. Unless a bit later I say it’s been awful, but I don’t think it will be. I’ve got high hopes. Pattier, here we come. Well, that was that that ride was successful. That that was amazing. It was it’s a definite um a good route for cycle travel. Cycle.t travel. Yeah. Um and I don’t think we could have come up with a better route if we’d actually sat down and planned it ourselves. No, I think we might have found a a shorter route, but that would have been following various droads for I I don’t think we could. I I mean I think you know and I mentioned earlier the fact that we always seem to be traveling in the southeast direction. Yeah. And I think that was a pretty direct gone through that forest section if we planned it ourselves, would we? Oh yeah, absolutely. Right. Okay. Now, uh we’re at the station and we’re going to go through the palava now of getting our bikes on the train. This is bike train number three, isn’t it? I think that we’ve taken. I think now right this isn’t one where we actually have to hook them up but I think but we do need to make them push that push that up. Uh no I don’t think that’s this is a bit like krypton factor. Yeah, this might be for luggage. I think if you Is there a lock somewhere? There’s an instruction there. Espass. Hang on. Just be careful you don’t get your fingers trapped. Yeah. Oh, is it the other way? Perhaps. No, I think it’s locking further near the pivot. Or perhaps it just Yeah, I think what we need to do is to just take the luggage off and the bikes go side by side. Does that make sense? So, the What does it say there? Merced. So, put your bike in the direction of the opposite direction of the one before it. And I think right. Okay. Those stretch over. Yeah. I mean that the bikes. Yeah. I think we put our luggage on there. Yeah. I mean the bikes can fit underneath, can’t they? But normally what we’ve had to do on the other trains and certainly previous experience is we’ve had to um hook our bikes up on the roof. But by the looks of it, this is looks like a slightly older TER train. Yeah. But still plenty of space. So you I think take that that strap that strap and and hook it around your handlebars. Oh, take that. Oh, no. Well, actually it says so the seat post presumably. Yeah. What’s notable is that this is all rubber coated for protection. Yeah. Well, there you go. Right. And I put mine in the opposite way. Well, first on the first on the train. I mean, this this works fine as we don’t get if we don’t get and the train starts from here. So, yeah. Coming onto the uh it’s in the heat of the moment. That could it could all have been a bit um Okay, that works fine. Okay, successful. [Music] [Applause] [Music] The echo gives it away a little bit. Uh after eight nights in the tent, we booked into a hotel in Neo last night and it was very good timing because last night, yesterday evening and I suspect through the night, it absolutely threw it down. So, uh we’re dry and we’re ready now for the final two bits of our journey to Lar Roelle. Today should be relatively easy because we’re only going to cycle I think we worked it out was it 30 kilometers 30 40 kilometers and then a slightly longer day on Friday which should get us as far as Lar Roelle and we’ve identified a couple of campsites. Lar Roelle. It’s the hopefully municipal campsite, albeit a very busy site, so we need to get there in good time. And then tonight, there are some campsites um in the Mah Patter van, which is a really pretty area. I remember it from 2015. So, I’m looking forward to going through there. And the weather’s looking okay. Looking out the window, it’s a bit gray, but it should hopefully, according to the weather forecast, brighten up over the course of the weekend. Uh yesterday on the train, we spent a bit of time also just booking train tickets in order to get back to San Marlo. So we’ve got two trains on Saturday which will take us to Ren. We booked into a hotel in Ren. And then finally on Sunday we’re going to catch the train from Ren up to San Marlo and that should get us back to the ferry for Monday morning when we’re going to be sailing back to the UK. So that’s the plan. Um, clearly I had a good night’s sleep last night. It is amazing to actually have a pillow after 8 days in the tent where I’ve got my camping pillow which basically is rubbish. Um, and uh, the problem I have with staying in hotels is that when you’re camping and you pack up your tent and you put everything in the panas and you put everything back on the bike, all you need to do is turn around and look at the ground and it’s pretty obvious if you’ve forgotten anything. That’s not the case in a hotel. I’m terrified that I’m going to leave something important behind. And uh I’m going to spend the next 5 10 minutes as I finally put the bits and pieces back into the pas that I’ve actually got everything. Hopefully I won’t leave anything here. Um if I do, I’ll be back here later today to come and pick it up. But no, no, no. I’m not going to. I’m going to make sure I take everything with me. We’ve not got far to go today, I reckon. Well, if we follow my suggestion from last night, we’ll find a campsite uh at a place that I’ve forgotten the name of, but it’s about 40 kilometers following the river west of Neo. I dare say it’s a lot nearer if you followed a route that was direct, but we’re following the river. And I don’t know the name of the river. Um, but we’re following the river and uh it kind of meanders backwards and forwards as you would expect it to because it’s in a fairly flat landscape. Now, just reflecting on the solo cycle touring and cycle touring with a friend. Uh, I have to say it’s gone pretty well. Um, I think we’ve managed to balance spending time together and uh, having our own space. But the thing that I mentioned this earlier, I think I think I think I the thing I do find a little bit uncomfortable about is making all the decisions. And I still feel as though I’m making all the decisions or most of them. And Tim, you know, because he’s a very polite person, agrees and goes along with what I’m saying. So today, cyclist dressed head to toe in uh fluorescent yellow there. look like a hazmat suit. Um, so today I’m just going to let Tim take the decisions and uh we had breakfast in the covered market in Neo and then I just waited outside. I thought, well, come on, Tim. Make a decision. Make a decision as to when we’re going to set off and in what direction we’re going to set off. And eventually he did. Thank goodness. Um, that might have been a subtle hint that I really want him to take charge. Uh, but uh, let’s see how we get on for the rest of the day. Tim, you’re in charge. Although, you’ll probably only find out when you listen to this much much later. Hopefully, you’ve seized the uh, day and you’ve told me what to do cuz I need a bit of instruction today. Mercy. [Music] [Applause] [Music] Yesterday’s cycling was very very easy but very very picturesque through the Mar Pva. We paused in the town of Koulong. It’s known as the green Venice around here, La Venise Vet. And you can easily understand why. It’s crisscross with waterways. Uh lots of people on the water punting, canoes, pleasure boats, but not very busy. Uh and almost carfree. Koulon itself was a small town village where there were very few cars. So it had a nice quiet atmosphere a bit like you find when you go to Venice. You don’t have that constant sound of the motor car which you do in many places unfortunately. Um so we wandered around had a spot of lunch there. Um and then rejoin the Velonet continuing west. The original plan was to stop at a campsite in a small place called Damvix. Um but Tim had found an alternative a bit further on which made sense because we still had plenty of time in the day. So we cycled another 10 kilometers or so and got to compare. Compinare it was called. That’s right. which was a good campsite, very friendly. And uh we noticed that there was a chain link ferry across the water uh which we needed to take to get to the uh campsite. So, um I was a bit worried that if it wasn’t working, we might have to double back and retrace our steps to the bridge. So, we did take a bridge rather than the ferry, and that meant that we got there guaranteed. Um, and then this morning the ferry was working. Um, and we hauled ourselves over the water back to the Villa Fonet, which was on the opposite side of the canal. River looks more like a canal, but was it a river originally? I do not know. Anyway, I think we’re now in Shahant Maritim again. The campsite was in Vond on the other side of the water, different depart. Um, but it’s a flat landscape. We’ve got 35 kilometers to cycle to get to our final destination of La Roelle. So, we hopefully when we get there, we will have managed to do what we set out to do at the beginning of last week, which is get to La Hosell by Friday the 22nd of August. Um, obviously we’ve had to cut out a couple of sections, short sections, and then we took the train instead and we changed course to go to Pier in order to take a train. But I reckon from leaving Bayer on the north coast and then cycling as far as Wrum which wasn’t on the Veil of Honet, we will have done roughly 650 km which is roughly the length of the Veil of Honet. So perhaps if we caught the ferry to Westham to begin with, which was not a practical option, bearing in mind Tim lives further west down in Somerset, it’s worked out rather well. And we’ve just got a weekend of train travel left before we get back to uh Britain on Monday morning. But perhaps 30 km to go this morning and we’ll be hopefully on the comp municipal in La Roelle, a place that I’ve stayed at before back in 2022 on my grand tour. There aren’t many stretches of the European cycle network, whether they be Eurovos or not, that I’ve actually cycled three times, in fact, on the continent itself. I can’t think of another example, apart from this one, which I’m now cycling for the third time. It’s the route that goes from La Roelle up to Mahan. And I first did it in that direction back in 2015 when I was cycling from Tarifa in Spain to No Cap in Norway. And I think I wrote at the time that it was quite a rough track. Bonjour. Um, in 2022, so 3 years ago, when I was doing Lugon tour, I cycled in the other direction cuz I was following the Veis. And this section here between Maram and La Roelle is both LaOd and Level Francet. So I did it in the other direction from Maran to La Roelle. Um and again from memory can’t say I was that impressed by the uh quality of the ride. Very easy ride on flat surfaces but a bit rough in places. But I’m back for a third time. 2025 Lavllo Francet and I’ve just set off from Maham. 25 kilometers in front of me is the town of Lar Roelle where we finish our ride. I’ll give my judgment as to how good or bad the ride was in terms of comfort when we get there. It perhaps hasn’t made life any more comfortable for me that when we were in Mahon, I stopped at the bike shop and asked them to pump up my tires. So, they’re now rock solid, which means that I’m going to feel every little bump and undulation along the way. Right, Tim. So, we’re on our final stretch. Yes. We’re probably going to be in Lar Roelle within I don’t know within certainly the next two hours probably a bit sooner than that. So what are your impressions of Lavllet alto together? Well I’ve really enjoyed it. I mean I think things that that strike me the the variety. We start at Wrem and we followed the canal through Kong and we followed either um former railway lines or canals. We’ve seen a nice a good cross-section off front. We’ve seen the floor and for most recently we’ve been seeing sunflower fields ready for harvest which we didn’t see in the north. It’s difficult to compare the weather because that could be changing from day to day anyway. But yeah, we’ve been pretty lucky with the weather when we basically had one storm and that was when we were bailed out into that hotel in uh Neo a couple of nights ago. Um, what would be your of the whole route, what would be your favorite bit? That is a difficult one. Um, each day has had its new charms. But if I had if I said to you, look, you’re going to go back and you’re just going to do one section again, which one would you do? It probably would be the bit start at Samur and heading south. How about you? Um, well, I suppose if I if I came back, I would try and do that Swiss Normon bit. The bit that we actually inadvertently missed out cuz we sure cuz we uh Oh, yeah. we weren’t following the route. Um, I’ll probably go back and do that. And ironically, I actually really enjoyed that bit where we didn’t follow that villa of honet and we cycled from Evo to to Yeah, I thought that was perhaps cuz it was very different from the route and it was across those wide open plains. Um I don’t know there was something a bit more adventurous about it perhaps. How about the bit that you would definitely avoid in future? I can’t think of one off the top of my head. I think the bits there were one or two bits through the uh city centers that weren’t so great, but by and large that was the exception, I think. Yeah, I don’t mind towns and cities because it, you know, it gives you an opportunity of kind of stocking up and seeing a bit of life. Um, I there were times a bit further north uh when we were following especially the disused railway tracks and I had this back in 2022 as well when I was following the Villa Seni from Paris to Mon Sam Michelle. There are long stretches where you are on a disused railway track which is really easy cycling and the gradients are never very steep cuz obviously a train can’t go up a steep hill but they do get a bit boring after a while. They can become quite sy. Yeah. So I was quite relieved when we started following the river um the Mayen. Actually, that was that was a a nice bit. Yeah, quite enjoyed that. Well, I guess because the canals are still in use and each of the lock gates had an attendant uh and and several of those lock gates, lockepers cottages had uh a cafe, a pop-up cafe, didn’t they? Yeah. and and just the fact that they because you’re following a river, it’s an accusation as well as following a tow path of a canal can get a bit sy. Certainly that’s the case if you follow the um canalized rine from for example from Basel north towards Strasburg. There are long stretches of that where you think, “Oh my goodness me, will this ever end?” Yeah. Um, but following a river cuz it’s twisty and turny, there’s always kind of something interesting to see. Uh, and you don’t miss out the towns. Railways were built not necessarily between town center and town center. Very often they would be built on the outskirts of town. Yeah. So, you don’t actually go through the center, whereas towns were built on rivers. So when you’re following a river, you don’t tend to miss out on the center of town. And you also tend to go through the the nice bits of town where, you know, as time went on, they built a nice stone bridge and the the village center, the town center buildings tend to be quite well put together, tend to look quite nice. Yeah. Um, in terms of accommodation, we’ve done mainly camp. Yeah. Mainly camping. Uh by the time we get back to Britain, we’ll have done two nights in hotels. That’s the night in Neo, which was a very nice hotel. Uh and we’re also going to be staying in a hotel in Ren on our way back north. Um but apart from that, it will all have been camping. Um now there’s a slight caveat here that we got two campsites still to go. Which was your most favorite and least favorite campsite? There were some of the campsites were really nice until the evening came along and you had the uh evening’s entertainment which did disrupt sleep somewhat. Yes. So on on that score, I’m going to nominate as my least favorite campsite the one where we had the seemingly well certainly all late evening showing of that musketeer film and that was in I’m just forgetting myself. Can you remember the name of the town? No. I think that was Mayan, wasn’t it? I think it was. It was. So that was my least favorite. Um, my most favorite campsite don’t fall. Yeah, I think it probably is in terms of cuz I like when you arrive at a campsite and they say, “Oh, just put your tent anywhere in that big area down there.” I kind of internally grown when they give you a pitch. You know, if you’re going to be in a big field with other people who are just with their bike or perhaps even walking and a tent, you’re with your tribe of people. And I think it’s at uh Don, apart from it only costing us €5, that we probably bumped into the most number of cycle tourists. Yeah, there quite a few air. And the other thing is you can’t necessarily judge from a price how how good or otherwise a campsite will be for cycle touring. True, but you can. The one at Dom where it is so ridiculously cheap. I mean I mean I don’t know they they’re barely covering their costs. It tells you something about their welcoming attitude to people who are traveling by bike. But yeah, there we go. And in terms of traveling, cuz right at the beginning, in fact, the previous podcast we talked about the potential challenges of cycling as two people rather than individually, bearing in mind that most of our experience prior to this has been individually. How have you found the experience of traveling as two people? I’d say generally positive. I mean, I suspect that um I we haven’t had a debriefer at this, but I suspect that both of us will probably end up doing more cycling as solo, but for me as a as a particularly uh bad French speaker, it’s been absolutely wonderful having a uh a translator with me. Thank you very much for that. Yeah, I we haven’t had too many shouting matches. Oh, we haven’t had any quite. Um I mean it’s still two days to go. Yeah, give it give it time. Um I likewise I mean I I think as we’ve progressed we feel we felt more comfortable about just cycling individually during the day. Yeah. And also to a certain extent I mean for example last night you went off to the bar. I was happy to just sit there and continue eating my spaghetti and pesto by the uh tent. On the balance of things, and this is not a reflection on on anything that’s happened in the last two weeks, but I still am yet I’m yet to be convinced. Traveling by yourself is still my preferred option, I think. Yeah, I think I agree. I mean, I think I’m I’m fortunate that my wife doesn’t seem to mind me going off for these trips. Probably because it means she’s not expected to do that herself. We spoke earlier about the difficulties of all the the benefits of having someone to just look after your bike for a minute whilst you’re going to the shop, go to L, whatever. We’ve both successfully managed to do that for the last 10 years. You can definitely see how if you didn’t at least get on with someone how quickly it might great. But the fact that we did get on, I think that’s um that’s a tribute. Yeah. Yeah. Have you got any What’s the next journey? Have you got anything in mind? And I know when you when we first discussed this earlier in the year, you were toying between going back to uh well Shetland or sorry yeah both Shney and Ornney that you hadn’t visited or Western Ireland. Yeah, I mean they’re still on the list. I still uh think like we were discussing yesterday where actually it’s so nice to be able to relatively rely on the weather in what we do in like in coming south to France in general the weather will be better. Yeah. I don’t think I could have if when I came back to you originally and said, “Well, if you fancy somebody tagging along, um if you said, “Well, I’m off up to Oakney or on the western coast of Ireland.” I would have probably made excuses. Yeah. cuz I thinking well last year I was in Shhatland and Orney and the weather was well at times it was just bloody awful cuz I’m not tired of school holidays and um and going up in May for the Shetland trip and then prior to that going to the out heedes I was quite lucky with the weather whereas I think when you went you had quite a quite a foul job went under a bridge hence the dinging sorry is that again I I was saying that um that when um when I did the out he can’t what time of year it was I was quite lucky with the weather in 2021. Didn’t you do it in September? Yeah, I think I must have done. So, I must have done it after you’ve been research school holidays and I was very very lucky with the weather. I had only about one day that was a wash out and similarly for the the Shhatland trip last year was I think you were unlucky with the weather for more day paddle more days. Yeah, but I mean Scotland is always going to be a bit hit and miss, isn’t it? Anyway, so anything outside the UK or Ireland? I think that if I find myself able to do a long trip as example, you know, perhaps as a first retirement trip, then maybe heading to Malta and then uh take the ferry to Sicily and Italy and maybe combining that with a rerun of the veny Munich cycle trail. Right. That’s a long-term one that probably won’t be next year. Isn’t that the Eurovail 7? It could well be that there there are two route long routes that go through Italy. Well, the Eurova 5 that’s the one kind of I nominally followed back in 2010 although you know there was nothing there to follow. Um but the Ural 5 goes all the way down to Bindesy. It starts over on the west coast and then swaps over to the east coast gradually after Rome. But the Euro7 I think does the opposite and start in Malta. Starts in the I think now it does start in Malta. Yeah. Yeah. I think I would probably end up doing a hybrid route of combining both of those partly because there may be some uh people I visit in in Bundesi. I I suspect that those roots aren’t as well developed as they are in France. In which case you just do what you in which case you do cycle touring old old school and plan your own route. Yeah. Or you get on cycle.t travel and you let that do the hard work cuz it did a very good job. And having tried that on the air voter patter. Yeah. Um I was impressed as as were you. Right. So, um, we’ve got about another 15 km, I reckon, before La Hosell. So, let’s hope the sun keeps shining. And when we get to the water, stop. Yes. Well, are you tempted to go dive into the Atlantic for a swim? I’ll take that as a no. No, I’m not a great one for water. Yeah, I like looking at it. Compared to 10 years ago, 2015, the route from Larashell to Mahan is vastly improved. My memory of cycling this in this direction 3 years ago is kind of non-existent, which is a bit worrying. Um, but it’s really pretty good, especially very close to uh Laho Shell Center itself. And we’re now 1.5 kilometers away from our final destination. This is very good uh cycling infrastructure. Absolutely. I mean, this is a pristine surface as a I don’t think this was here 3 years ago. No, there’s a lot I don’t recognize from when I came up here in 2017. Yeah, I’m assuming that the route finishes probably outside the tourist office. I’m expecting to find a sign some point soon saying far fet. Yeah. Yeah, we’ll press they. They’ve got an equivalent of the one we’ve found just within the first kilometer or so of the uh route back up in the north. Ah, right. I recognize that as the train station. That’s where I caught the train back in 2022. Yeah, definitely. Quite an ornate building. And we’ll be back there tomorrow in order to take the train initially up to Na. Right. This is definitely the middle of Lar Roelle. Facade of the G SNF is covered in scaffolding. Very ornate, beautiful building. Another sign is telling us to turn right in the direction of that ferris wheel. Hopefully they’re going to let us through. Mercy here. Still following the cycle route. It’s going to come to an abrupt end sometime soon. Probably in the harbor area. My betting is next to the tourist office. Can’t see the uh Atlantic Ocean yet, although I think it is in the distance there cuz I can see the harbor and the mass of probably lots of very expensive yachts. Oh, and those are the towers, the famous towers of La Hosell, the twin towers. Got another sign here for Lavoet. Are we going to be let past? We are. Merci Msier Park. Have we reached the end of the path? Let’s quickly check. Oh no, there’s another sign telling us to turn right. And I can even spot one over there. Can you see that one over there? Well, I can see the water now. Is that Ah, that’s not for the Villa Fet. It might be. According to the uh the map, we have finished our journey. There we go. Where’s our commemorative plaque? Welcome to Lar Roelle. Ah, the office to tourism. There it is. Ah, voila. There it is. The same sign made out of metal with letters cut into it that we saw back up in Wistram. Reload. Our journey is over. Any final thoughts? Well, we’re back to the ocean. Not sure when I go home yet. Sure. Should I turn around? Uh well in fact I can tell you we’ve done 38 according to my mechanical timer here but the odometer says 670 km which actually makes rough sense bearing in mind we took a few bits out the bit between and so and then we shortened the bit between and by going to Pier and taking the train but we added on that bit at the top by going from Baya to Wist in the first place. So yeah, 670 km. I think the official distance is is it 650 the official distance? I can’t remember what we said. Oh, 630. It’s there. Look, 630. So somehow we’ve managed to do 40 km too many. So we’ve definitely cycled lavoet and some Yeah. [Music] [Applause] [Music] We thought the fun was over, but it’s only just started. But fun in inverted commas, we’re in a train on a train even. The first of three trains that we’ve got to get in order to get back to Samoa for the ferry on Monday morning. two trains today, Saturday from Larashell to Na and we’re currently sitting on that train and then from Na to Ren later this afternoon and then tomorrow from Ren to San Marlo. Now not worried about tomorrow cuz we’ve ticked all the boxes for tomorrow. We’ve got our tickets. We’ve got our bike reservations. But when we were booking the first two trains, the ones for today, it didn’t seem as though it was possible to book a reservation spot, but we should have done. So, it’s a bit touch and go as to whether we’ll actually get to Ren tonight. Um, fortunately, the train that we’ve just got on, by playing ignorant, I’m going to forget that I speak any French whatsoever. There was a woman, a young woman on the platform. In fact, there were quite a few people helping people on with their bikes. People kept turning up with their bikes. More and more people. They’re the ones with reservations. We didn’t. But thankfully she organized it with the train conductor to put us in the carriage right at the end where there are free spaces. But it’s all a bit stressful. Tim, how are you feeling? I’m feeling more relaxed now. Yes. We don’t have the knowledge that we’ll be getting to rent tonight, but we’re on part one of a two-part Odyssey today. Yeah, it could be an odyssey. Um, have you thought about we could cycle from Naunt to Ren overnight. Yeah, that would be interesting. It wouldn’t be too hot to do that. Probably doable. M I did look not that this quick type into Google how far is it from uh to get from non to ren in Google’s bicycle option by bicycle is 130k from from n from n to ren ah I mean I’m not suggesting I want to do it but that’s not an impossibility is it? No, I mean we’ll be basically arriving probably in the early hours of tomorrow. Yeah, but we would at least get that final train. That’s probably the third option. The second option would be to hire a car. Yeah. Which we both looked at. Although whether my car whether my bike would actually get into a car, yours dismantles. Yeah. We don’t need a huge car for that to do. I mean we we use we can use the panya bags as packing with the front wheel off but both bikes they will be yes mine does fold but um then again it is Saturday afternoon and we’re going to find a car rental place open obviously the preferred option is that when we arrive in Na the people at the station and the conductor on the train is just as amanable just as friendly and just as nice. Yeah. As the one on the train from Larel to N. That that that was quite touching how um helpful they were. Not not just to us cuz I don’t think we’re the only ones without a reservation. She took pity on us, didn’t didn’t she? So that’s uh so I’ve got I’m feeling more relaxed now that we do have other options. First option ideally take the train. We’ve got a ticket. In fact, we’ve got a bike reservation, but the problem is it’s not for the train that we’re actually booked on ourselves. It’s for the later train. So, if push comes to shove, one of us could at least travel legally with our bike if we bought a ticket for the later train. Yeah. One of us I mean, one advantage obviously we try the first train at 5:44 p.m. Yeah. Which has about five intermediate stops. Yeah. or the second train which is at 701. Yeah. For which we have one bike spot booked. Yeah. That has no stops between there and Ren. Yeah. So at worst we hide the we hide a bike in the toilet. Yeah. Right. Uh right. Well, let’s let’s cross that hurdle when we come to it. And then we’ve got the second option of potentially hiring a car. Yeah. Although would that be possible at 4 5:00 on an afternoon in uh that’s pushing it on Saturday? I doubt it. Um and then that third option of cycling 130 km overnight. Yes. Silence. [Music] [Applause] [Music] right There’s an element of jeopardy about this. I’ll let you reveal all, Tim. Did we arrive in San Marlo this morning on time? We did. We did by hook or by crook. Uh we managed to get both of those trains yesterday on Saturday. Very, very nice staff at both La Hoelle and Na stations. Very, very helpful. despite the fact that we didn’t have any reservations, they let us on and they found a space and they were brilliant. Uh, which meant that last night we were able to stay in the hotel Ibbyis in uh, Ren and then this morning we jumped in a train and I’m delighted to say we are now in San Marlo or rather very close to San Marlo. So in the end there was no jeopardy about it. No, we managed to find them. And despite having reservations, not once were we asked to show that we did have them. That’s true. That’s true. Um, but uh there is a moral in the story here in terms of peace of mind, in terms of actually enjoying the trip. Today was far nicer cuz we I knew that we’d ticked all the boxes. Yeah, yesterday was a bit stressful to say the least and we were genuinely thinking we might have to hire a car and I was genuinely thinking is it possible to cycle 130 km to San Mara? Yeah. But uh how have you spent our final day on tour? Well, we’ve both been for bike rides. You you went quite a bit further than than I did. Um I just went along the north coast um east of St. Marlo only about 30k. Um I wandered through on the way back through the old part of the through the city walls. Um it was of course heaving with people. I did treat myself to an ice cream so it was worth worthwhile for that. Yeah. San Malu is a it is a really fascinating place. It was destroyed. Well, not quite destroyed, but it was heavily damaged during the war, but they’ve rebuilt it, but they haven’t rebuilt it as an identicative of what it was. They’ve rebuilt it kind of along a slightly different line, but it it works and it’s just a really interesting place to visit. Um, I kind of did what I should have done back in 2022 when I came to St. Marlo on my GR tour of France. And I took the ferry. I went down to the f the little ferry that goes across the uh estry of the uh the river. Uh got that to Dinar. I actually swam in the sea this morning in Dinar and then went on a cycle which brought me all the way back to San Marlo by the two sides of the Estri by following the Urailla for the uh Marit team. So that is it. Uh as we look out upon very beautiful seaside scene. Uh we can’t see some Marlo from here. I don’t in fact what where is it? It’s behind you. It’s behind us cuz we’re in a kind of a little curve here where we’ve just had a very very nice seafood meal. So that has been episode 92 of the Cycling Europe podcast. Thank you Tim for taking part. You’re very welcome. And um you’ll find more details about this particular escapade on the Cycling Europe website, of course, cycling.org. At some point, there will be a film. I’ll put all the video together and make a film, but that might not be until later in the autumn. If you’d like to support the podcast, then you can do that by visiting cyclingurope.org/support. And if you’d like to contact the podcast, then visit cyclingurope.org/c contact. But from a beautiful scene here in or near St. Marlor, thank you for listening. Thank you for following our journey along the Vevel Francet or as Tim insists on calling it the Vevel Front. Um but uh it is the Vevel Fret. Thank you for listening and happy cycling. [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Laughter] [Music]