Back to Bordeaux

We had an excellent ride from Saint Emilion back to Bordeaux. We departed after a great breakfast from our Dutch hosts and hit the road under sunny but not too hot skies. The ride was about 75 km, but at least 60 km was on a dedicated bike path. And of that, 35 km was downhill. Hard to beat that combination.

The wildflowers were out along the way.

Wildflowers adjacent a biodynamic vineyard

And gloriously, the sunflowers.

Lorie had to walk fairly deep into the field of flowers to get these shots since the flowers do what sunflowers do, turn their faces to the sun, and the sun was opposite where we rode by.

We passed lots more corn fields, vineyards, and chateaux.

Our shadow chased us along

In amazing time (for us, at least) we were crossing the Garonne river and riding into the heart of beautiful Bordeaux.

The Garonne. An apt nickname would be The Big Muddy.

A local told us that they are trying to ban these monstrosities from the city.

A very old gate to a city that was once gated.

One of four clock towers located at compass points around the old town

We were on a mission this morning: to procure bike boxes to pack up the bike to get ready to fly it home. I had reached out to several bike shops in Bordeaux in the past week but hadn't had any luck. Before arriving yesterday, I mapped out about 10 different shops that were fairly close to were we are staying. The first one didn't have any boxes, but the shop guy suggested an e-bike shop a few doors along the road. That shop wasn't on my list, but we stopped in. Bingo! The guys in the shop were (a) fascinated by our tandem (they had even heard of Co-Motion), and (b) only too happy to supply us with all the big boxes we needed. We ended up spending a lot of time there, telling them about the bike and sharing riding stories. It is always a joy to meet kind people in random ways.

We stashed the bike at our apartment, in the heart of the old city, and went back to pick up the bike boxes. Mission accomplished, and it was barely 1330.

When I had been calling bike shops earlier in the week, I had randomly called a shop called "Musette and Coffee." The guy who answered relieved me of hacking the conversation in broken French, and in perfect English explained that he'd moved to Bordeaux over 20 years ago from Kentucky. He was a teacher and said that he just had to get out during the Bush administration. I laughed and said that those were the good old days. Anyway, he didn't have any boxes but told us that if we wanted to ride out to watch the Tour de France stage on the day we arrived back, he'd love us to join in.

So we dashed to the Musette and Coffee shop and arrived just as a group of about 15 cyclists was preparing to ride. Rob, the owner, is the teacher I mentioned. After a decade of teaching in Bordeaux he opened the bike shop, which had been his dream forever. It is a great shop with lots of steel and titanium bikes. They'd all heard of Co-Motion and loved our ride.

We headed about 15 km outside of town to find a spot along the race route. We sat in the shade under a big tree and had lots of fun. About 10 ex-pat Americans and 5 French, all great bike lovers and all having a ball. There were wheelie contests, there was beer, and it was a beautiful day.

The gang

A few of the shop guys wanted to try a wheelie on our tandem. Rob said no way since he'd probably have to fix it after they broke it. I was glad Rob interceded!

I took a slow motion video of the race as it passed. They are going so fast that without slo-mo, it is just a blur.

Saturday morning here. We plan to take it slow. Coffee, the market, maybe sight see a bit. Maybe work on the bike. A day unlike we've had for 2 months now.