Al'Hotel Pau

Considered having one last night on the road, cracking our bottle or 9.99 Lidl champers (premier cru!). In the end, we opt to do the big dash & head for home. You reach that point where you just feel ready. Tedious... especially as the winds that blight SE France are blowing in full glory! However, the point has come, we decide, where there isn't much to be gained by staying out any longer. Feels good to be back on 'home' turf - but, as familiar ground ...

A brief stop over so that Mike could revisit Pau where he spent a month on a French exchange more than 50 years ago!
First we thought we should have a look at Lourdes as it was very near. It was difficult for us as dedicated athiests to understand the place. It is full of pilgrims but there did not seem to be any sense of joy. The buildings were magnificent and impressive,but the surrounding streets were full of very tacky souvenir shops all ...

WHAT THE BROCHURE SAID:

This second day of riding is a big day that travels over the most feared cols in the Pyrenees,

but it is also some of the most spectacular riding. Firstly we have a nice gentle warm up to

Laruns, base camp to the stunningly beautiful Col D’Aubisque (1709m). The cafe on the top

provides a perfect place for a deserved rest before ...

... 169m) and the Col De Pinodieta (176m) before lunch.

The walled town of St Jean Pied de Port offers a perfect lunch stop, and then we cycle on to our first proper climb over the Col D’ Osquich (500m). The sign of the small town of Arudy will no doubt be very welcome at the end of this 180km monster day! We get our Raid carnet stamped twice today – we are well on our way!

WHAT I EXPERIENCED:

So, nearly ready for the off! Thankfully, false alarm about arrival of guests to take over house in absence means we have one more day in which to prepare... much needed!
We will just about get there - I think.
Round about now it occurs to us we really ought to have assembled scooter on trailer and gone for little spin to test strapping arrangement, etc... just to make sure it all holds up. Oh well, the road will be a good test of all that... I guess.

... in a pretty shabby hotel with the most miserable reception lady that I have ever encountered. We checked in and decided to walk into town. By the time we got into town it was starting to get dark. As we walked by the church we noticed thousands of people walking (or being wheeled by nuns) with lit candles around the statue of the Virgin Mary. This is really one of the most amazing things we have ever seen ...

Salut tout le monde, Today 'la greve' has fully taken over the universite. I arrived for class this morning only to find all the other students and professors standing around outside chatting and discussing the new blockages, which have made it fully impossible to enter into the fac. C'etait incroyable. Je n'a jamais vu quelquechose comme ca. So instead of having class, I spent a ...

... just nod lamely in agreement and mutter "sure", waiting for the first opportunity to shift the conversation to a more agreeable subject. Also to my advantage is my overly positive, rather bafoonish manner of conversation here in France. No one's going to make fun of the ghost of Christmas past if he's making an honest effort to learn French. By the way, I know I talk about food a lot on this thing, but that's because it's so great here. I think ...

... big-time bona fide miracle sites discussed in Sullivan's book. In 1858, a fourteen year-old girl named Bernadette received eighteen mysterious visions from a white-robed glowing woman over the course of a couple months. After some controversy and a few miracles attributed to the apparition, Lourdes became a sort of religious mecca for Catholics all across Europe. Since then, one hundred fifty years later, the town has confortably established itself as an ...

I came home from soccer last night to find my family having a "réunion", which is basically a meeting with church friends which they either host or attend practically every night. Soline welcomed me in and offered me a crepe. That's when I saw it: A magnificant machine, a crepe griddle, capable of griddling six crepes at once. The table was littered with various jams, creams, fruits, and spreads to put on the crepes, and they were all so good. I instantly ...