Bordeauxing
Trip Start
Apr 27, 2006
1
27
110
Trip End
Apr 01, 2008
Bordeaux,
France
Friday, July 14, 2006
Admittedly, I was in Bordeaux on a Monday through Wednesday, but the town seemed to be solely populated by older wine tourists. There were apparently so many of them that they completely booked the tour I wanted to take (of three of the ten Medoc Chateaux orignally classified in 1855) before I tried to sign up. Old wine snobs suck. I had to mollify my disappointment with a 45 Euro prix fixe dinner matched with some lovely wines (a 1990 Graves, a 1995 St. Emillon, and a 30 year Dow).
Even the Tour was boring
"Do Not Take A Picture Of Me"
. The stage started in Bordeaux, so I went down to the staging area about 2.5 hours beforehand. Nothing to see or do because I didn't have a pass to go into the fanfest area. I wandered around the moving advertisements (vehicles modified to advertise products - see pictures) that leave in a caravan before the race, checked out the gear for sale (shitty), got some free coffee (bad) and free cheap paper hat. I then read my book for awhile until the excitement started. Or not.The caravan left - 45 minutes of crass commercialism on wheels, only moderately improved by the fact that almost every vehicle had a pretty girl in the back waving at the crowd like that is going to cause me to change my bank to Credit Agricole, my tires to Eurotyre, or start drinking Nesquik. After that, there was about 45 more minutes of team and racer introductions - every single one of the 170 or so of them by name and accomplishment. In French of course. Then they saddled up and rode off. Whoopee. I found out later it wasn't even the real start. They then rode 9.5 kilometers through a "neutral zone" to the real start of the race. I did have a nice Haut-Medoc that night, though.
Ces't Le Vie. Not every day can be a puke and urine-filled fungasm, I suppose. Off to:
Paris (Bastille Day)
