Category: Cycling

Holy Week Continues – Dwars door Vlaanderen

We got going early the day after Gent Wevelgem (In Flanders Fields) and drove the relatively short distance to a campground on the east edge of Ypres (or Ieper depending on the map or signs). It was still quite early so we dropped our grey water and emptied the toilet then parked. A couple of hours later we went to the office and actually checked in.

There was a lovely walking/cycling trail that ran right through the side of the campground and along through a small forest to the river/canal.

It was only a short walk from there to the Menin Gate where they still play taps at 8 pm every evening.

On Tuesday morning we got going to pick a spot to watch Dwars Door Vlaanderen from. They’ve really started to limit the places that campervans can park – seven years ago when we first came here and watched all of the races it was much easier to find a spot.

We ended up in an ok place, although not really where we wanted to be. It was on a very small side road beside a quite busy larger road and there was already one campervan there.

By race time the next day we’d been joined by another couple of vans and dozens of cars.

The race came past us twice…

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…with Wout near the front on the second pass.

He took off by himself and lasted for quite a long time, only being caught by Ganna in the last 100 metres or so. Sadly he ended up in second place for the second year in a row.

After the roads had cleared a bit we drove southwest to Tournai where they had an aire with a toilet dump. After spending the night in the parking area next to the aire we found that the toilet dump was backing up so we couldn’t use it! We found a nearby gas station that had GPL so did manage to fill our cooking and heating gas up, then tried to find another place to dump the toilet.

One place that should have been good ended up not really being in use anymore so we drove back towards Ronse to an actual campground. Getting to it was yet another frustrating experience as there was a diversion for road works that Miss GPS didn’t know about and we took the ‘very scenic’ route to get there.

In the end it worked out, however, as they had enough room for us for the night but we had to agree to leave before 10 the next morning as they were fully booked for the next four nights because of ‘La Ronde’. Luckily the bar was still open!

We had a nice quiet night and I had a lovely hot shower in the morning before we finally were able to empty the toilet. We headed directly to the same spot we’d watched Dwars door Vlaanderen from and parked up to wait for the race on Sunday.

There are many campervans parked wherever they can along the roads – the Tour of Flanders is one of the five ‘Monuments’ and is a very important part of Holy Week in Belgium. The race is 278 km long and its one of the biggies – and Holy Week has nothing to do with the fact that its Easter!

Gent Wevelgem…In Flanders Fields

Early the next morning – before even having a cup of tea! – we started searching for a good place for Sunday’s Gent Wevelgem – which is now renamed ‘In Flanders Fields’. We circled a bit before ending up about 50 metres from where we watched from last year. The nice paved pullout should have held three campervans but the two that were already there had spaced themselves out so a third couldn’t get in. We figured they were waiting for a friend and would reposition themselves later. We did park on a smaller (not paved) area just down the road so it wasn’t too bad.

Saturday was pretty quiet, although the road is a bit busier that might be expected. One of the highlights was a family taking their alpacas (or they might have been llamas) out for a walk.

Many campervans passed by us during the day, fruitlessly searching for a place to park.

We had a delicious lunch of roast duck with roast potatoes and fresh green beans. It was a big hit and I think I’ll have to make it again.

I tried to explain the significance of the area in WWI to a friend but just started choking up and crying. So much suffering for what? Then again just over 20 years later…insanity. And now – thanks to the absolute idiot in the White House – another one started? How stupid – what a fucking moron!

On race day Sunday as usual there was a constant parade of cyclists and fans walking past us towards the Kemmelberg climb.

The race passed right by our spot twice, and the third time came down a side road from the left, climbing the Kemmelberg three times in all.

The first time we both walked down the road a bit, and some ‘VIPs’ arrived via helicopter.

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When we returned to the campervan before the second pass we discovered a bit of a mess – we know that Max doesn’t like being left alone, and he made it very clear. He’d managed to pull the garbage bag out of the door-bin and had shredded it to bits, with all of the contents spread over the floor, including mushy raspberries that had gotten ground into the mat. However – it was pretty hard to reprimand him when I was laughing so hard.

For the second pass of the race we stayed right around where we were parked…

For the last time around Colin stayed in the campervan while I went back down to the side road the riders were coming from.

The crowd was totally psyched by the knowledge that Wout van Aert and Matthieu van der Poel were in a two man lead, and when they came into sight the fans went crazy.

I waited until most of the riders had passed before heading back to the campervan to watch the end of the race on tv with Colin. Neither van Aert nor van der Poel won but they hung on until almost the end, and another Belgian rider did win – Jesper Phillipsen – and it was very exciting.

As it was going to get dark soon we chose to stay where we were and spent another night in our little spot – there were some quite strong winds at times but we were snug and warm.

From Poggio to E3-Saxo

We spent another quiet night in the parking lot on the Poggio before heading west to France then north towards Belgium.

The first night we stayed at a very nice place in Digne-Les-Bains on the lovely river Bleone.

We passed through some beautiful countryside – it was quite cold and included snow.

We stopped for a quick break for a coffee and a small bite to eat at one of the many parking areas along the motorway. It had a very nice monument to WWII – we tried to look it up and it seems there was some sort of ambush of Nazis there, and then retribution fell on the locals.

That night we found another beautiful aire/sosta that was on the bank of the Moselle river just past the city of Nancy.

The night was chilly but quiet and we had a very good sleep.

The next morning didn’t go as planned – we managed to drop the grey water, but the toilet canister wouldn’t come out. You can’t manage very long in a campervan without a toilet! We got some direction from an old local fellow who advised us to go back towards Nancy and we would find a service place.

He was correct – we found a great campervan sales/service place right off the motorway and they took us in and we were out again in about two hours with a new toilet canister! Off again towards Belgium with only a couple of hours lost.

We had one night at an aire that was the parking area of an abandoned quarry, and another at an aire next to a sports centre near Tellin/Resteigne.

We ended up at the campground in Zwalm (where we’ve been a few times before) by noon on Thursday, and were able to eat lunch, shower and do laundry.

Luckily the campground also has two clothes dryers so we weren’t left with a bunch of wet laundry in the campervan. After a nice night – with lots of intermittent rain – we left early Friday morning to find where we wanted to watch E3-Saxo from.

We found the route fairly quickly and ended up choosing a place on the large paved parking area of a local football (soccer) club. It was just past the top of the Kapelberg climb and just before a sharp corner towards the Paterberg.

I went for what ended up being a very long walk looking for a store, or even a cafe/bar to no avail even though I went through more than one village and was never far from houses. What do folks do around here if they want a coffee or a litre of milk?

Anyway right after I returned to the campervan the bar at the football club opened so we headed right in there. Asking for red wine in a country that has over 150 kinds of beer was a bit puzzling to them, but they did manage to dig a bottle out from their storage shelves. It was quite good – from South Africa – but not cheap!

As the race wasn’t passing us until after four we returned to the campervan for lunch – on the way out we asked if we could buy the remainder of the bottle of wine to take with us – deal made (again – not cheap).

After lunch we went back to the bar to watch on their big tv as the race started and approached. Quite a few other folks arrived as well and the bar was doing a fairly good business. As soon as the riders were getting near we all trooped outside to line the small road to cheer as they passed.

My photos are kind of crappy but Colin got some good ones. Once again we all trooped back into the bar to watch the end on tv – there was quite a ways to go so we were in there for a while.

Shortly after the race ended we got going west, stopping at one of the many Lidl’s on the way. We made it to the town of Kemmel and decided to stay in a car park there rather than attempting to find a spot on Sunday’s route in the dark and rain.

On to Poggio!

Rather than drive 100 miles south to watch the next stage of TA live on Sassotteto we decided to just stay where we were and watch it on tv. It was a good choice, as we were heading north afterwards and it meant several hours less driving south then north again.

We ended up taking the coast road north to Ravenna, then going northwest towards Ferrara. Miss GPS took us on a fairly ‘scenic route’ but we eventually made it to the west coast around Imperia. After that it was a bit dicey – we wondered if Miss GPS was punishing us for not listening to her at times in the last couple of days or maybe she was going through menopause and was just being super bitchy. In any case she totally mis-directed us near the end of the day when we were trying to find an aire on the coast and we ended up inland on the side of a mountain. Not usually a problem for us but I was a bit pissed off at her – anyone that has been led astray by any GPS system will know how we felt! We did know fairly quickly that we weren’t going where we wanted to but decided to see where we ended up.

We did get on our way the next morning in the right direction – having muted Miss GPS – and arrived at our destination of the campground at Santo Stefano Al Mare that we’ve been to several times before.

I can’t describe how lovely the shower was, and we got to do laundry too – truly wonderful to be clean and have clean clothes at the same time!

The campground has some very nice cats that I happened to catch sunning themselves on the roof of the office as we left.

A short drive got us to Poggio – one of the most iconic climbs in cycling races.

It’s not long (only 3.7 km) and not steep (average 3.7% grade) but very important in the first Monument of the year – Milano SanRemo – La Primavera.

There’s been some improvements done in the general area…

…and more still ‘in progress’…

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We had lunch in the local cafe/bar on race day – we thought we’d ordered roast rabbit but ended up with roast pork. I was a bit disappointed that it wasn’t rabbit, but since I do like pork it was ok.

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There were at least three different police forces on hand, in addition to ‘Mr. Whistle’ who thinks he runs everything.

Colin and I, as usual, went to different places to watch and photograph from.

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I was lucky and had a couple of fellows next to me that had the race on their phone – I watched over their shoulders as Pogacar, Pidcock and Van der Poel took off on the Cipressa.

By the time they reached us Van der Poel had been dropped and it was only the two in front.

Because the finish was only down the hill I really wanted to run across the road to the bar to watch the end on tv but the cops wouldn’t let me – I settled for watching it on another fellow’s phone – Pogacar won!! I could hear screaming and cheering from the bar and I was screaming just as loud – so happy!

Leaving Trasimeno/Papiano/Trevi and on to Tirreno-Adriatico Stage 5

Leaving Asciano early – without breakfast or even a cup of tea (because of lack of electrics again) – we stopped in Castigliano del Lago for groceries. There was some kind of race going on – it looked like a walking/running race perhaps around the lake. After we parked once again at the aire in San Feliciano I saw one of the runners – looking fairly fit, but puffing on a vape as he ran.

The aire was almost totally packed – most of them likely here for the race. There also were two tour buses that pulled up and discorged several dozen old folks who proceeded to amble along the lakeside promenade into the town. I was walking Max at the time and the volume of them seemed to intimidate him a bit – we decided to return to the camperan rather than venture into the village for tea.

I do have a comment about the lake…Trasimeno is the third largest lake in Italy and you can literally see the perimeter of the entire lake from where we are. The surface area of the lake is just over a third of that of Okanagan Lake, and overall that’s around 350 square km. In contrast Lake Superior is over 82,000 sq km of surface area.

It doesn’t mean one is more beautiful than the other, however, although Trasimeno does have a slightly more violent history. Hannibal played a trick on the Romans when he was invading, and they killed so many Romans that part of the lake turned red with their blood. Also, in WWII the Canadians broke through the Nazi line on the west side of the lake in one of many battles on the Allies’ way up from the south.

We met the new estate agents at the house in Papiano on Tuesday afternoon. Basically the woman spent most of her time making excuses for the lack of attention to the terrace. This is how the terrace should look…

…and this is how it looks now:

In the meantime I took the fellow outside with me and played ‘bad cop’ ranting about the terrace to the poor guy for about 15 minutes. I think we got it through to them that we weren’t happy and that something had to be done – as we had requested several times.

We left Papiano for Trevi, where we spent a couple of nice nights at the aire there, and had a lovely lunch at one of our favourite restaurants – La Vecchia Posta. We both wanted the roast wild boar but were told that that needed to be pre-ordered so settled for the wild boar ragout pasta instead, which was, of course, delicious.

We left after two nights for Fossombrone to find the route for stage 5 of Tirreno Adriatico. Miss GPS took us on a route we hadn’t been on before, and it was just beautiful – lots of lovely little towns and wide green valleys. Even the road surfaces weren’t too bad!

We found, as usual, an excellent place to park on one of the climbs for a couple of nights and settled in to wait for the race the next day. There are lots of deer and wild boar around here – I think we hear the wild boars sometimes at night, and I’ve seen several deer in the field across the way in the late evening.

Race morning was not bad – not so much wind, and not raining.

Coverage on the tv didn’t start until right around where we were, but as usual all of the police motos and the helicopter…

…let us know when the riders were near.

Alaphillipe was in the breakaway of seven or eight, with the peloton following around 5 minutes behind. Colin lucked out as the EF rider threw his bidon directly to him – it was the one he wanted the most this year.

After the last rider had passed we retired into the campervan and watched the last half of the race on tv.

From just down the road you can see Fano (I think) and the Adriatic Sea in the distance.

Papiano Terrace Dismay – and Strade Bianche!!

When we visited the house in Papiano we were dismayed to see the state of the terrace – it’s so covered in ivy it looks like the little house is being eaten! The lovely terrace is one of the best features of the house and the estate agents have let it go to shit – despite several requests from Colin to please have it tended.

We made an effort for over an hour – having brought some gardening tools with us, but it was just too much for us. A meeting with the agent and a demand to get some help are in order!

After our disappointment with the house we stopped for lunch at Monte Buono on our way back to the aire on the lake – the food was delicious as usual, with me taking home over half of my seafood lasagne for tomorrow’s breakfast.

Later that afternoon I took Max for a walk and visited the small supermarket to get some essentials (ok – wine!!). At the checkout there was a man ahead of me that was purchasing one bottle of beer – the cashier opened it for him and he had it half finished by the time he was out the door. Then Max – the little moocher that implies to everyone that he never gets fed – got a nice little piece of the next fellow’s salami sandwich.

We decided to get to Asciano nice and early so headed there on Thursday to spend the night in the local aire, before going to our favourite place to watch Strade Bianche. It’s partway along the section named for Fabian Cancellero – or maybe just a bit past it.

We got to the space before 9 in the morning and there was only one campervan already there – he was parked in an awkward way and took the space of probably three others but we had plenty of room so it wasn’t our problem.

Several more campervans joined us throughout the day – two of them were related to each other so it’s nice that they both got a space. Sometime in the late evening our electrics started failing – apparently we can’t watch tv all day and charge all of our devices and expect the solar panel and battery to carry it all – bummer! We spent the night with no lights available for loo trips but made it through ok. Within an hour or so of the sun rising on race-day morning the battery was almost recharged and we were okay for the rest of the day – although we did try to not run too many things at the same time.

The campervan next to us had a little boy – maybe about four or so – he was just adorable and one of the local farmers took him for a ride around the fields on his caterpillar/tractor.

Race day started out nice and sunny, and the usual parade of amateur riders and fans started to pass by. One family were quite obviously Pogacar fans – even the little girl’s face had a Slovenian flag painted on it.

Because we’d been able to get the starlink back up we knew when the race was nearing us and who was in front – but we didn’t really need the tv as we could see the helicopters and the motos were racing past us, and the dust was rising on the road as they approached.

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The first to pass us were three riders from UAE – with Pogacar in the middle of two team-mates. It was quite dusty and the wind direction had unfortunately changed – the flags were hanging better but the dust got everywhere!

We saw on the tv that Pogacar made his move on one of the next climbs, ending up once again going solo for many miles before winning for the fourth time – well done!

We stayed until the end of the race before taking down our flags, saying farewell to our neighbours and going back to the aire in Asciano for the night. Once again we’d drained the electrics a bit but it was quite alright for the night.

Vuelta Frustrations, South to Storm and Beauty

After spending the night after the race on the mountain we left very early, just as it was getting light. We were back at Rio Luna nice and early – had a shower and took it easy for the next few days. A couple of nice walks with the dog, and watching more Vuelta stages on tv in the bar.

I got quite upset while watching one stage as the organizers shortened the race before the final climb due to the f’ing protestors. I will say again and again – it’s a race, not a political event – f-off!

We left the campground on the Wednesday morning heading south past Leon. Just before the city Colin said ‘oh my – what is that’ – it was a little dog racing towards us right on the motorway. He slammed on the brakes and the car in the exit lane to our right just managed to avoid the little fellow. We pulled right and put on the hazard lights – I jumped out the side door and started running back down the motorway after the dog. All of the oncoming traffic slowed and a couple of folks stuck their heads out saying ‘he went that way!’. I tried to catch him but he was a very fast runner – obviously panicked – and I am not. I jogged along calling ‘puppy, puppy’ for about a mile then had to give up. As I didn’t see him dead on the road I had hope that he’d managed at least to get off the road and down to a field on the side. Going back to the campervan I was very sad – the little guy was so cute, perhaps a Yorkie or something, and I would have been so happy to catch him. A short while later we passed a car accident – looked like a motorcycle had been hit and the rider was strapped to a board ready to go into the ambulance. Maybe the little dog had escaped from the car after the accident.

We got to Valladolid and after stocking up on supplies at Lidl we found the time trial course, which was the same as when we were here two years ago. Finding the same spot we’d been in before we settled down for the afternoon – but that didn’t last that long. A police car pulled up and started asking questions – basically they were on the lookout for protestors and were trying to head off any trouble. I decided it wouldn’t be a good idea to show them the pieces of cardboard painted with the palestinian flag that I’d pulled off the poles on the mountain stage we’d been at! In any case the police made us leave our spot and led us – with lights flashing – to a parking area a few hundred meters back, which was fine.

After a nice quiet night Colin gave me some bad news – the route of the ITT had been shortened due to the fucking protestors so they would not be coming past us after all. We saw our Belgian friends leaving the route, then we took the time to let a couple in a UK campervan know as well before just heading back south to the house. God damn ignorant protestors – I’m so fed up with them!

We got all the way back to the house in one day – a bit of a long drive, but no problems along the way. The bougainvillea are all blossoming again, the window boxes are flourishing, and it’s plenty warm enough for swimming so all is ok here.

We got to watch the final few stages of the Vuelta on tv, and more than once again the f’ing ignorant ‘free palestine’ protestors had a negative impact – I wish the police would just arrest them all and throw them in jail for a few days (or at least until the race is over!).

The Renault and the campervan are both in different shops getting things done so we’re down to just one vehicle – which is fine for the amount of driving we usually do.

We’re having the house painted by our ‘neighbour across the valley’ – she’s a lovely little lady and is always smiling and happy. Her son lives in the house that shares part of our driveway.

We think that the police have finally caught the burglars that have been terrorizing our valley for the last several weeks. Colin will have to watch the local facebook group chat page for confirmation.

One day we had a torrential rainfall – so hard it wasn’t even large drops but more like a waterfall. The wind was also very strong and coming from the south – we found out that two of the smallest windows that face that way need a bit of weatherproofing as they leaked live sieves. I spent about an hour mopping the floors in both the snug and the office, and one of the walls is going to need cutting and re-plastering on the inside.

I’m not sure if we’ll get any more swims since the recent rains and much colder nights, but it’s still nice enough to sit outside and enjoy the view.

Return to Rio Luna, and Vuelta up San Lorenzo

We left the house on a Thursday morning and made it as far north as the lake just past El Tiemblo, where we’d stopped a couple of years ago. I took a lovely photo of the lake near sunset, and when looking back at the last time we were here I seem to have taken an almost identical photo – I guess when I like something I like it!

After a nice quiet night we got going north again fairly early, avoiding toll-roads and arriving at our favourite campground Rio Luna.

We spent a few days just chilling out, going for a couple of nice walks, and watching the Vuelta on the tv in the campground’s bar – while sipping some nice Rioja.

On our second day here I had a fight with a folding lawn chair…

…I lost.

Two days before the stage we came to see we took a little re-con drive to the general area, and decided to go to the second-to-last climb rather than the last one.

There are a couple of places along the way where the fires had swept down one mountain, across the road and up the other side.

Luckily there aren’t any bad ones around the area at the moment, although it was a horrible summer in some places.

Back at the campground one of the local ranchers was moving his herd of sheep, taking some time for them to graze in the field just outside the campground’s fence before moving them along.

We got up quite early the next morning to head to the mountain we’d chosen for Saturday’s race, leaving just as it was getting light.

It was still misty when we got to the top of the San Lorenzo, and we found a wonderful wide spot that only had two other campervans parked.

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We had a couple of nice walks – there are lots of horses and cows on the hills and they’re not all fenced in.

By evening there were many more campervans both behind and in front of us, and during the next morning we couldn’t believe how many more managed to squish in.

An enterprising fellow brought an ice-cream truck up – he also had chips and beer – looked like he was doing a good business.

Our ‘Belgian friends’ arrived in their huge bus, this time with Tudor on it rather than Quickstep. They stopped and said a quick hello to me (I was out walking Max) before heading back down the climb to park. Later in the day they walked up and we had a really nice chat – we first met them several years ago and have seen them regularly at many different races in several different countries. They are Alaphilippe supporters thus the sponsor name change on their bus. It was really nice to see them again.

At one point one of the black horses and her little foal started walking down the road and a car was coming up from below us – I made the ‘slow down’ motion to him. When he stopped I realized he was the horses’ owner and he got them back up the track where they would be safe.

The Palestinian protesters had been busy – there were slogans painted on the road, and stickers on all of the signs denouncing Israel, etc. Colin and I, and also one of our neighbouring campervaners scratched off as many as we could. Then later Colin noticed that many of the signposts up and down the road had cardboard painted with Palestinian flags tied to them. I walked down about ½ km and tore them all off the posts – almost every single person parked along the road either gave me the ‘thumbs up’, said ‘good job’ or ‘thank you’!

There was one woman sitting on the road almost across from our campervan who actually said ‘don’t you support other people’s right to their opinion?’ and I countered with ‘I do, but this is a cycling race, not a political forum’. Our neighbour also told her to shut up.

We did get, of course, a marker for ‘top of the climb’, along with a bit of barrier – also several well-armed policemen. I had a nice chat with one of them and they’re not going to tolerate any guff from any protestors.

There have been a couple of issues with protestors intefering with racers, and there’s talk of changing the final day into Madrid. Not to mention that the Israel Premium Tech team is under pressure to withdraw – they’ve already removed ‘Israel’ from their jerseys and I’m sure some of the riders are more than a little anxious. Again – it’s a sporting event!

As usual we knew when the riders were getting close because of the helicopters and motos, then we could see them snaking up the hairpins below us.

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It took a while for everyone to pass, then we walked up to where a group of folks were gathered outside a campervan. The fellow had swivelled his tv out the door and we all got to watch the final climb up past Saliencia with Soler – a spanish rider – triumphant at the finish. A really, really good and fun couple of days on the side of a mountain.

Local Races, Doctors and Tests, Lunches and New Car

Most of the terrace plants are doing really well – we haven’t been at the house this long in past years so they’re getting tended and watered more. The jasmine especially is very lush, and the two tomato plants have sprouted up like crazy.

Colin’s hernia operation went well – he has a follow-up appointment soon to make sure all is ok. I convinced him to use my upstairs bedroom for a week while I used the spare bedroom/office/library. Thus he didn’t have to go up and downstairs as much and all he had to do was move into the lounge to get to the couch and watch tv while he recuperated.

The ‘honey man’ is at the market every Friday morning – I’ve tried several of his products and all are delicious. We also get what we can from the veggie people, and have tried scallops from the fish guy.

We took a drive to Confolens one day for fish and chips – it ended up being a bit of an ‘adventure’. First of all we went in the campervan as the fish and chip shop is quite small and in case there wasn’t room we’d be able to park somewhere nice and eat inside the campervan.

There were roadworks on the way and the main diversion included going under a bridge with fairly low clearance. We couldn’t fit under so turned around and ended up following another campervan that seemed to know where they were going, eventually getting across the river and into the town. To top it all off the cafe was closed due to ‘it being too hot to open’!

We’ve been to the little restaurant at Villognon several times now and always enjoy what we get, although I must say that the duck confit I had the first time was my favourite.

We helped out at the annual ‘kids’ races in Saint Angeau, parking the campervan at a side road near the finish line to marshall any traffic and prevent them from turning in either direction. Luckily there was a french lady on the other side of the main road doing the same thing and she took care of most of the interactions with the drivers. There was only one driver that was somewhat ornery, but at least he did as directed and didn’t try to run us over.

The following weekend we helped again at another race – the Paul Poux, which has about 300 entrants and covers three different routes of varying lengths. This time Colin and I were at different places – he was right in Goue and I was just down the road at another spot. I was very nervous about being alone and not being understood so I printed up four papers in french with phrases on them such as ‘there is a cycling race on’ and ‘you may only turn left when I tell you it’s safe’.

There ended up being many more cars than I expected entering and leaving my little side road, but every driver was extremely nice and co-operative and several laughed at my phrase pages. Luckily the races had started early as it was getting very hot by the time we left around 10:30.

On our way to Aigre one day we saw that the restaurant in Villejesus had re-opened. We were very happy to see that and stopped on the way home for a drink. There’s a nice war memorial across the road…

…we went back several days later to have lunch but they wouldn’t let the dog inside and we didn’t want to sit on the outside area as it’s right on the road so ended up getting pizza from one of the places in Aigre.

The next weekend we helped out at yet another local race – this time the regional gravel championships.

There are many ‘white roads’ around here and it was a sunny and hot day. We were assisting at the water table, handing out bottles as the riders passed. I ended up taking over the opening of the bottles and setting them out on the table for the others to ‘hand’ to the riders as they pass – not as easy as it might sound in some cases.

Colin got a new car! He’d been looking online for a Porsche Panamera but decided that the potential maintenance costs could get pretty high so we ended up at the BMW dealership in Angouleme. He’s dealt with them for many years and ended up getting a lovely sporty coupe.

I wouldn’t want to be getting in and out of the back seat as a passenger but the dog likes it, and the hatch/storage area is huge. Apparently it’s really nice to drive but I haven’t tried it out yet – I’m fairly comfortable with the ‘old’ blue one (which we have kept) but will eventually have a go with the new one.

We made another trip up to Confolens and had success this time with the ‘english’ fish and chips. The shop is quite small and there’s only sitting outside with space for about 20 people. We were lucky as we hadn’t made reservations and it was the best fish and chips I’ve had in a long time. Having delicious local french cuisine at one of the many restaurants we now frequent is one thing, but fish and chips brings fond memories from childhood.

We took delivery of firewood for next winter – the pile seemed so large when we started…

…but it only took about 90 minutes – with a small break – to stack it neatly on the lower terrace.

Colin had a follow-up appointment with the hernia surgeon and she was quite pleased with his recovery. He also had an initial appointment with a urologist – he was one of the rudest professional people I’ve ever encountered. First of all, when we were in the waiting area a woman came out one door and muttered ‘that was very rude!’. When we’d gone in we realized why – the doctor was constantly saying very nasty things under his breath in french because Colin’s french isn’t perfect, especially when it comes to medical terms. Part of the problem was that I understood much of what the doctor was saying and it took all of my self-control not to reach out and slap him, then dramatically storm out. I really hope that Colin doesn’t need surgery as that doctor was horrible.

On a nicer note we got a small bird-bath for our feathered friends – it has a solar-powered pump that makes a little fountain so now they have a fat-ball feeder, a lovely seed feeder (made by Claire) and now a water source.

LEST WE FORGET!!!!

Since being back in Mansle we’ve gotten into a nice, if somewhat lazy routine. I’m usually up pretty early, then after breakfast and a cup of tea we take Max down to the campground for a run about (him, not us!). Then we go to one of the bars for a coffee/drink.

We’ve been out for some very nice lunches – my new favourite place is in Villognon. I had the duck confit the first time and it was just delicious – we’ve been back a couple of times since. Then for Colin’s birthday lunch we went to the Cheval Blanc in Luxe, and it was so good! I think my favourite course was the cheese trolley but by then I was so full I could only sample a few of the twenty or more offerings.

We’ve had to leave Max behind a couple of times, and he wasn’t happy about it – witness the destruction left in his attempt to get into the garbage can to ‘help himself’.

On Easter Sunday we went to the bar for a drink and passed an old fellow carrying a bunch of ‘greenery’ – turned out he was on his way to the church. We saw that most of the other folks were also carrying bunches – looked like weeds to us, but I think it was ‘palm Sunday’, although they certainly weren’t palm fronds.

There have been several heavy rainfalls, with the river going up and down each time. The hippodrome has been flooded and even the road down to the campground was closed for a few days due to the overflow.

The local cycling club hosted a regional race about a week ago and there was a good turnout. Colin and I manned the beverage table, and we got a delicious lunch first with all of the other helpers.

There were several motorcycle riders helping as well to lead out the various groups of riders.

It was a lovely day and we were very glad to have been able to help out.

We ended up with lots of leftover coca colas (I did not have one – never in my life), but ran out of beer (not my fault either!).

It was VE Day yesterday and it was a big deal here – far more important than ‘May Day’ last week.

There were several different groups of service people represented at the local war memorial where they layed wreaths, then all gathered at the bar for a drink afterwards.

It’s the most crowded I’ve ever seen the place!

I know that in other places in the world the end of WWII was a big thing, but over here, especially places like France, Belgium, The Netherlands, etc it is a really, really big deal. It hits you in the face at times like you can’t even imagine back in Canada.

Whether you’re seeing a large cemetery with hundreds of graves or a small roadside memorial to one unknown soldier – they are everywhere. And each and every one is immaculately kept and tended with love by the local people.

LEST WE FORGET!!!!