Another Dragonfly Day

Hello from Florac, France!

We are sorry for the lapse in communication but we have been busy busy busy pedalling, pedalling, pedalling!!!!

We spent a few days along the coast of France but soon grew weery of the constant winds and the flat terrain so we pointed our wheels to the north and are now headed to Paris.

We could go on for pages trying to discribe the amazing, awsome, beautiful, stunning areas we have been pedalling through but time is money and at 3euro`s for 30 minutes we`ll just tell you about the absolutely encredible day we had today!

Last night we treated ourselves to a much needed soft bed (7 nights of sleeping in a tent) We stayed at a lovely Gite in the town of Ganges, France. The woman who runs the Gite let us use her washing machine and we were able to get all caught up on the VERY stinky laundry! After a good nights sleep and a great breakfast we set out to attack the day.

Nothing like a 3 mile climb with grades of 15-18% to get your legs warmed up! And don't forget thats with each of us lugging 45lbs of "stuff" with us! But the scenery is so amazingly stunning that you hardly even notice that your thighs are burning from the latic acid build up. The mountains we are ridding through are almost more majestic than the pyrenees' were. And as grand as the climbs were in the pyrenees these are even more impressive!!!!!

The woman at the Tourist Office in Ganges and our host at the Gite tried to warn us of the steepness of the route that we had chose but to us it looked just too beautiful to pass up. After the first BIG climb we had a pleasant gradual climb of 4-5% for 10km the REAL climbing began! Oh my gosh!!!!! For the next 2.5hours we climbed and climbed and climbed. We thought for sure we were going to end up in heaven. At about a 1/4 of the way up the hill Sherry had a Dragonfly fly in front of her. She knew that meant two things, 1. It was going to be a tough climb and 2. that she would make it to the top eventually! She hadn,t seen a dragonfly since the last big climb over the pyrenees`. It was an incredible climb. Bob felt very strong and led the way but both of us actually passed two other riders!!! Pretty impressive considering all the extra weight we carry. Of course Sherry was soon sorry that she had passed them because now she had to maintain that lead! I `think it is something about a woman who has a Dinosaur horn on her bike passing a man on a hill that makes them feel a little like a whimp. But try as they might they did not regain the lead. Bob meanwhile was breezing along making it look easy. He claims that his thighs were burning but I don,t believe him. He was a good Sherpa though and waited for me at the top!!!!

Of course the top really wasn't the top! We still had another 8km to go! As we reached the 5000ft mark and were above the tree line the top finally came into view! We were rewarded by the most spectacular views!!!!!! We have so many pictures to down load! (we promise to get them downloaded soon)

Once at the top the road sign informed us that it was only 30km to the town of Florac. Our days goal! It was a beautiful ride down down down but neither of us had done a very good job of eating enough and Sherry especially hit the wall. Poor Bob was just as tired but playing the role of the "Sherpa" he kept his spirits up and gave Sherry some much needed encouragement. When we FINALLY reach Florac our first stop was the market for a Knickers bar and an orange Fanta!!!!!!!

As a recap..............
7/17 Agde, France to La Grande Motte via a dirt canal trail = 50miles
7/18 La Grande Motte to Ganges 2 cols climbed one of which was on the 2006 Tour De France Route = 60miles
7/19 Ganges to Florac 2 cols climbed one of which was on the 1960 Tour De France Route = 60miles

Tomorrow we have some more climbing to do but as we head more to the Northwest we should be getting into more moderate terrain. Or so our legs are hoping! We are treating ourselves to another Gite tonight and will be fresh and ready to go in the morning!!!!!

The weather has been exceptionally warm which suits us just fine but our goal is to be off the road by early afternoon so as to avoid the real heat of the day. The forecast looks like we are likely to get rain as we get closer to Paris. Hopefully it will be a warm rain and not the cold weather we had at the beginning of the trip.

And for those of you who were keeping track..........Bob is holding steady at 19 flat tires (thanks to the new wheel) and Sherry at ZERO!
France is so amazing!!!!!!!!
Bob & Sherry