A wonderful day after
early morning mist and cloud burnt off with many photos taken but none of which
actually do justice to the majesty of the landscape.
Arriving at base camp for the ride there was
just the hint of blue skies over some of the surrounding summits but overall
the light was changing every minute.
They set off with a
target time of 37 minutes as set by Marco Pantani for the 14 km climb with 21
hairpins and a 10% average gradient.
They set off
passing through the village of Huez
They proudly achieved
a time of 80 minutes which is not too shabby as even the younger van struggled
requiring excessive use of the cooling fan.
On reaching the
summit the village (?)
was in full preparation for the ski season which is due
to commence next week. The Scots lad
running the Trek bike store was getting ready to consign the vast number of
bikes into store to be replaced by skiing gear.
Needless to say he relieved the lads of many Euros with another cycling
shirt for Andy and other useful souvenirs such as milestone paper weights – you
have to see one to understand!
He also explained
that when the tour came through last there were in excess of 800,000 visitors
in the village that day!
Exhilarated after
their climb Andy and Geoff hurtled down the mountain in approximately 18
minutes whilst Vince and I meandered back at a more leisurely pace as we wanted
to get back in one piece! Sadly it appears the video camera strapped to Andy’s
bike appears to have mal-functioned and has not recorded this for us all to
enjoy!
After arriving back at base camp
Vince produced more
rolls with ham, cheese and tomato and a slice of lemon cake purchased from
Intermarche had to be eaten (as was a slice of fruit cake from the same store
on arriving at our site for tonight at Macon) but none of these purchased cakes
are a patch on homemade – where’s that SOS parcel?
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