Monday June 17th - 89k to Compiegne. Cold to cool, 11°C to 17°C
Unpacking the bikes to re-assemble
Folding Louis Vuitton bags for later
Ready to ride - rain hail or shine
Is this the right roundabout?
Buying lunch at local supermarket
Sheltering in a tractor shed
At last French countryside and sun
Wheat fields as far as you can see
And typical poppies everywhere
My first puncture
Today is the start of our 2000 km trip in Europe. We have all day to cover 53 km from Paris to Compiegne where I have booked a Bed and Breakfast. The bikes are re-assembled and we head out to what is supposed to be a leisurely trip to Compiegne. It's 12 deg C when we arrive in Paris and head out on our bikes
Within 15 minutes of landing, we are out of customs, found our bike boxes at the extra large baggage area and found a little cubby hole to start re-assembling our bikes. Find the scissors, slash open the boxes, then find all the bits. We have a lot of onlookers. In one hour the two bikes are put back together ready to go. The panniers are squashed tight. It's funny how we arrived with more stuff than we left with. And it's all heavier too. I fold up our two louis Vuitton bags into 20cm squares and put each at the bottom of one pannier - it's impossible to buy these bags at an airport when you leave. Each one only weighs 200 gms - well 205 gms to be precise - a small sacrifice in extra weight rather than go hunting for a bag at the end.
By 9.30 we are ready to leave, but a huge thunderstorm has rolled in - it's pelting down rain, thundering, lightning and cold. We wait for a while until the worst has past, drag out the rain gear that had been neatly packed away, and roll out through the doors of Charles de Gaulle airport. Three years ago, on another cycling trip in France, we rode into CDG at the end. It was relatively easy then, cruising down the main freeway, through seven major roundabouts, and right into the Terminal. We thought it would be just as easy getting out. Wrong. We were supposed to be heading for the little village of Le Mesmil Amelot, the only small village near the airport and a good starting point for heading north. But after two hours and 20k of winding around the airport, we were no further advanced. The name Le Mesmil Amelot kept popping up as an exit on a round about but it never eventuated. Ian commented that at least we were seeing a bit more of the countryside, but I was tired of riding past the same countryside three times in an hour. My cyclometer had already ticked over 20k when we knew we were less than 1k from the airport. It was to be a long day
Eventually we made our way out of the maze of freeways and roundabouts, but we never did find the elusive Mesmil Amelot. Instead we found our way to Thieux, a small village a long way out of the way, and one that we had been to before on the way into the airport three years ago, coming in from a different direction.
The weather was closing in again and it was almost midday. In France everything closes at 2pm. So if you haven't bought lunch before then, starve. We found a tiny supermarket and bought the usual bread cheese tomato butter and dried ham and ate a few fistfuls on the spot. It had been almost 8 hours since breakfast.
Moving on, the weather started closing in and a few cracks of thunder with heavy rain sent us scurrying to a nearby farm shed full of tractors. We squeezed between the machinery to wait out the storm, finished lunch and rode off - it's already 3pm and we still have 50k to go. The sun comes out and the countryside becomes rolling fields of wheat littered with poppies. I'm going down a hill against the slight wind, pushing hard and feeling really tired - jetlag must be bad today. Up another hill and my legs won't turn the pedals. I'm so slow I stop and tell Ian I feel terrible and I need a break. He takes one look at my bike. Flat tyre. Yes, TG. All of a sudden I feel better. At least there was a reason for having to pedal hard downhill. It takes 20 minutes to change the tube on the side of the road.
At least the sun is out and the weather warming up but our 53k day should have finished by now and we've still another 30k+ to go. Through the Foret de Compiegne and there's hundreds of bike tracks which we follow. I have a mud map of Compiegne with the location of a Decathlon Sports store where we knew we could buy a gas bottle for our Jetboil. But somehow after leaving the forest, we finish up on an A road zooming along with the peak hour traffic. Soon we take a turn and lucky for us we look through the bushes and there's the one and only Decathlon store in front of us. Five minutes later and we are on our way to the centre of Compiegne and looking for Du Palais au Jardin where I booked us in for the night.
The room is large both of us collapse onto the Queensize bed. It's almost 8pm and my cyclometer reads 89k - a long way off the 53k estimated by google maps. But then google maps didn't know we would do multiple circuits of Charles de Gaulle airport. We're starving and walk down to the Parisienne Brassiere for an omelette, chips and salad, Ian with a beer, me with a Riesling. Home to bed. It's been a long day.
Du Palais au Jardin - home tonight