Spain and France 2011: Le Mont Ventoux

From Florac we followed the Lonely Planet route up a river to Pont de Montvert, a tiny hillside village. We camped beside a group of 4 french cyclists, all men in their 50’s. They were on a 7 day cycle trip and while they were camping, it looked like they were travelling quite light. We set up another of our epic picnic dinners – tonight was homemade hamburgers – and they looked quite bemused before cruising into town for their restaurant dinner.

On Tuesday we got up earlier than usual in preparation for a big day ahead – 110km, including a 600m climb over Mont Lozere. The climb over the pass was fine as we were fresh and the morning was cool. After the flying descent down the other side we followed a river to Villefort, then continued on towards Vallon Pont d’Arc; famous for it’s natural limestone archway over the river.

I stopped at an electrical goods store to see if I could get an adaptor. I asked the guy behind the counter if he could help me and did he speak english? No, he didn’t speak english; so I held up my computer cord with the New Zealand plug and said “problem”. He took one look and replied “no problem”. One minute later he was back with an identical cord but with the french prongs. Five euro; less than 5 minutes; and my computer problems were solved.

The last 20km were tough, especially for Julie who’d not slept well the night before and had been feeling tired all day. Not being a complainer, I only found out about this late in the day. I was on a high from finding a plug for my computer so I was full of energy – though the last few kilometres my wheels were getting heavy. We finally arrived at the campsite after 8pm. I had bought picnicky-type foods from the supermarket so we wouldn’t have to try to cook anything. Julie sat there, too tired to even eat!

In the morning we cycled the famous Gorges de l’Ardeche. We stopped to get photos at the natural archway and saw a Canadian couple on birdy folding bikes.

I was so excited and quizzed them all about their bikes and even sat on the guy’s bike – he didn’t seem to mind. We took our time cycling along the gorge – I have to admit by this point I was pretty gorged-out; having spent the last week cycling though gorges, so the view quickly grew samey.

We played tag with a campervan that kept stopping and we’d overtake it; then it would overtake us…. There were motorcyclists who gave us the thumbs up; and a group of day cyclists who I enjoyed winding up by telling them we were headed for Le Mont Ventoux AND the Alps (which is all true). One of them commented “How beautiful to be young!”

We finished up in St Martin d’Ardeche, a cute wee town. There was even a British shop selling second-hand english books and British paraphernalia.

On Thursday we cycled through vineyards and stone villages to Malaucene. The cherry trees are full of deliciously ripe cherries. I have a little ethical rule for myself - I will only take the cherries from trees that are hanging over the fence and nearly on the road. We came across a tree right by the road, and it was laden with fruit - in fact the fruit was rotting on the tree and on the ground. The cherries needed a tummy to fill. I left my bike and stood there eating cherries straight off the tree. Julie had a few then stood and waited for me. Eventually she said "Byrdie do you want a plastic bag to put some in?". I guess it looked like I was never going to stop....

Well I had told so many people we were on our way to cycle over Le Mont Ventoux (just to see their facial expression more than anything else) that we really had to then do it. We were lucky that the weather was good on the day of the ride - we probably wouldn't have bothered if the mountain was covered in cloud. It is a really popular ride - I guess maybe because it is a real landmark - a solitary, quite striking white-stone peaked mountain rising out of the provencal landscape. There were cyclists everywhere. Of course us two with all our luggage stood out from the masses; and people would clap and yell 'bravo!'. It was a slow slog upwards for 20km; and at the top were dozens of lycra-clad cyclists milling around, taking photos and talking on their phones. I can guess everyone of them would have been saying "I'm at the top of Mont Ventoux!!!"