Tour of
Consolation II
Day 5 -9
DAY 05
Col de la Cayolle. Beautiful gentle giant.
30Km of pure bliss!
So many wow! moments, so many fotos.
Sheep, lots of sheep.
Rode the last 5Km up with Kiki , a “Culture du tubular” french old schooler and his 5.5Kg 1x12 bike.
New favourite mountain?
Bonus surprise unplanned gorge in the downhill.
Fancy cars & matching overweighted tourist couples. Weird.
Bats & butterflies. Weirder.
Good road. Back wind. Heat. Lots of it.
Cafe & coke & delicious Martille cake.
Crazy steep col. More heat. 43 degrees.
GPS overheats. Not charging. Panic.
Smells like mediterranean forests. Me likes.
Wind.
A frog in a fountain.
Two barechested (hipster) bike packers. -Aren’t we all?-
A very blue lake.
“Déja vu” moment in supermarket.
Sunset loop in at the Verdon Gorge!!
Solitude. Absolute freedom.
This is Auslandia!!
And to top it all, I spotted a big fat wild boar, my first one ever!
Bivy with lake views.
Best day in a while.
I love cycling
203Km | 3703m
DAY 06
Horrible night.
Sleeping matt de-inflated. Body half recovered. Puffy face.
Red sunrise.
Purple lavender fields. Blue skies. Blue lake.
Heat. Scorching heat.
Up and down. Relentlessly. More heat.
Mental games. Pain. Heat.
Unappealing terrain.
Nice talk with the decathlon security team.
… Finally. Gorges de la Neche.
Solitude. Pure freedom. Total bliss.
Boom! Small camping around the bend. Shower.
Invited to Rose wine out of carton.
Slept under a tree.
Nothing worth anything is ever easy.
167Km | 2353m
DAY 07
Early start. Good legs. Going big.
Finally an open mid town café with real french old men and everything.
Committed and very ambitious looking cyclists everywhere. Middle finger at Mt Ventoux.
Rolling. Pretty grey day.
Gorges de Ardéche. Drama! Bottom bracket brakes.
Panic. -It is saturday!-
Backtrack sprint. Shop found. New “n'en a qu'un français, c'est bien?” one mounted.
Back up to Ardéche. Not so impressed.
Flat light. Legs not so fresh. Slow progress.
Cévennes. Road gest very narrow. Up.
Belgian lady gibs me water.
Valley gets very narrow. Up. Up.
Rave festivals every where. Black Block get together. More raves.
Night comes. More Up.
Forecast for the night is wet.
Small camping saves me. Under the tree routine.
Weird day.
229Km | 2292m
DAY 08
5:30 am.
Rain.
Shelter in the camping toilets.
Up the rest of the col in the rain. Soaking wet. 8 degrees.
Two cafes and 3 raisins schneckediboombooms.
More rain. A lot of rain.
Shelter in Florac. Food. Cafe. Wait 1.5h.
Clears up. Down the Gorges du Tarn. Bullshit. More rain.
Finally drys out.
I need a warm shower. Find hotel online.
Get lost photographing a veeeeeeery long and high bridge.
Dropped bike. (Important detail)
Sprint to hotel. Misscalculate the location by 12km. Very long 12km.
Nice place. Across from a castle. Room full with drying gear in minutes.
Just in time for dinner. These guys eat a lot dead animals.
Legs hurt.
Good night.
206Km | 2161m
DAY 09
Rest day?
Late start. Shaved legs. Full belly. Clean shades.
Cloudy. Flat. Soon warm.
Knee hurts.
Suddenly blue sky. Hot.
Albi. Cool city.
Very hot. Realised I lost my tracker 8 (cycling) hours before 😭
(when i dropped the bike at the Bridge?)
Super hot. No legs for hills.
Komoot rerouting drama.
Head wind.
Super super hot. Liquid diet. Gazpacho.
Super windy. Side wind.
Hilly. Back wind. Tired.
Endless rolling hills.
Camping. Beer.
191k. Rest day? Pfui!
