Postcards from Provence and beyond

As I start writing this, we are sitting on the ferry at Roscoff, waiting to leave the port, on our way to Plymouth. It’s hard to believe that 2 weeks ago, we hadn’t even left Provence.

In many ways, it’s been a bit of a disrupted journey, with the original start being totally turned on its head By a cancelled train!

Our ideas of watching the rugby final in Toulouse and pedalling on from there were turned on their heads, so we got the maps out and replanned the adventure.

With a week’s less pedalling time, we had to think differently, so decided to cycle to Nimes, take a train to Clermont Ferrand, and pedal on from there.

We love riding through France, and never tire of pedalling along the quiet lanes, finding the roads less travelled, simply enjoying being immersed in the beautiful countryside of rural France.

This trip gave us a chance to find a route that would take us through areas that we haven’t really explored before, and heading out of Clermont Ferrand would allow us to head through the literal centre of France.

There is something wonderfully simple about exploring a country, by bike. We have to strip our lives back to the basic necessities, as everything we carry makes the hills, just a little bit harder. Travelling light makes us really think about what we actually need, rather than what is just nice to have, and it is amazing what we can actually go without.

The simplicity of travelling by bike, also extends into daily life. The days are focused around where we are going, where we will stay and where we will be able to get food too. It may not sound much, but it means that we have to live in the moment, and that inevitably slows us down even more.

In many ways, exploring a country by bike is a great way to practice mindfulness. Beyond what we need on a day to day basis, other issues that usually consume our thoughts, get quieter; what normally seems important, gets set to one side and it helps put everything in perspective.

It also means that we are constantly focused on the moment. On the bikes, our minds can’t wander off, as there are always things that we have to be aware of, on the road. And we’ve found that living in the moment is a real treat, in today’s world that bombards us with so much noise.

The main benefit though of exploring by bike, is that you really experience the countryside, on a very different level.

There is a wonderful quote by Ernest Hemingway, when he said ‘by riding a bicycle that you learn the contours of a country best, since you have to sweat up the hills and coast down them’

But it goes beyond that, as you appreciate not just the contours, but the subtle changes too. We notice the changing scents, the shift in birdsong, even the change in road surface, as we pass from one department into another.

It’s the little things like this that give us a sense of moving through a country, and the effort of turning the pedals makes us realise just how far we have come.

The last 13 days have been a joy, and even though we have found ourselves pedalling through the heat of an unprecedented canicule, we have loved every moment (even the ones that didn’t quite go as planned)

We’ve taken a route through some incredibly pretty, and quiet parts of central France. It’s an area that we have driven through, but have never really stayed in, so it felt like a perfect way to get a better sense of the area.

Over the winter, I had been marking places that looked pretty, on a map, and had designed the route to pass through a few of them.

They aren’t the high-profile places that people always talk about, but are the quieter villages, little places away from the well-beaten path and not visited by ‘influencers’

They were all incredibly beautiful. From the peaceful village of Hérisson, with its picturesque houses and church, dominated by the ruined chateau…

To the ‘plus beau village’ of Charroux, with its rose-scented streets, and stunning, circular central ‘square’

There were the little villages along the Loire that found a very special place in our hearts too

And the spectacular little chateaux that we passed along the way.

The thing about being on the bike, is that we can stop, when we want to, able to spend just a few moments taking in something that has caught our attention.

Watching the birds, at sunrise in one of the lakes of the Brenne was really lovely, especially the grebes, with their young that were oblivious to our presence

We’ve probably seen more sunrises than we had expected, due to having to get going so early each day, to avoid the worst of the heat, but they have been glorious, peaceful, golden moments, as we have pedalled along, with the rising sun casting our long shadows across the fields

At these times, it’s felt as if we have had France to ourselves, as we spotted hares and deer, in the early morning cool of the day.

Originally, we had planned to pedal all the way, back to Roscoff, but riding long distances, day after day, in temperatures that we’ve never experienced before was not a good idea. I hate to add ‘at our age’, but we do appreciate that we are a little more vulnerable than we used to be. So, we took a chunk out of the trip, by taking trains between Angers & Saint Brieuc.

When we booked it, we felt a bit flat that we wouldn’t be pedalling all the way, but it turned out to be a delightful way to end our ride.

We had forgotten how pretty northern Brittany is, and had stunning rides through the delightful towns

And colourful banks of hydrangeas

To spend a few days on the coast.

We took early-morning coffee and evening wine to the bench by the sea, letting hours slip away, as we watched the ebb and flow of the tide. There was a particular black-headed gull that got exceedingly grumpy, whenever another gull stepped on ‘his sand’. We watched as he chased them away in one direction, only for others to come from behind. It was great entertainment (we’re easily amused!)

As we have sat, our conversations have all been about the peaceful roads we have pedalled along, what we have seen, where we have visited, and the fact that we hear skylarks and wrens, rather than golden orioles and bee-eaters.

They haven’t been about how far we have pedalled, how fast we were going, or how many metres we have climbed. All that information is pretty irrelevant to the joy of the journey. Although, I have just totted up the distance, and we have done just over 800km in 12 days of cycling, which is quite nice to know.

It’s been fun, and even the little problems (shops being shut, no food available, and tearing my hair out trying to book bikes on trains), have been part of the experience.

France has disappeared from view, behind us now, so we’ll start to look forward to a busy few weeks back in the UK – we have 9 days of events to do, with my jewellery, so it will keep us out of trouble.

Then, in 7 weeks we will do this all again, in the opposite direction. We’ll visit some new places, and some old favourites too, although quite which ones yet, we’re really not sure.

For now though, we hope you enjoyed this little trip through France with us. We’ve certainly enjoyed the ride, and more importantly have crammed lots more memories into our (already stuffed) saddlebags.

And surely, in the great scheme of things, that is what slow travel is about.