Postcards from Provence and beyond

Was it really less than a werk ago that we pedalled back up the hill to our house, after a summer of cycling that had seen us take on a 2500km ‘aller-retour’ from our little home in Provence, to Devon and back.

It already feels like a distant memory, and I suppose that is why I write the blogs and do the reels, every day that we are on the road. We both live in the moment, and are constantly looking forward, rather than back, so once the day has passed, we soon lose track of it, as we plough head-long into the next one.

The posts and videos act as memory banks for us; little boxes that we can open, on a whim, enabling us to revisit the days, and enjoy them again, once we are back. And through them, we can share with you some of the joys, and occasional frustrations of our time away.

This summer was rather epic, in so many ways. It started as a little conversation one evening, just about the sheer cost now of driving a car back to the UK, and the hassles of it too. By the end of the evening, we had decided that we wouldn’t need the car, when we were back in the UK, so decided to pedal there and back instead.

If I’m honest, this is how most of our little adventures start. A chat on a walk, or whilst eating supper, that spirals into a full-blown plan, within a few hours and we go from there. Last year the off-the-wall conversation saw us spend 6 weeks exploring the countryside of Japan in a campervan, this year it turned into a 2-way trip across France, and now that’s finished, we’re head-long into preparing for a long-distance walk in Portugal, in just a couple of weeks time.

We did our first A to B ride together, in 2023, when we pedalled from Devon, home to provence, and since then many other little adventures have followed. But this summer’s return trip was the longest distance we’ve pedalled so far.

We love the rides, and each is different, with so many memories being packed into our saddlebags, with every turn of the pedal.

There is something incredibly real, about travelling by bike. You become part of the landscape that you are pedalling through, experiencing it on a totally different level to if you were doing the same trip by car.

Hemingway said ‘It is 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. Thus you remember them as they actually are, while in a motor car only a high hill impresses you, and you have no such accurate remembrance of country you have driven through as you gain by riding a bicycle.’

I think this is one of my favourite quotes, as it’s so true. But it’s not only the contours that you experience, but also other little details too….

The changing scents, as you move through different regions, from the earthy tones of the woodlands , to the salty tang of the sea, and the strong herb-scented air of Provence…

There are also the birds and insects, and we smile as we hear the bee-eaters lilting call, or the gentle night-music from the crickets, and even the last desperate kss-kss of cicadas, as we pedalled home along the Canal du Midi

We realised just how much these little elements, that to so many people would seem irrelevant, really give us a sense of place and especially a feeling of being at home, which we really only started to feel, once we had left Toulouse, and were pedalling across the South.

The trips this year haven’t been stress-free, but if I’m honest, can any trip like this ever be described as being without a problem or two? But adventures should have problems that need to be dealt with, if they didn’t they wouldn’t be an adventure!

There were 4 general themes to the problems – weather, camp-sites, access to food and trains, which I’ll explain in a bit more detail, below.

1. Weather:

On the way up through France, the main issue was the heat. We set off at the start of a Canicule, and found ourselves pedalling through a furnace. Living in Provence, we are used to cycling in the heat, and are used to being out early, so that we’re back, before it becomes dangerously hot.

We never imagined that we would be facing even higher temperatures, as we moved through France. We tend to find that we are OK, when it’s below blood temperature, but we quickly feel the difference, the moment it rises above.

The first couple of days, we got it wrong and didn’t arrive at our camp-sites until mid-afternoon, which meant we were cycling through the heat of the day, when the tarmac reflected even more heat back at us. We found ourselves stopping under almost every tree, just to cool down enough to carry on again. We drank bottle upon bottle of fluid, and took the time we needed to arrive safely. It was hard work, and we quickly learned that we needed to change our approach.

We shifted our times, setting an alarm for 5.30am, silently packing down the tent (or at least we believed we were doing it silently!), and pedalling out of the sites by 6, at the latest. By doing this, we managed to get the majority of the day’s kilometres done, before the really intense heat took over.

Our ideas of slow mornings, enjoying a coffee by the tent, before pedalling on, quickly fell by the wayside, with the days starting with an almost military operation, with coffee happening after the first part of the ride had been completed.

The huge positive was that we cycled with the sunrise, enjoying the only moments of slight freshness, and catching sight of wildlife in the fields that weren’t expecting cyclists, at that hour of the day.

These early starts may have been tiring, but the riding was utterly glorious, and it meant that we arrived, where we needed to be, before the afternoon heat really kicked in.

By the time we arrived, we were tired, hot and simply in need of a good shower, a cold drink and some supper.

Which is when some of the other problems raised their heads!

2. Campsites

Over the last few years, we’ve tried just about every accommodation option that we can think of. Starting with booking hotels and apartments, on the lunchtime of the day that we needed them – this was far too stressful!

Then, in Spain, when we booked a full itinerary of accommodation. This removed the stress of finding somewhere to sleep, but added the stress of having to do a set distance each day, leaving no lee-way for breakdowns or other unforeseen occurrences – this too, was far too stressful.

Then last year, we decided to give camping a go, fitting panniers to the bikes, rather than just having bike-packing bags, and carrying a tent and everything we need, with us. On the face of it, this seemed like the perfect plan, and we did enjoy our nights in the tent, only being forced into accommodation, when huge thunderstorms were threatened.

There is a wonderful simplicity to camping. We bought a slightly larger tent than we needed, so that we could keep everything inside, overnight, and bought incredibly lightweight, and amazingly comfortable chairs, so we would have somewhere to sit (other than cross-legged on the ground (which at our age is getting slightly uncomfortable for long periods of time). We can’t carry anything, other than the basic necessities of life, and with that comes a great sense of freedom.

This year, we decided to give it another go, being braver with the weather, and just enjoying the small campsites, along the way.

In the main, it worked well. We arrived at the sites, early afternoon, found a pitch and waited for the offices to open, so we could check in and pay the pitch-fee, which tended to be between 12 and 20 euros per night.

We did though find that it was much harder than it used to be to find little sites, some having closed, others having become all-singing, all-dancing holiday resorts (our idea of hell), and others being campervan parkups, which we could use, once we could get into them! On one occasion, we could only get in, and print the code that would allow us to access the showers, with the help of the local Municipal Police Officer

But they were certainly harder to find, and when we arrived at Capestang, to find the only one for miles around closed (when it had been advertised as open), we felt everything was conspiring against us.

We love being in the tent, and much prefer it, to having to find accommodation, but equally, I’m not willing to take the leap to wild-camping – so perhaps we will need to have a re-think, before future adventures.

3: Access to food

If arriving at a campsite and having a shower is important,then so is being able to find food too. I suppose we live a little ‘dangerously’ in that we don’t carry food with us, as the last thing we want to do is carry lots of extra weight. So, we tend to plan our rides around passing supermarkets, or epiceries, towards the end of the day’s pedalling, where we can load up with bits for supper, and perhaps a beer (or 2) too.

It’s a great plan, and tends to work well, but this summer, we found shops that had been advertised as open, with their doors firmly closed. Two had closed indefinitely, with the fittings being ripped out, others had closed due to the exceptional heat, and another large supermarket, apparently tends not to open on Mondays, even though it is advertised as being open all day.

Unfortunately, this always happened in little villages, where there really was no other option – no bars, no restaurants, not even a pizza vending machine.

A such, we found ourselves eating rather an eclectic mix of meals. One one evening a slab of pastry filled with potatoes, and another filled with meat, which we softened with some balsamic vinegar..

On another, simply baguette and balsamic vinegar, although the view across the lake was rather lovely

And on another evening, a tin of ravioli, which the kind site-manager gave us, when she realised the epicerie next to the site had closed early, leaving us without food. Happily, later that evening, a pop-up creperie arrived, so we were able to eat well, after a particularly long day’s ride.

What we have found is that more and more the villages are changing, with boulangeries, and other services closing, with towns becoming much more of a focal point. It also means that we find it harder to find a place for coffee (which is a mid-morning necessity for us) so we now carry a jet-boil, aeropress and coffee, so that we never miss out!

This shift makes our life, on these little adventures, just slightly more complicated, although it’s amazing how good a bit of baguette with balsamic vinegar can taste, when you’re ravenous, after a long day’s ride. It’s almost worthy of a Michelin star!

4. Trains:

I know this is a cycling adventure, so trains really shouldn’t come into the equation, but we have used a few trains on this trip, just to make sure we arrive where we need to be, on time, and also to avoid the heat, which became unbearable.

Our original plans were thrown into disarray, when the train we had booked to take us to Toulouse, to watch the final of the PROD2 league, was cancelled, following an accident on the track. In effect, this delayed our trip by a week, which was a big frustration. You can read about that day here

On the ride up through France, the heat became excessive, and after cycling into Saumur, we decided to take the train to Brittany, in the hope that we would be able to pick up some slightly cooler temperatures, and a sea-breeze.

That took us down the rabbit hole of booking bikes onto trains, with coupons for travel. Each region has to be booked seaparately, and we discovered (after a rather fraught couple of hours, and a delightful conversation with customer service) that the BreizhGo system, wouldn’t work from an Apple phone. But eventually, we managed it, only being able to book certain trains, as others were already full. Not that this seemed to make a difference, as it was a free-for-all, with bikes in just about every access point.

In the UK, it wasn’t any different, and even though we had bookings for the bikes, the hooks in the only available bike locker were broken, and we were advised (in no uncertain terms) that if we didn’t stow them on a hook, then we would be required to leave the train. This led to us having to move all the heavy luggage that people had stowed in the area with the only available hooks, so that we could travel, in order to catch the ferry that we had booked.

It just feels that whenever we travel by train with the bikes, our stress-levels go through the roof. The only time that it seems to work well, is on the French Intercity Trains, where the bikes are given a seat number too.

Our anxiety of whether we will be able to get the bikes on the trains is almost crippling, and more often than not, we find ourselves standing with them by doorways, or in the aisles, waiting to be told off, like naughty school-children (even though we have paid our 1 to book them on and get our QR code, allowing them to travel with us)

It should be so easy, but is always so difficult. I suppose part of the reason for this is the sheer number of people taking their bikes on the trains. In Brittany, it was full of cycle tourists, on their way out, or back from rides, and this is fantastic to see. It just needs the train providers to catch up with the demand and provide the carriages and space that is needed.

That said, all these little frustrations are always overwhelmed by the fun we have on the rides, and this summer was no different. It didn’t matter that we were having to set an alarm, just so that we could pedal out with the sunrise…

Or that on some days, we got soaked to the skin, and were trying to shelter behind hedges from the torrential rain and sharp wind…

We were happy to crouch in a corner, on a train journey, as at least we were on the train, and on our way to where we needed to be…

And we found that as long as we could find something to eat, we were happy, although I haven’t added baguette and balsamic vinegar to our supper options, now we’re home!

It was another wonderful adventure, and we pinch ourselves that we are able to simply turn our legs to carry us, and everything we need to travel across France.

We just need to take stock a bit, to decide what we can change and tweak, to make sure that we can still enjoy exploring this wonderful country, in a way that we love.

But, we have a winter to think about that, as our bikes are away, and the backpacks are out, as we are starting to get ready for our long distance walk in Portugal. Another simple trip, carrying everything we need on our backs – but no tent!