Part 1 : "Training" in the Pays de la
Loire
We hadn't adequately prepared for this trip in part because Carol
was recovering from a broken pelvis and also because we were spending
a lot of our normal cycling time with our grandson. Priorities! As a
result, our first week was going to be our "training" for the
remainder of the tour. This is not a recommended
plan!
Sep. 7: We took an overnight flight from Montréal's
Mirabel airport to Nantes, arriving around noon. We cycled the
8 or 9 km through busy suburbs into Nantes and immediately went to
the station to buy tickets on a 5 PM train to Cholet, about 50
km away, so that we could avoid having to cycle through the large
ring of suburbs surrounding the city. We always choose trains that
allow us to take our bikes free as bagage à
main. Check my web page on 'bikes
on trains' to learn how to find such trains. We wandered with our
loaded bikes in the old center of Nantes. Not much impressed - big
city, lots of traffic. There's a beautiful Jardin des
Plantes near the station - a good place to kill time while
waiting for the train. At Cholet, we found a hotel
(H. Commerce - inexpensive, although she charged us
for storing the bikes in her garage) and after settling in, we
wandered the old center of this small city, had a nice meal and a
pleasant stroll afterwards - a nice evening and a good, smooth start.
Sep. 8 (81 km): Getting out of Cholet turned out to
be tricky because of one way streets and a long climb, but within a
half km of that hilltop we were heading east on a small country road
and I had that wonderful feeling again - the sun is shining, the
countryside is beautiful, the road is smooth, there's no traffic -
I'm back in France! We stopped for breakfast in
Toutlemonde. As we have done for years, we picked up
pain aux raisins (raisin brioche) at a
patisserie (pastry shop) and then at a café we
ate it with café au lait. We cruised along on
gently rolling roads in sunny 25°C (77°F
for you folks in that archaic little island of tradition, the
USA), picking up lunch stuff in Yzernay. You must get
to the boulangerie (bakery) and the
alimentation (grocery) before everything closes for the
two hour lunch at 12:30. We bought some Roquefort cheese -
near the top of my list of reasons I go to France almost every year.
By mid-afternoon we had reached our destination, the small city of
Thouars, and got our first indication that travelling outside
the summer months was going to be different: the tourist office was
closed - not because we were outside their office hours, but because
they considered the tourist season to be over! There's a grand
chateau in Thouars, high above the Thouet river, which couldn't be
visited because it is now a college and classes were in session. We
had the name of a hotel from the itinerary we had planned in advance
of the trip and found the address - "Route de Parthenay" - the road
south out of the city. When we got to the intersection of that road,
we guessed 'right' and, after cycling 5 km out of town through grain
fields, decided that we should have guessed 'left'. We found the
hotel (H. du Chateau) about a hundred metres from the site of our
wrong turn. Nice meal - our first (of many) confit de
canard (duck leg & thigh which has
been slowly cooked in, stored under and reheated
in its own fat. It seems unappetizing when you see it printed
like that, but it is very tender and tasty!) A fine
first day.
Sep.
9 (89 km): There was a little early morning mist being
'burned' off by the sun as we climbed away from our hotel to the
Cirque de Missé, a corniche above the Thouet river, and
continued east on very tiny roads. We came upon some dolmens
in the grain fields - 4000 year old evidence of early civilization.
We climbed a wooded ridge and then descended into Oiron, with
its beautiful chateau, and had breakfast. We heard singing from the
little village church, the sweet soprano voices of a girls' choir,
and were surprised when we went in to find that there were only six
singers, all around 70 years old! We had a nice
ride through a marshy area and then came upon some young men
removing the plastic mulch from a field of melons. Well, actually,
the melons had already been harvested. There were a few still lying
on the ground so I asked if we could take one and we did - it was
very sweet! At lunch we tried a glass of the local wine - a VDQS
Thouarsais. Pretty good. (VDQS is Vin
Délimité de Qualité Supérieur, just below
the Appelation Controlée designation.) It was getting
hot - up to 28°C (84°F). Everything was being harvested at
the time - grain, colza (that's canola), sunflowers, melons, .... We
continued on through rolling hills (a few climbs here) through
Lencloître and Colombiers where we saw names
painted on the road, the telltale sign that the Tour de
France had passed through the area in July, and finally
rolled into the city of Chatellerault right in the middle of
rush hour traffic. Carol was tired after the long hot day. She wears
braces on both knees to cycle and she broke her hip (slipped on ice)
in 1994 and broke her pelvis (slipped on ice) at the end of January,
1999. (I have to get her away from Canada during the
worst of winter.) We found a hotel (H.
l'Univers - nothing special) and then wandered around the city
for a bit before having dinner at a pizzeria
(salade de gésiers - that's a
salad of confit of duck gizzards - and a pizza).
Sep. 10 (68 km): I decided to load all the panniers
on my bike for the rest of the trip. We had many days ahead of us and
I wanted Carol to last! We had breakfast before we left Chatellerault
and then, still heading east, we started with a very steep climb to
Targé and then a nice 30 km ride through rolling,
woodsy terrain, finishing with a fast descent into St.
Pierre-de-Maillé on the Gartempe river, featuring a
beautiful setting and attractive old mill. Another long climb,
descent and climb put us in Angles-sur-l'Anglin ("Un des
plus beaux villages de France" says the sign.) Quaint, but we'd
been there before so we just had lunch before taking off again, east
to the Creuse river and then south to le Blanc. We'd been
there two years earlier and stayed at the Domaine de l'Étape,
an old manor house in the woods about 7 km east of le Blanc. We got a
room there again. As on our last visit, we had a wonderful meal, on
the terrasse. Beautiful
evening - wonderful day.
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