Monday, July 19
Our train trips on this excursion have been great, but there are few things I like more than driving around rural France. Other than hiking or biking, and I’m way too much of a devotee of sloth for extensive use of either of those modes of transport, you just can’t beat travel by voiture de location—rental. Driving provides the spontaneity and up-close contact with the sites, the land, the cafes and the people.
Today we drove west from just outside of Vienne, about 40 kilometers south of Lyon, to Clermont-Ferrand. As mentioned before, we were in Vienne so we could return to Roman ruins at Romaine-en-Gal. Here’s where the poor planning part II comes in. It was Monday; the museum was ferme, closed. C’est le vie. We did visit a roman palace and the coliseum in Vienne. The seats of the coliseum are pretty much what you’d expect for roman stone work, but the stage was completely hidden by one of the largest lighting and sound arrays I’ve seen. They’d just finished the 30th Vienne Jazz festival featuring BB King, Norah Jones, etc.
Anyway, it was time to head west. We told GPS Randy to take us off the fast route and send us on a more leisurely course and that he did. We spent a couple of hours going through tiny burbs, go-arounds. We may have passed through someone’s back yard. The countryside, though, was spectacular. I’ve never driven in this part of France. The undulating terrain, full of sunflowers, corn and cattle began to climb and eventually grew into some 1000-meter+ mountains. Great biking and camping.
Our course had been a bit slower than planned and incredibly scenic, but cocktail hour was calling and driving is stressful. A little drink, a little TdF on the tube (Contador is such a douche), and a rather lengthy Randy-directed walk to the centre-ville for some grinds. It was a nice end to the end of our third week of the TdF Tour.