There was a change of scene for this year’s gite trip with
the plan being to stay close to Montreuil- sur-Mer after a Dover-Calais
crossing and then riding on to Dieppe
afterwards. Sadly Terry was still recuperating so only seven of us went.
Five of us (Pam, Liz, Tony, Brian and Colin) met on Friday
June 19 at Lamingtons in Bletchingley for elevenses, meeting Ian at Leigh for
lunch before cycling on to Headcorn. From here we took the train past Dover
to Martin Mill, avoiding the steep hill and a gentle ride took us back to the hotel
where Tim was waiting.
On Saturday, a flat road from Calais
to Guînes alongside the canal ended in disappointment when Guînes was devoid of
anywhere to buy food but we did stop for refreshments. Here the hills began and
the next 16 miles to Desvres sapped the calories but a bakery spared those who
stopped. Desvres had a choice of hills , one to the supermarket and one to the
town, so we did both. Fortified by the magical combination of chocolate
éclairs, fruit tarts and Leffe the next and last hill seemed a mere pimple in
spite of adding our shopping to the panniers. Then we were rolling down the
valley of the Course towards Montreuil. The gite was in fact in Aix-en-Issart, a
village about 7 miles away with no restaurant and Tony quickly produced vast
quantities of spag bol on arrival.
Sunday was a rest day with just a trip into Montreuil
for lunch. Cycling began again in earnest on Monday when Tony led us a 60 mile
run through country lanes to St Valery sur Somme.
Google’s mapping cars get to some unlikely places in France
and rewarded us with several stretches of gravel road on the outward run. The
puncture fairy which had been following Tony since home struck him twice again with,
frustratingly, no obvious cause.
Tuesday finally banished the fairy, thanks to Ian’s supply
of everything one could ever need, in this case gaffer tape! The cause was a
loose rim tape causing the tube to chafe on the drillouts for the spokes. Tim
led us a circular route to Le Touquet for lunch at the beach and back on some
of the roads used in this week’s Tour. Our last long ride from the gite was on
Wednesday to Azincourt ( Agincourt) led by Brian. Here our non linguist managed
the interesting feat of booking a table for seven at the local brasserie while
at the same time being convinced it was closed for lunch and we should look
elsewhere!
Thursday was for the inner cyclist ahead of Friday’s ride to
Dieppe. A short ride to the Auberge
d’Inxent provided a fine lunch followed by a trip to the Beussant chocolate
factory. So ended a glorious week of sunny days and no rain.
On Friday, three took the train to Serqueux leaving a gentle
ride along the Avenue Verte to Dieppe
while Tim led the other four who cycled. The 66 miles turned out to be easier
than expected though all the hills were after lunch. We stopped for coffee in
the interesting old town of Rue and
later dried out in Eu over lunch after some heavy showers. Our luck then held until the last ten miles
where we found ourselves thoroughly soaked in the centre of a thunderstorm.
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