We seem to be travelling faster than I can write. We have now moved on to Gemenos which is near Aubagne which is near Marseille. We are staying or "couch surfing" with a lovely couple Simon and Marion who have a stunning home half way up a mountain on the outskirts of Gemenos. More on this later - but it is worth saying now that we couldn't have found kinder or more accommodating people who have opened their home to us as though they had known us all their lives.
Now a quick message of thanks and a sincere recommendation - having cycled ourselves into the ground or mountainside on our first day on the road and having cooked a much needed meal we got into our "skins" (for those that don't know they are athletic compression tights which are somewhat obscene if you don't fancy yourself as a ballet dancer and which your wear during exercise or afterwards to help recovery) and went to bed in our tent, in the woods, in the middle of nowhere half way up a mountain somewhere in north Spain fully expecting to wake up barely able to move and planning for as gentle a day as possible through necessity rather than choice.
If you read the box when you buy a pair of skins it seems like there could be a lot of over hyped scientific mumbo jumbo - if you think of that shampoo advert from a few years ago, the one where she tells you to pay attention because it's time for the science bit - well you kind of get the gist of how it's written. Having read the box with great scepticism, having looked at myself in the mirror when I first tried them on and blushed at what was in front of me, I now take all my negative thoughts back and really no longer care if they make me look like Dale Winton doing a sketch for comic relief. They are absolutely brilliant. We woke up the following morning feeling fantastic - I could walk normally, didn't have to hobble around at all. Once we were on the bikes we were stunned at how we felt. Now I know as an experiment we should really cycle a full day and then not wear them that night to see how we feel in the morning but there is no way in a million years I'm ever going to try that. It's just not worth it. I have slept in the skins every night now since we started and have every morning woken up feeling ready to get going with few if any aches and pains in my legs.
So to the recommendation. If you do lots of exercise - get a pair. And the thanks? Well thanks to Dave and Lisa for telling us about them. I now know, Dave, why you never stop wearing yours.
So our second day in the saddle was another great day but this time no need for hindsight to tell us that. We made it all the way to Tolosa which again was a lot further than we expected and not as difficult as anticipated. This did create one problem: when, in the middle of the afternoon, we considered how we were feeling, decided pretty good and so chose to push on it meant we arrived in Tolosa in early evening. There was no where we could easily camp wild, there was no official camp site in the town and just the one hotel. So although it wasn't really in the spirit of our adventure, on only our second day, we booked into a hotel. An expensive reward for two days hard cycling and definitely not one to be repeated. It was great though to have a hot shower and a bed for the night. Oh how we needed to toughen up.
It's very strange how you can so quickly forget and how one day merges into another. I have to ask Bridget to remind me what the second day's cycling was actually like. I remember we started with a short up hill section and then a really long down hill - 50kpmh making up for the slow slog the day before; I remember stunning views and I remember a fairly stormy end to the day as we arrived in Tolosa just in time. The rest is somewhat of a blur. I better remember how I felt which was pretty much ecstatic all day, big smiles all day, tired but happy at the end of the day when we assessed the map. On the second day we also started a small routine. When we camp wild we get up very early and leave as soon as possible so not to offend anyone. Then we stop in the first village, unpack our stove and make porridge. We did this for the first time on the second morning somewhat tentatively thinking local people might not like the ball of flame that bursts from a Whisperlite stove when you first prime it nor the roar it creates while you cook (these are really quiet villages we are talking about) but no one batted an eyelid that morning and no one has said anything since - in one French village we were even encouraged to enjoy our breakfast.
We have been going just over two weeks now and it has all been beyond our expectations and better than we had hoped. We do have some small concerns. We aren't finding it as easy to camp wild as we had hoped both mentally (I am really struggling in this especially when there is a genuine campsite available nearby) and also finding what I consider to be a suitable location - discreet, not an obvious trespass and at the right time of day. We have passed many perfect sites but so often in the morning or early afternoon and not early to late evening. The other concern at the moment is how expensive food seems to be - especially now we are in France. Combine this with the state of the pound and the bottom line is we are spending far too much money. When we totted it up this morning Bridget was particularly worried. I am a bit more laissez-faire and keen not to let it ruin what is a once in a lifetime experience but even I am struggling to work out how we have spent so much. So from today we have begun an auditing process. We are now writing down and recording every single euro we spend and on what. Then after another couple of weeks it should become clear where the money is going and how we can reduce costs.
Now a quick message of thanks and a sincere recommendation - having cycled ourselves into the ground or mountainside on our first day on the road and having cooked a much needed meal we got into our "skins" (for those that don't know they are athletic compression tights which are somewhat obscene if you don't fancy yourself as a ballet dancer and which your wear during exercise or afterwards to help recovery) and went to bed in our tent, in the woods, in the middle of nowhere half way up a mountain somewhere in north Spain fully expecting to wake up barely able to move and planning for as gentle a day as possible through necessity rather than choice.
If you read the box when you buy a pair of skins it seems like there could be a lot of over hyped scientific mumbo jumbo - if you think of that shampoo advert from a few years ago, the one where she tells you to pay attention because it's time for the science bit - well you kind of get the gist of how it's written. Having read the box with great scepticism, having looked at myself in the mirror when I first tried them on and blushed at what was in front of me, I now take all my negative thoughts back and really no longer care if they make me look like Dale Winton doing a sketch for comic relief. They are absolutely brilliant. We woke up the following morning feeling fantastic - I could walk normally, didn't have to hobble around at all. Once we were on the bikes we were stunned at how we felt. Now I know as an experiment we should really cycle a full day and then not wear them that night to see how we feel in the morning but there is no way in a million years I'm ever going to try that. It's just not worth it. I have slept in the skins every night now since we started and have every morning woken up feeling ready to get going with few if any aches and pains in my legs.
So to the recommendation. If you do lots of exercise - get a pair. And the thanks? Well thanks to Dave and Lisa for telling us about them. I now know, Dave, why you never stop wearing yours.
So our second day in the saddle was another great day but this time no need for hindsight to tell us that. We made it all the way to Tolosa which again was a lot further than we expected and not as difficult as anticipated. This did create one problem: when, in the middle of the afternoon, we considered how we were feeling, decided pretty good and so chose to push on it meant we arrived in Tolosa in early evening. There was no where we could easily camp wild, there was no official camp site in the town and just the one hotel. So although it wasn't really in the spirit of our adventure, on only our second day, we booked into a hotel. An expensive reward for two days hard cycling and definitely not one to be repeated. It was great though to have a hot shower and a bed for the night. Oh how we needed to toughen up.
It's very strange how you can so quickly forget and how one day merges into another. I have to ask Bridget to remind me what the second day's cycling was actually like. I remember we started with a short up hill section and then a really long down hill - 50kpmh making up for the slow slog the day before; I remember stunning views and I remember a fairly stormy end to the day as we arrived in Tolosa just in time. The rest is somewhat of a blur. I better remember how I felt which was pretty much ecstatic all day, big smiles all day, tired but happy at the end of the day when we assessed the map. On the second day we also started a small routine. When we camp wild we get up very early and leave as soon as possible so not to offend anyone. Then we stop in the first village, unpack our stove and make porridge. We did this for the first time on the second morning somewhat tentatively thinking local people might not like the ball of flame that bursts from a Whisperlite stove when you first prime it nor the roar it creates while you cook (these are really quiet villages we are talking about) but no one batted an eyelid that morning and no one has said anything since - in one French village we were even encouraged to enjoy our breakfast.
We have been going just over two weeks now and it has all been beyond our expectations and better than we had hoped. We do have some small concerns. We aren't finding it as easy to camp wild as we had hoped both mentally (I am really struggling in this especially when there is a genuine campsite available nearby) and also finding what I consider to be a suitable location - discreet, not an obvious trespass and at the right time of day. We have passed many perfect sites but so often in the morning or early afternoon and not early to late evening. The other concern at the moment is how expensive food seems to be - especially now we are in France. Combine this with the state of the pound and the bottom line is we are spending far too much money. When we totted it up this morning Bridget was particularly worried. I am a bit more laissez-faire and keen not to let it ruin what is a once in a lifetime experience but even I am struggling to work out how we have spent so much. So from today we have begun an auditing process. We are now writing down and recording every single euro we spend and on what. Then after another couple of weeks it should become clear where the money is going and how we can reduce costs.
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