Saturday 26th May. Lacanau Ocean (8) to Biganos (9)
34.5 miles. 2hrs 55m riding time. Average speed: 11.78mph Total: 405miles.
The weather in Lacanau last night was scorching. This morning I awoke to howling wind and torrential rain. The TV news is showing floods in the area and snowstorms in the Pyrenees. I lingered over breakfast watching the hotel’s patio furniture being blown end-over-end into a tangled heap against the restaurant’s windows. I loitered a bit more hoping vainly that the weather would improve – it didn’t. I eventually left at 10.30. The rain was still pouring down but the wind thankfully eased as I made my way inland and followed a tarmac veloroute through the forest around the Lac de Lacanau south to the Arcachon basin. All day the route led through dense forest and there was nothing at all to see; it was easy cycling but really quite boring in the rain. Consequently there was nothing of note to write about until both of my tyres punctured at the same time. I couldn’t believe it! I’d been running on these Kevlar re-enforced tyres for over 1,500 miles and never had a puncture yet; they don’t even show any signs of wear – now I had two flat tyres to fix in the pouring rain. I was thankful that I’d had the prescience to carry two spare inner tubes since trying to fix punctures and get rubber solution to stick patches in pouring rain would have been near impossible. The punctures were caused by tiny, razor-sharp flints which I managed with some difficulty to remove from the tyre using eyebrow tweezers – (A good tip that; always carry an old pair of eyebrow tweezers in a puncture repair kit to remove flints and thorns too small for your fingernails to grip and remove.)
I decided the day could get no worse; I was well short of my target so,
dejected and soaked to the skin, I quit cycling for the day and headed into
the village of Biganos. I booked into the Hotel de France which was old-fashioned
but spotlessly clean and well-maintained.
My room cost just 37 euros.
Once checked in, my first priority was to spread my kit out to dry and mend
the punctures in my inner tubes. The Hotel de France didn’t seem to
be opening its restaurant tonight so I had to walk about half a mile in
the rain to the nearest restaurant - a pizza café again!
Once I’d eaten my pizza I just wanted the day to be over. When you’ve
spent so long planning a trip and the weather turns against you you feel
somehow cheated. Riding that would have been really enjoyable in fine weather
becomes no more than unavoidable and masochistic drudgery when the weather
is so bad.
Wind…