D - 64 until the Tour de France 2013!

I've just been checking out the Tour de France website and they now have a super cool little countdown thing. Only 64 days to go!

 

And to keep us all satisfied we have the Giro about to start on Saturday - hurrah!

 

Will Bradley go for the win leaving The Tour open for Chris Froome? Who knows?  We're all disproportionately excited about it in our house!

 

The Cahill family holiday is now sorted. Cross the channel to Le Havre and then three days in the Loire before a night spent in Annecy - there we'll we'll almost certainly do the round of Lake Annecy before heading off down to Le Bourg D'Oisans - campsite booked near the foot of the Alpe D'Huez ready for Stage 18 when the peleton have to to do two ascents of the Alpe!

We'll be there, Union flag flying somewhere just above Dutch Corner - the orange swamped bend traditionally adopted by thousands of noisy, excited and often quite well 'oiled' Netherlanders! Fabulously friendly, riding through them is one of cycling's great experiences.

 

Between now and the beginning of the Tour I'm going to post various pictures and tales that we've enjoyed in our visits to the Greatest Race on Earth.

 

Commencing with this fellow in orange - having made his way up from the bend below - Dutch Corner - shaking hands all the way. It's scenes like these that make the four hours by the road waiting for the riders to go through so absorbing - there's always something happening!

Yellowhammers and Brimstones

Tuesday morning, out on a ride, and suddenly there’s a flash of yellow in an otherwise dreary grey morning light. There it was then ... the season’s first glimpse of a Yellowhammer!

Brimstone butterflies next, the colour of butter, and a sure precursor to warmer rides!

It’s a great colour, yellow. And it certainly attracts attention. The first daffodils of the year, the yellow label on a bottle of Wolf Blass wine, and of course the site of the yellow jersey in the Tour de France peleton.

Summer brings days of paddling in my yellow kayak, fishing for mackerel of the Devon Coast. And then there's custard, bananas, lemons, sweetcorn, peppers and pineapple.

Psychologically, yellow is the happiest colour in the colour spectrum.

 

Lovely wife Jo is also thrilled with the yellow jacket I ride in during the darker months. Pragmatically, I have grown to like it too. But I’d still rather wear black, because, even at the age of 52, I still want to look cool. The little Yellowhammer proves Jo right though ... a tiny glimpse and there it was.

As to being 52, this week the Times reported on exercise with regard to age. This was in light of an eminent journalist, Andrew Marr, suffering from a stroke hours after completing a gruelling training session on a rowing machine. Andrew Marr is 53 years of age. So this has made me think.

The Times also stated that, at 50, men are more competitive with each other than at any other time. I thought then of friend Nige and I, half wheeling each other on an otherwise pastoral ramble through the Severn Vale with our wives. Or Dave and I hitting a birthday balloon around until it became proper indoor volleyball, culminating in me breaking a rib on the arm of the sofa as I dived to retrieve his winning drive ..... with my six year old son’s birthday balloon! And finally, this time last year, of my ridiculous push to come third in the Common Room mileage competition – exhausting myself in the process – lowering my immunity levels and ending up a virus ridden mess for the next three months. But I did come third!

So, I’m still riding the miles, but I’m giving myself a break. I’m chasing the kind of fitness level whereby I can go for hours on end, but I’m happy to tackle the hills in the granny gear.  I’m making friends with my knees, instead of ignoring their irritating complaints. Slower perhaps, but possibly a lot further.

Footnote:

A few days later:  A Brimstone butterfly! Spotted whist umpiring on the Under 9’s cricket pitch. Spring may finally be here!

Tunnel vision In Mallorca

Now, I'd never ridden through a tunnel of any substantial length. The one above is in Mallorca, on the way to  Cap de Formentor, a lighthouse on the most north-easterly tip of the island. The fellow on the cycle preceded me, whilst I waited for a friendly vehicle to approach. I'd decided that I'd ride in front of it, using its lights to show me the road ahead. And sure enough it worked a treat, enabling me to zip through at a steady 17/18 mph!

 

The fellow ahead turned out to be Dutch, and he's stopped to take a photograph the other side of the tunnel. He asked me,

 

"Did you see the big rock in the road as you came through?"

 

No. I hadn't. And I can't have missed it by much either. So a close shave then, and the rock will undoubtedly be a boulder next time the story is told.

 

However, the tantrum booking of a short package to Mallorca proved to be a revelation. The Puerto Azul Suite Hotel in Puerto Pollensa was ideal - full of cyclists from Denmark on an organised Cycle Camp - and only a couple of hundred metres from the seafront. Three types of fish on offer at the evening buffet, porridge and honey for breakfast, and the Tour of the Basque Country on TV every afternoon. Bargain! 

 

In the carpark outside we bumped into Bradley Wiggins van, and later his man, wheeling the great man's suitcase from the hotel ready for the next day's riding.

Sadly we didn't see the Tour De France champion himself, but I did ride some of the roads he did on my jaunt to the lighthouse.

On the zig zags above I met two professional riders on a coaching session, their verbose trainer hollering orders at them from the team car, whilst they hurtled up the hill. I crawled up the hill, and enjoyed both the view, and the Kuota Korsa Lite Road Bike that I'd hired for the day from PollensaCycling. A flighty, stiff little aluminium number compared to my carbon Roubaix, sadly left at home - this being a short 'family' break after all.

 



Top tip now for 'family' holidays. Make sure that you sneak a pair of cycleshorts into your minimal cabin luggage (no lengthy checking in for us!). You never know if you're going to feel the urge to hire a bicycle! Forty Mallorcan miles on a narrow saddle in ordinary shorts? Only possible if you're a regular user of Brooks Saddles. Even then, you do end up feeling a little 'bruised'.

 

The Cap de Formentor ride was beautiful. A day of climbing and descending, with small amounts of level riding inbetween. Mallorca Cycling describe it thus.  

 

Although only 40km (25miles) the route is hilly and packs in 1600m (5200ft) of climbing.

 

However, like a lot of climbs in the Alps, the gradient is never too severe and the suffering is always tempered by the views. The coffee in the Lighthouse Cafe is improved by the environment, but the cakes are fabulous.

 

Arriving back at the hotel, recovery mode kicked in.

 

'I've a window of an hour in which to have a chocolate milkshake and some peanuts!'

 

This knowledegable, and desperate,  statement was greeted with, "Let's go then!"

 

Lovely Wife Jo was more than happy to venture forth to the Cappuccino Grande Cafe, now on the list of 'Great cafes we have known', there to have Olives and a Mojito.  

The Chocolate Milk Shake was of the finest kind, and greatly enhanced by the knowledge that I'd done the work to earn it.

As the drinks, peanuts, olives and the Sun went down, we soaked up the ambiance of a Mediterranean Cafe, and listened to Cappuccinno Radio. I'm listening to it now too, as I write this, next to the beautifully green, but constantly wet Cotswold Hills.

You could listen too, by clicking this link.

Cappuccino Radio

The Times, Bourneville and Velominati - reviews

Well .... time for some reviews, as all good blogs seem to have them.

First off, the Sunday Times Business supplement.  A section of the paper I rarely read, it proved to be the perfect solution when it came to drying out my drenched cycling shoes yesterday after an hours ride in the biggest downpour this side of Easter.

Next would be Cadbury's Bourneville Chocolate, four cubes of which prove to be just the fix one needs after lunchtime scrambled eggs. Not crunched between the teeth though, but rolled around and slowly melted between sips of post prandial tea - bliss.  This is the only chocolate that I am allowing myself between now and Thursday 18th of July - that being Alpe D'Huez Day on the Tour de France. 

 

The year before last I rode up the Alpe wearing my Frank Schleck Leopard Trek shirt - obviously not an option this year, him being nabbed for drugs and all.    Also, according to Velominati.com,   

Rule #17 states that, 'Team kit is for members of the team'. I'm a hypocrite here, as I stated the same with respect to football and rugby kit in an earlier post Postmen on Pashleys. What was I thinking?

This year I have my eye on a jersey from Shuttvr.com. Slightly slimmer in the fit, so action is being taken, lunchtime Bourneville consumption a small part of a bigger picture.

 

Which brings me to Velominati.com itself - the website where you can find all the rules of cycling. They state, 

 

'We are the Keepers of the Cog. In so being, we also maintain the sacred text wherein lie the simple truths of cycling etiquette known as The Rules. It is in our trust to maintain and endorse this list.

 

I found this site quite by chance. Lovely wife Jo has ordered me to buy a cycling cap with a peak, to wear under my helmet. This to protect my nose, already a little damaged by the sun. Duly obliging, I type Cycle caps into google and find an entire article on 'How to wear a cycle cap' on Velominati.com. A hugely entertaining and informative site. I shall be following Rule #22 to the letter - Cycling caps are for cycling.

 

 

 

 

 

Jonny makes up a joke.

So, we're all at the table having lunch - chicken and grape baguettes, followed by rhubarb yoghurt.

And then Number One Son Jonny says, "I've just made up a joke", which he then proceeds to tell us ....

Sylvester Stallone, Bruce Willis and Arnold Schwarzenegger are all sitting around discussing their next movie roles in a film devoted to the Great Composers.

"I'm going to play Beethoven", says Stallone.

Bruce Willis responds with,"In that case, I'm going to be Mozart".

And Schwarzenegger gets up, walks to the door, and says, "I'll be Bach"

I told him I'd blog it. Just to be supportive.

Balaclavas and bears

Tony and Barry had one. I reckon half the kids in our class had one. But I didn’t. My mum wouldn’t even listen to me.

        ‘You’re not having a balaclava! What do you want a balaclava for in the middle of the summer?’

        I must have told her about ten times why I wanted a balaclava.

       ‘I want one so that I can join the Balaclava Boys . . . ‘

       ‘Go and wash your hands for tea, and don’t be so silly’

 The Fib and other stories – George Layton.

So this morning I had a phonecall from Bob. 

      "Steve .. I'd like some advice about balaclavas"

We'd agreed that today we'd ride down the Gloucester-Sharpness canal towpath to Slimbridge Wildfowl and Wetlands centre. The only problem being that .. this morning .. the temperature was registering 0.5 degrees.

     

      "Thermofleece Bob. Definitely not wool. If you find something good, I'll have one too."

The last time I had a balaclava it was a Mountain Equipment Thermofleece - and I'd lost it in Glencoe after taking it off to dig a snowhole. Warm work digging snowholes. Prior to that I'd been about six, and it had been heavy, itchy wool.

Just after lunch Bob duly arrived with two balaclavas and off we went, wending our way across the great divide between Cheltenham and Gloucester to find our canal towpath.

It was cold beside the canal. And grey. And derelict. But our spirits were lifted when we spotted two bears asleep on a bridgekeepers bench, and had a friendly chat with the man himself.

     

 "This time last year," he said, "The bridge expanded in the heat, and we had real problems getting it open." 

So here we are, four days into Spring, and the yet the weather, contrary as ever, has decided to retain the character of Winter, and keep us waiting for warmth.

Is it any wonder then that, last week, in a fit of pique, we booked a holiday to Mallorca.

Looking across to the Severn Estuary from the Gloucester to Sharpness canal.



The Mud Doctor's Wedding

"I am never at my best in the early morning, especially a cold morning in the Yorkshire spring with a piercing March wind sweeping down from the fells, finding its way inside my clothing, nipping at my nose and ears."

                                                                                       James Herriot – Yorkshire vet

Geologists, Dr Matt Jones and Keely spend a large part of their working lives drilling for mud samples, which are then dissected, analysed and pondered over in the most scholarly fashion. Talking mud, they fell in love, and this eventually led to Giggleswick Parish church, on one of the coldest march days in recent memory.  The same day last year we were sunning ourselves in shorts and T-shirts! Oh the vagaries!

Keely wore a backless dress – and I, late for the wedding and having had no time to change, sat and watched, wearing my thermal skin, shirt, hoodie, gilet, coat, scarf and gloves, but thankfully, no hat. I’m not a hat person. But I still felt cold.

“I was all warmed up on the adrenaline”, she said. And if they could have plugged her into the National Grid, her 1000 watt smile would have lit up the lives of all those in the 2000 homes on the Isle of Arran, who’s electricity had gone down that very same day.

We spent the reception sat with a roost of retired teachers, counting the cruise destinations they’d been to, and eating a roast (with Yorkshire Puddings).

But Yorkshire itself was most definitely cold. Cold and very, very white.

However, the low slung Plough Inn, in Wigglesworth proved to be a haven of warmth and Yorkshire hospitality.

Tea arrived. “Any chance of some biscuits?

“Aye ... I’ll get ye some biscuits”, said the affable landlord, whereupon his wife, the bustling landlady appeared, seemingly out of thin air, and said, “Nay ... I’ll get you some biscuits – e’ll get ye the rubbish. I’ve got the good ones!”  And she did.

On the way home, cruising down the M6, Joni Mitchell came on the radio, singing,

Oh I could drink a case of you darling
And I would still be on my feet
I would still be on my feet

A memorable lyric in a truly great love song.

Listen to Joni Mitchell - A case of you