Cycling the Canal du Midi (June 2015)

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Cycling the Canal du Midi (June 2015)

Wednesday, 10 June – Collioure to Toulouse, France. Morning Eurobus from Collioure to Perpignan. SNCF train from Perpignan to Narbonne, change at Narbonne for train to Toulouse. From Toulouse station we cycled about 8km to the F1 Hotel south of the city in the University district. We unpacked and relaxed for a small bit (not a proper yoga session!) and then took the Metro back into the city for a lovely dinner at La Bistrot, which was in an area we had previously not visited. There were many small restaurants and bars that were all doing a brisk business, mostly from students. Afterwards we wandered around a bit more and then returned to the hotel by metro and were sound asleep before 11pm. Travel is hard work!

Thursday, 11 June – Toulouse, France. We took the metro back into the city and arrived there about 10am. We spent the whole day in slow further exploration. We had another very good traditional meal in another previously unexplored area. I took quite a few photos. We split up for a couple hours and Joan visited the boutiques while I visited Gilbert Joseph and FNAC. Together we visited two art galleries, one with an exhibition of Gordon Seward, a British artist of Irish and English descent, who has lived in the Toulouse area for twenty years. His paintings are very bright and colourful and use some mixed media like plastic utensils and small plastic toys. We trooped on to the cultural centre Bellegarde for the opening of another art exhibition, this one by Mustapha Boutadjine, who does very large portraits of iconic figures, including some jazz musicians (although none were represented in this exhibition, with the exception of Django Reinhardt). His works are not so much paintings but small pieces of cut out paper arranged to form an accurate yet interpretive portrait. Both artists presented interesting work. After this second exhibition there was a performance by a local jazz manouche trio- The Niglo Turbo Trio: Sami Chalbu, guitar; Murice, contrabass; Mike Davis, guitar. Jazz Manouche is an old form typical-French genre of jazz of which I am not particularly keen as it tends to be repetitive and samey sounding. This trio was a typical jazz manouche band and after about 30 minutes the songs all sounded the same to me. But it was a pleasant evening sitting out listening to music with 50 or 60 French people. It started to rain as we were returning to the metro. Early to bed; cycling tour starts in earnest tomorrow morning!

Friday, 12 June – Cycling the Canal du Midi: Toulouse to Villefranche-du-Lauragais. This morning the cycling adventure began. We re-packed our panniers and pushed the bikes down the corridor of the F1 Hotel and out onto the tarmac to begin our 350 km cycle back to Collioure. The sky was grey and it was cool and there was no wind – perfect cycling weather. The route from the hotel in the University district, south of Toulouse, to the Canal du Midi, looked pretty straight-forward on the map. It was about 8km and it we found the Canal without any temporary mis-direction. We stopped briefly for a photo opportunity at a very grotty Irish pub we passed. It was called The Dubliners and it seemed somehow appropriate.

Here is the brief history lesson: the Canal du Midi: The idea of linking the Atlantic Ocean to the Mediterranean Sea through France originated with the Romans. In the mid-1500s the local Languedoc states carried out a study of the idea, but did not proceed. In 1618 a new study was undertaken and the project proposed which was met with great controversy. Pierre Paul Riquet, a travelling tax collector for the region, had great experience of the pitiful state of the road network and decided that a waterway would enhance mobility and commerce throughout the area. He presented his plan for the canal to the king in 1663 and was given permission by Royal Edict to build it three years later. In 1670 the section between Toulouse and Naurouze, where there is a modest ridge and the highest point along the canal, was finished. With a ceremonial opening in Castelnaudary, the remainder of the canal was completed in 1681, six months after the death of Riquet.

The pathway that runs parallel to the Canal du Midi is smooth tarmac and at its early stages used as much as a cycling commuter track into Toulouse as it is as a leisure amenity. It is crowded with joggers, dog-walkers and slow-walkers. There is the occasional fisherman dipping a line into the green water. We cycled east from Toulouse, toward the Mediterranean Sea. We are carrying everything with us in two panniers each, mounted over the rear wheel, with a small backpack strapped on top of them containing our important stuff like the laptop. The panniers contain 15 litres each and the backpacks 10 litres; that’s 50 litres for each of us. I carry the bicycle repair gear and Joan the daily rations. We have decided not to ‘rough it’ and will look for small chamber d’hotes along the way (no tents or sleeping bags for us!).

According to our research, the route along the canal is paved from Toulouse to Port Lauragais. The cycling is relatively easy in that it is flat. We have been cycling regularly in Collioure and all routes from there include substantial hills. Once we reach the Med and turn south, however, we will encounter hills again, and that might prove challenging with the weight we are carrying. We shall see when we get there; perhaps by then we will be superfit-cyclists!

Our first days’ journey accomplished about 45 km to Villefranche-de-Lauragais, with a brief detour to see Montesquieu-Lauragais on the way. We experienced slightly drizzly weather at the turn off for Montesquieu and sheltered for awhile. This small town was recommended as short detour from the canal, less than 2km distant. It was, however, at an elevation of 80 metres, which caused us to dismount and push the bikes. We were hoping to find a cafe but the town, while incredibly cute, was without any cafes or other amenities. It was sleeping. As we started back to the canal, the drizzle increased to a short but intense shower and we were soaked through in a couple minutes. At this point we dug the rain jackets from the depths of the panniers (better late than not at all) and continued alongside the canal.

We passed many residential barges as well as rental boats along the way. One of the very first barges we encountered, which was heading toward Toulouse, was an entertainment barge advertising itself as a ‘Jazz Club’!

We arrived in Villefranche-de-Lauragais about 3pm and Joan went off to inspect the hotel offerings while I stood guard over the bicycles and watched the local life passing by. Villefranche, Joan discovered, has only one functioning hotel so that is where we stayed, in a large and very comfortable room. After showering, Joan practiced yoga and I went walkabout the town. And nearly immediately I spotted a poster announcing a performance this evening of the Elastic Band Jazz Villefranche! Free entrance at the town cultural centre. The band, nine local guys, were playing 50s and 60s jazz standards (Horace Silver, Herbie Hancock, Miles Davis and Sonny Rollins ... but no Thelonious Monk!) Who woulda thunk it!

We had our dinner at the hotel. Joan usually isn’t too keen on ‘hotel restaurants’ but this seemed the best option in this town. We had two traditional dishes from the area: Cassoulet, which is a local stew containing duck confit, sausage, pork rind and haricot or cannellini beans, and Toulouse Sausage. Both were very good. Cassoulet is hearty and filling, and each area in this part of France offers their own slight variation and interpretation. Toulouse sausages are world famous and absolutely delicious!



Saturday, 13 June – Cycling the Canal du Midi: Villefranche-du-Lauragais to Castelnaudary. Sunnier and warmer for today’s cycle, although the forecast is for showers and perhaps a thunderstorm or two. We started early, returning to the lock where we had turned off the previous evening, turning east and cycling onward toward today’s chosen destination, Castelnaudary, about 35km (with detours included). The cycle pathway is much less travelled here, and there are few joggers. The plain trees continue to line up along the waterway.

Avonet Lauragais was our first quick detour for elevenses, but again there was no cafe in the village, only a lovely Church of the Miracles, a statue of Joan of Arc, and a history of murdering Cathars. There were, however, many flowers in full bloom, and a sign stating that this town had won a regional flower competition in recent years. We sat in a small park and had some smoked ham and cheese, half an apple each, and drank loads of water. Again, this town was on top of a small but steep little hill and we had to push to bikes up. We returned to the canal and after a few kilometres we stopped at Port Lauragais.

Port Lauragais is where a couple of small rivers enter the waters of the Canal du Midi, and they have been moulded into a couple small lakes filled with boats for hire, and the area around these lakes turned into a large nature park. The car parks were full of cars, some with suitcases on the pavement waiting to be loaded onto a rented boat for a river cruise. We had passed one holiday cruise barge that was packed with day trippers. We cycled quickly onward.

At the Haut-Garonne border, where a sign announced ‘Leaving Haut-Garonne’, the tarmac cycling path changed to rough ground and parallel dirt tracks. The dirt tracks were mostly hard-packed, although there were tricky damp and muddy spots with soft going. We had to divert onto a roadway for a couple km where there was only a very rough walking path along the canal. Later on the track reduced to a single lane close to the water. And after a couple more locks, the dirt road returned. We cycled on. A few other cyclists with panniers passed us going in the opposite direction. Everyone salutes each other with a nod of the head and a bright ‘bonjour’! A Dutch man cycling on his own asked us if we had noticed any campsites along the way as the one he had been planning on staying at was closed for the season and not reopening until Monday.

We cycled into Castelnaudary around 3pm. Castelnaudary is a town we have visited before. It is famous for its cassoulet. (I think every town in this area claims to have the ‘best’ cassoulet!) The people of Castelnaudary claim to have devised the dish of cassoulet during the Hundred Years’ War (1337-1453) with the English. All restaurants in this and the neighbouring towns offer cassoulet on their menus – each chef has his or her own version or interpretation.

Joan chose a hotel, and we parked the bikes in a storage area at the bottom of a short set of stairs. After a quick shower and a short yoga session, we went to the cafe next door for coffee and internet access, blog writing and catching up with emails and newspapers.

Dinner at a small family-run local restaurant, Au Petit Gazouillie, consisted of starters of a green salad with gently handled lettuce leaves (the previous night’s lettuce was bruised and man-handled) with a raspberry vinaigrette, and thin slices of dried ham. Our main courses were the famous cassoulet for Joan that contained a large lump of pork and a length of sausage (nicer than the previous night) but not as much duck confit. I had a sliced duck breast on a bed of thin French fries. Joan had a plate of three French cheeses and I had a glass of ice cream with chocolate sauce.

We wandered around the quiet town a bit after dinner, looking into a few of the other restaurants. Many of the stores had closed down with signs for rent in their display windows. The wifi in the hotel did not work (so no blog posting).

Sunday, 14 June – Cycling the Canal du Midi: Castlenaudary to Carcassonne. Heavy rains overnight cleared by morning. After a quick breakfast we collected our bicycles from the hotel basement where they had been joined by nearly a dozen others. While re-attaching the panniers we met a Dutch couple who were also preparing to depart. They had passed us along the way yesterday, travelling in one day from Toulouse to Carcassone. They average about 70 to 80 km per day. They are well-experienced cycle-travellers. They carry a tent and cooking equipment, but the Carcassone campsite was closed so they too stayed in one of the local hotels.

The pathway was mostly hard-packed and two-track, with a single track at times. Amazingly, with all the rain that poured down overnight, there were very few soft spots and we need not stop to push at all. We were a little worried about this section as the guide book suggested the going would be considerably more difficult than it turned out. We did no detours today, but did stop for coffee a couples times, and for our now usual picnic lunch of sliced meat, cheese, half an apple and a handful of nuts.

We arrived into Carcassone at 2pm and were very pleased with ourselves and the days’ riding as we had not expected to arrive until between 3 and 4. We had reserved a room in a BnB for the night and found it relatively easily, unpacked the bicycles and stored them in a nearby garage. Our room in the BnB has a Sri Lankan theme as the French couple have an adopted child from that island country. We showered and rested and then had dinner at Restaurant 37. Joan had a large salad with home-made pate and I had the menu of the day which consisted of a refreshing cucumber salad, gammon steak and mashed potato, and a cherry dessert. We walked up the genuine fake medieval city and wandered around a bit and took some photos. It was not crowded - the tour bus brigade had long departed - and pleasant walking around as the evening air was cooling.

The ‘Cite’, as it now known, has been occupied since before Roman times, and reached its zenith in the 12^th and early 13^th centuries when it was the capital of the region. The Crusaders captured it in 1209. After the treaty of the Pyrenees in 1659, when the area became part of France, the ‘Cite’ lost its strategic importance; it fell into disrepair, became a ghetto and as it crumbled its stones were used in construction work throughout the area. It wasn’t until the mid-1800s that a local architect campaigned for its restoration and what stands today is only a vague interpretation from those times as to what a medieval city resembled. The ‘Cite’ of Carcassonne, however, remains an interesting place to visit, even if it is as fake as a Disneyland castle!

Monday, 15 June – Cycling the Canal du Midi: Carcassonne to Homps. The morning sky was clearing with more blue than clouds. We didn’t bother going into the centre of Carcassonne this visit as we had wandered around it on a couple previous visits and we were keen to get cycling! We found the entrance to the Canal du Midi at its far eastern end, and continued on our way. The route is mostly two-track hard-pack ground with a single track in some places. Apparently, originally, Carcassone wasn’t supportive of the building of the canal, and their lack of interest in it seems to continue to the present day. (Carcassonne seems to rely on the ‘Medieval City’ as its focus for visitors.)

We are cycling through ‘Cathar Country’. Like the Catalan culture in southern France around Collioure, the ‘Cathar’ culture is evident in each small town with flags and symbols, statues to the past, renovated ruins, and the historical memories of those horrific times remain in generational memories. Briefly, and probably too simply, the Cathars were a Catholic sect that could not reconcile the world’s evil with a just God. They believed that evil came from direction of an ‘evil God’, one who controlled the material world while the ‘good God’ was responsible for the spiritual world. The population of this area of France admired the Cathars’ and became converts. The Pope and hierarchy of the Roman Catholic Church became increasingly concerned about the growth of counter-religions, labelled them ‘heretics’ and launched an army against them; thus the ‘Crusades’ were born: a war of religious genocide. The last known Cathar was burned at the stake in 1321. (Does any of this sound contemporary!?)

It was sunnier today, and the pathway along the canal was not as sheltered by the massive overhanging plane trees. A parasite has attacked these trees, which for us are a representative symbol of France, and along this stretch in particular many of them have been cut down and their replacement trees have yet to fully mature. Each tree has a blue numbered disc tacked onto it. We have read that one of the methods that the disease transfer from one tree to another is along the ropes used by the boats when they are tying up along the canal banks. All along the canal, but usually close to the locks, canal boats of all shapes and styles are tied up, now to wooden posts specifically for that purpose.

We stopped briefly in Trebes which is situated in a confluence of the Aude and Orbiel rivers, crossed by the Midi, and one of places at which canal boats can be rented.

A few Canal du Midi facts: over 12,000 people worked at constructing the canal. There are 64 locks and 55 aqueducts controlling the waters; 7 connecting viaduct canal bridges, and 126 pedestrian and vehicular bridges spanning it; and over 42,000 plane trees alongside it. Benjamin Franklin visited it to study the locks, which were used as a model for the locks between two of America’s Great Lakes.

Each lock is accompanied by a lock keeper and a lock keeper’s house. On the house is engraved the name of the lock and the distances between it and the previous lock and the next lock. While most of the locks are still managed by official lock keepers, very few of the houses have been adapted as amenities such as cafes, or picnic areas or galleries for visitors. Today, however, we came across a couple that were cafes and we duly halted and re-fueled ourselves and watched the boats being lifted and lowered via the locks. And one was a quirky sculpture garden (of which I took quite a few photos). Much of the research we did before going on this trip suggested that one of the issues with navigating the Canal du Midi, either by boat or by bike or hiking, was the lack of amenities available directly nearby, and we have found this to be true. But we stock up on water, meats and cheeses, nuts and fruits, and stop to refresh when we feel a need.

We reached Homps about 3 pm and found accommodation shortly thereafter in a wonderful old house on the quai, Domaine val Auclair. This BnB features a cute little dog, a King Charles, very friendly and affectionate, named ‘Jazz’!

Homps is one of the places where a small port has been constructed for the canal boats that can be rented here. There were foreign-registered automobiles and a dozen or more recreational vehicles parked up around the lakeside. We had a very pleasant dinner at Le Foudre, entrecote for me and octopus for Joan.

Tuesday, 16 June – Bloomsday; Cycling the Canal du Midi (day 5): Homps to Capestang. Breezier this morning. After a filling breakfast and chat with the elderly Scottish couple who were also staying at the BnB, and a final kiss of affection from Jazz the King Charles, we set off on our journey to Capestang. The distance by road between these two small towns is 28km; the distance by canal is 42 km. The pathway was, as usual, varied between tarmac (very little), two-track hard-packed ground with loose large stones and knobbly roots protruding from the ground at inopportune places (mostly), and a narrow single lane track that had wild grass growing up to our elbows, with the odd waving branch of blackberry thorn hanging over the path (some). We noticed more stumps of plane trees that had been chopped down. There were a few places where rows of new trees had been planted. We would come across a section where the plane trees remained, and invariably the first two or three trees would be either dead or dying. This part of the Canal du Midi is very flat and has few locks; in fact it is part of a stretch of 43 km without any locks at all. We always cycle on the pathway running alongside the canal, even when there is also a road running parallel, except in a couple places today where the path was very narrow and dangerously close to the water’s edge. We didn’t make any detours, and our only coffee stop was in Le Somail which boasts a Chapeau museum, an antiques shop and an antiquarian bookseller with a stock of over 50,000 (French) books. Between Le Somail and Capestang the canal splits into two branches, with the Canal du Midi veering slightly northwards to Bezier and its sister Canal de la Robine southwards to Narbonne. We stayed true to the Canal du Midi and cycled into the town of Capestang around 4pm. A prosperous medieval town, it gained much of its wealth from salt harvested from its lake (which is now drained). We found another BnB in a lovely old house just at its edge, and walked back into the centre for a typical French meal: goats’ cheese salad (Joan) and charcuterie plate (me) starters, steak (for Joan), duck (for me) and French Fries, finished with Dame Blanche; hearty food well earned by a hard days’ cycling. We are very pleased with our progress of averaging about 40km per day (about 4 hours cycling with about 90 minutes worth of rest during it). We are very tired and a little bit sore of bum! In fact, our bottoms are so sore it is painful to fart!

Wednesday, 17 June – Cycling the Canal du Midi (day 6): Capestang to Beziers. Breakfast at the BnB commenced at 9am, and therefore we had a more leisurely morning than previously. Fortunately, our planned cycling distance for today is only 25km, to the town of Beziers. On the way out of town we visited a small supermarket cum petrol station to stock up with water and provisions. While I was outside with the bicycles, a Hungarian motorcycle gang roared into the courtyard and pushed near to the petrol pumps, bypassing a patiently waiting French man in a white van. A heated discussion ensued between the French man and one of the Hungarian bikers. Eventually, after a bit of shouting and gesturing, the Hungarian backed up his motorcycle and the French man filled his van with petrol and drove away. We cycled back through the small town to the canal and continued cycling toward the sea.

The cycle path was mostly hard-packed clay, with the usual rough spots, some rocks and roots to avoid. At some of the rounded vehicular bridges the pathway curves beneath; on others the route ascends a slope to the bridge on one side and then descends back to the canal on the other. Many of the plane trees on this part of the canal had been chopped down and the cycling is more exposed to the sun, and the wind! We stopped often for water. We cycled into another small village on the canal, Colombiers, which has also created a small port for hiring canal boats. The port had a few shops and a restaurant. We purchased more water and then cycled on.

We lucked upon an area with two picnic tables at which to have our lunch of sliced meat, cheese, half a tomato and a handful of walnuts. While we were sitting there a group of three of the rental cruise boats travelling together tied up alongside the bank. There was great mirth in their efforts to dock and tie up the boats. Finally secured, the women gathered on the deck of the first boat, the men on the deck of the second. Wine bottles were uncorked by the women, and the pastis bottle by the men. And their party began! We watched for awhile and then continued on.

Approaching Beziers is a series of locks that allows the canal to drop 22m, a sort of water staircase for barges. They are called the Fonserannes locks. The area is a gathering point for day-trippers from Beziers, and there is a ‘little train’ that shuttles visitors between the locks and the city.

We continued into Beziers. Beziers is a town we have visited before. Our previous visit was to attend a live jazz gig by Vijay Iyer’s trio, but that was on a Sunday when the town is effectively closed down. And on the visit before that one it was raining so hard that we didn’t have the opportunity to conduct a proper visit. We have decided to have a ‘bike-less’ day and properly explore Bezier on Thursday. We found our accommodation, an ‘apart-hotel’ less than a km from the town centre, checked in and stuffed the bikes into the elevator. The small but well-appointed apartment comes with a tiny gallery kitchen, a round table with two chairs, a long narrow desk with LAN connection, fold out sofa bed with a firm mattress (and a tiny dishwasher that is in the cupboard underneath the sink!). We fitted the bikes into the room and settled in. As the unit has a kitchen, Joan decided she wanted to cook, so we visited a nearby supermarket where she found some wonderful local sausages which she served with an avocado, cucumber, red pepper, onion and tomato salad.

Thursday, 18 June – Beziers. Clear blue sky. Today was a cycle-free day! Bezier, according to some archaeologists, is the oldest city in France. The Iberian-Celts inhabited the area during the 8^th Century B.C. until they were kicked out by the Greeks in the 6^th Century B.C., who built a small city. Bezier is the birthplace of Pierre Paul Riquet, (the designer of the Canal du Midi, for those who skipped over the earlier history mini-lesson), and it beautiful tree-lined and pedestrianised main thoroughfare is named after him. At the top end of this space is a wonderful municipal theatre building, built in 1844.

In 1209, the Crusaders massacred 20,000 of Beziers’s inhabitants, when the townspeople refused to hand-over 210 named Cathars. Beziers has one other claim to fame, as the birthplace of Jean Moulin, one of the heroes of the French Resistance during WWII, who reorganized, reinvigorated led his comrades until he was caught, arrested, tortured and executed in June 1943.

Today, Bezier is a town suffering from the current economic downturn. It main shopping streets have more closed store-fronts than shops trading, and many of those trading seem to be just hanging on. The central fruit and vegetable market also has only half its space actively trading. It was lacking a horde of the little old ladies with their trollies that feature in most French markets and keep them thriving. While, the grandeur of the main square and the theatre building and the churches are all quite beautiful, stunning even, and there are a few cafes and restaurants that seemed busy enough, the over-riding sense we feel is of a town in a slow and inexorable economic decline. It doesn’t help that there is a relatively new and shiny partially open-air shopping centre at the foot of this hill near the train station that is filled with designer stores, boutiques, an H&M, a roof terrace with ten restaurants, an eight-screen cinema and a twenty-lane bowling alley! It’s as though the whole town is slipping down the hill toward the river.

Having said all that, the three restaurants that most interested Joan were in the old city centre. Two of them were completely reserved, the third was dinner only, and the restaurant she eventually chose, Au Soleil, served us an excellent lunch! Joan had a warm salad of foie gras on slices of ginger bread and smoked duck, and I had another duck breast (great for my gout!). The restaurant was located on the square in the shadow of one of the majestic churches and we happily spent a couple hours there.

After lunch we walked down the hill through a lovely manicured park to the Polygone shopping centre and browsed. We purchased only coffees before walking back up the hill to our apartment. Joan cooked dinner, beefy burgers and a tomato, fennel and red onion salad with lemon and olive oil.

Tomorrow (Friday) we cycle to Agde, where the Canal du Midi empties into the Herault River and then into the Mediterranean Sea, and we will have completed this portion of our cycle journey. The next day we will turn right and start cycling back along the coast to Collioure!

Friday, 19 June - Cycling the Canal du Midi (day 7) – Beziers to Agde. We set out early this morning and re-entered the tarmac pathway alongside the Canal du Midi at 2 minutes before 8am ... and four minutes later the rear tire on Joan’s bicycle flattened with a puncture. We had ridden around 200 km, sometimes on very rough terrain, but it was on flat and smooth tarmac that the tire gave up. We spent about 40 minutes changing the tube, first having to unload Joan’s bicycle of its panniers and backpack, and then unload one of Greg’s panniers in search of the spare tubes and repair kit. This was our first tube change and we achieved it with a minimum of tension! And we re-packed, remounted the bikes, and cycled east.

The path beside the canal was tarmac for most of the journey this morning, and it seemed very easy compared to the tracks and single lane paths we had experienced.

We stopped crossed the canal bridge at Vias and stopped for coffee and pain au chocolate. Along the canal, just before the turnoff, we passed a permanent fun fair with rollercoaster rides and games to play; it was opening this evening for the season. At the bridge there were two signs, one pointing to Vias centre and one pointing in the opposite direction to Vias Plage. We were less than 2km from the Mediterranean! But we weren’t tempted to turn toward the sea until we had completed our Canal du Midi journey and we rode into the town. Vias is a small, fortifited village built in the 12^th century. The town square featured three small cafes, a patisserie, a restaurant, a covered fruit and vegetable market and an Irish bar! We stopped for about an hour over our coffee and watched the holiday visitors from the beach side, mostly Dutch and German from their accents, white skinned reddened.

We restocked our water supply and returned to the canal and continued cycling east. Agde is an old Greek town which sits beneath an extinct volcano that provided the black stone from which many of the older buildings were constructed and which is used extensively by local jewellery makers. Agde is a drab town. On one of the blogs Joan read while looking for accommodation and restaurants, the writer, an ex-pat Brit who had a house in the town, described it as ‘charming but scruffy’. We found it only scruffy, its charms, however, remained hidden from us. Joan, however, found us a pleasant and friendly and quiet BnB in the middle of a housing estate within walking distance of the town centre and the river front restaurants. She also found us a pizza restaurant at which to celebrate the completion of our Canal du Midi journey with a glass of Kir and a pizza. Called Don Camillo, the pizza had wonderful cheeses (I had a four cheese pizza with chorizo and Joan’s was a local cheese with which she was unfamiliar, bacon pieces and carmelized onions) but strange base that was like a version of pita bread.

It is in Agde that the waters of the Canal du Midi terminate as it enters the Herault River. It is a rather anti-climatic ending, but we were thrilled to have reached it! (There is a short offshoot of the canal that is more a branch of the river that continues about few km to the southern end of the Thau lagoon; and there is another canal at the northern end of the lagoon to Sete, but that is known as the Canal du Sete.) We turned at the bridge in Agde and followed the river to the sea! It was a very satisfying and slightly emotional sensation. In the far distance to the south, hazy, we could just make out the faint outline of the Pyrenees mountains: our next destination!

Saturday, 20 June – Cycling back to Collioure (day 1). Agde to Narbonne Plage. As we were planning a 50+ kilometre cycle day, we packed up and departed the BnB at 8am. Because of the Herault River and the salt marshes and lagoons south of Agde, we had to backtrack along the canal before turning south toward Collioure. We didn’t, however, backtrack far enough and at the Portiragnes lock we unintentionally cycled along a very stony roadway through the Camargue-like salt marshes to the Mediterranean where we were discovered a former river delta through or over which there was no passage. There was a small beach resort there, and I had to replace a second tire tube that had punctured on the rough road, on my bicycle this time. We cycled back to Portiragnes on the tarmac road and stopped there briefly for coffee at Chez Jeff (very poor) and a pain au chocolat from the patisserie across the road (very good) and to study the map. (Our map lacks significant road detail of this area, and the GPS on the phone works on occasionally as there is intermittent coverage in the wilderness spaces.) We decided to follow the Canal du Midi back to Villeneuve-les-Beziers where we were able to regain access to our planned routing to Serignan. As we were now about two hours behind schedule, and had already covered nearly an extra 20 km, we did not stop in Serignan except for a moment in the main square to note that it was a cute shady place, and continued cycling toward the coast at Valras-Plage.

Valras-Plage is a former fishing village, located at the mouth of the river Orb that has become a modern seaside resort and reminded us of similar village near Collioure, such as Argeles-Sur-Mer with its long sandy beach and beach side amenities and shops and eateries. We continued along the sea coast, having to turn inland again at Les Cabanes des Fleury to go around the Guirlande salt marsh and then back to the coast at St. Pierre Sur Mer. We had our meat and cheese and walnut and banana lunch sitting on a bench overlooking the wide expanse of beach. Today’s cycling was mostly on the flat, with the high and hot sun beating down, cloudless, into a slight wind, but on tarmac. We stopped around 3:30 at Narbonne-Plage, happily exhausted. After some difficulty, we found a hotel but couldn’t get access until 5pm. We purchased two large jugs of water and sat outside the hotel and nodded off as we waited. Initially, our plan was to continue on the next village, Gruissan, another 10 km cycle, but with the detour at the beginning of the day we decided we had travelled far enough for one hot day. Narbonne Plage also has a beautiful long sandy beach and a few typical resort restaurants serving fish-n-fries. We finished up our leftover provisions and supplemented them later with an ice cream. There was no wifi in the hotel so no facebook posting (sorry!).

Sunday, 21 June – Cycling back to Collioure (day 2). Narbonne Plage to Port la Nouvelle. Today was a wonderful day of cycling. Our first stop this morning was Gruissan, which is a very cute little town that sits on a small rise of land between two lagoons. (It wasn’t really, however, our first stop, as I got a second puncture just before we reached the town and had to change the tube. That’s three punctures in three days. I can now change the tube in about 20 minutes! I hope to have no more opportunity to improve on this time!) Once we finally arrived in Gruissan we regretted not having stretched to get here the previous day. It is a marina town, with many upmarket stores and restaurants and most importantly a bicycle store that was open on Sunday mornings and stocked replacement tire tubes for the bicycles.

Gruissan is situated slightly away from the Mediterranean coast, between the hills of the Clape and the two lakes frequented by the pink flamingos (although we did not see any). Gruissan was originally a fishing village on a small island surrounded by marshland. The narrow streets of Gruissan village are built around the 13th century castle tower and form a circular pattern (called a Circulade). In recent years it has expanded considerably with the development of holiday homes close at Gruissan Plage, a modern yachting marina and holiday apartments built along the palm-lined quays. Most famously, however, Gruissan is the setting for the French film, Betty Blue, a film about two passionate lovers living in a beach hut. That alone is reason enough to spend some time here.

Joan was keen to continue, so we cycled on. We followed the road around the northern lagoon through the Marais du Narbonnais, a conservation area of some 618 hectares, to the Canal du Robine. The Canal du Robine was and is an important part of the canal system, as it connects the Aude River and the Canal du Midi with the Mediterranean Sea at Port la Nouvelle. The Canal du Robine was only connected to the Canal du Midi in 1686, by a short canal called Jonction. Previous to that goods were transported between the two canals by donkey cart.

The lower part of the Canal du Robine, where we turned onto it, is strikingly different from the Canal du Midi in that it is exposed, there are few shade trees bordering it, and it runs between two large lagoons, Etang de Bages and de Sigean and Etang de l’Ayrolle, on a narrow strip of land shared with a railway line (no vehicular transport allowed, except for maintenance access). This 13 kilometre ride was very hot: blazing mid-day sunshine, 30+ Celcius, no breeze. At one point we approached a lock and I shouted to Joan to stop for a rest and water break. She bypassed the shade of two large trees and stopped by a fence, still in the sun’s rays. (Joan’s absorbs sunshine as if she is solar-powered: the sunnier and hotter it is the more energy she has!) It was a marvellous ride between the canals. Here the roadway is slightly raised so the view of water in all directions, a passing train on a parallel track, and far in the distance the gentle outline of the Pyrenees (our final destination).

We arrived at Port la Nouvelle at 1am. Just over the bridge Joan spotted the Hotel/Restaurant Le Port, its outdoor dining tables filled with Sunday-lunching locals. We stopped and about ten minutes later we were checked in, showered and ordering lunch! We were the last seated. The restaurant was full, inside and out, with families celebrating Father’s day. After a long wait, we were served: fish soup and cuttlefish for Joan, scallops with leek for me: both excellent.

Port la Nouvelle is the second largest French Mediterranean port for hydrocarbons (unleaded petrol, gas-oil and bio-fuels, which are then distributed throughout the south of France. Between 650,000 and 800,000 metric tons of cereals are exported through the port annually, particularly wheat, maize and barely, and delivered around the Mediterranean Rim: Italy, Greece, Cyprus, Spain, North Africa and Egypt. About 300,000 metric tons of dry goods are also handled each year. It is a busy port, but not at all sleazy or seedy as port towns tend to be.

After a yoga session (ie, for those who are not aware, in the Mediterranean part of the world a mid-afternoon nap is called a Mediterranean yoga session!) we walked to the waterfront where a local music festival was being held. The long beach front road was closed to traffic and half a dozen stages featured local bands. There was even a brass marching band going back and forth along the road playing Beatles’ covers, and a line-dancing group. It seemed as if everyone from the town was promenading here. We sat and had a pizza and a drink and watched the locals meeting up and kissing cheek-to-cheek and stopping for a chat. It was wonderfully atmospheric.

Monday, 22 June – Cycling back to Collioure (day 3). Port la Nouvelle to Port Bacares. Today was another wonderful day of cycling in the sunshine. In the morning we cycled out of Port la Nouvelle along its long and wide expanse of a beach side promenade. We had to cycle along the shoulder of the D709, a relatively minor road with infrequent traffic and one of the few times we have had to travel on a road, that the skirted along the edge of another salt marsh and then part of another lagoon. The D709 merged with the D6009, a much more heavily trafficked route connecting Narbonne and Perpignan and a road we had driven along on numerous occasions. We only had to cycle along this route for a few kilometres before turning back toward the sea, but this road consisted of a long upwardly sloping hill of over 2km and was our first real experience of a significant rising road with the weight of the panniers. I am delighted to report that neither of us dismounted. Our fitness levels are improving with the 4 to 5 hours of cycling we have been completing each day. We just shifted to a low gear (2:1) and churned away until reaching the summit. The descent into Leucate was a much shorter and quicker journey.

Leucate is a very cute little village and it was here we stopped for our usual elevenses of coffee and pain au chocolate. Leucate village is about 5 km from the seaside and thus less affected by the visiting tourist hordes, and it retains it quaint charms and local colour. Also, from Leucate there is a wonderful cycle path to Leucate Plage and then along the coast to Port Leucate. Some of the path between Port Leucate and Bacares goes through a pine forest. It was in the pine forest we stopped for our usual picnic lunch; today’s was a chicken thigh, coleslaw and a tomato that we had purchased at the Carrefour in Leucate. We were certain that we would find at least one picnic table along the route but we eventually came across a ring of large boulders and stopped there. When we left, about 200 metres further on, was the one picnic table!

We were planning on staying the night in Bacares. Bacares is stretched alongside the sea. We could not, however, locate any hotels. The accommodation consisted entirely of apartment complexes. We located the tourist office in a permanently docked ship, Le Lydia, but it was closed for renovations and was scheduled to reopen next weekend. It was at this point that my rear tire went flat: this was three punctures in three days. I stopped to pump it up and was able to ride about couple km before I had to stop again. I found a shady place to replace the tube. When I had the bicycle tipped over and was removing the tube, a young man in boy racer car skidded to a halt beside us and gestured did we have a pump? We confirmed that we had and he reached into the boot (trunk) of his car. We thought he was offering us an air pump and showed him our own, but he pulled out a collapsible bicycle from his car, folded it together. He too had a flat tire! We offered him the use of our pump but before he accepted it he reached out to shake both of our hands. He had most likely been driving around looking for a bicycle shop and couldn’t imagine his luck in spotting us in a similar predicament. While he pumped up his own tube I removed the punctured tube from Grand Cru. I was having bit of trouble squeezing the tube around the gear sprocket and the young man finished pumping up his tire and insisted on changing my tire as well. He didn’t bother with the tools to fit the tire back around the rim; he just used the strength in his hands. While I pumped up the new tube he cycled around the area on his bicycle to check the tube and air pressure. Joan asked him about local hotels or the location of the tourist office and he pointed in a southerly direction. He shook our hands again and folded his bike back into his car and sped away. As we were re-attaching the panniers and backpack onto my bicycle he came back to tell us that he was mistaken in the location of the tourist office and that it was back the way we had come. He thanked us again for the use of our air pump and sped away again.

We consulted our map and decided to continue south along the coast and hope to stumble upon something, and about 5 km further on, in Port Bacares, we found an old-style hotel run by an elderly matron with a vacant room on the second floor with a seaview. We locked the bicycles to a tree in their garden and were settled for the afternoon Mediterranean yoga session. The hotel stairway featured photos of the 1950s French rugby team. There was a fork being used to hold open a hallway door. This was a hotel stuck in time.

Nearby was a bicycle shop where I went to purchase another emergency tube. I told the shop owner about having three punctures in three days and he advised me to check the inside of the tire for something sharp. Joan and I had done that after each of the punctures and found nothing, and I told him that. The man smiled and pointed to his stock of replacement tubes and said he had 5 more if I needed them!

In the evening we walked to the main square around the edge of which we found a dozen restaurants. Joan inspected the menus, all of which were variations on the fish-and-chips theme. We chose one called Le Pyreneen and were pleasantly surprised at the quality and sophistication of the food presented: a starter of foie gras with ginger bread, fig and apple slices for Joan and deep-fried calamari for me; main courses of dorade in a mustard sauce for Joan and flambéed gambas for me. Both dishes had a savory rice and ratatouille. The menu included a quarter litre of wine or a beer or a sangria, as well as desserts (an excellent tiramisu in which the alcohol, that is essential but usually missing, could actually be tasted, and two scoops of ice cream). Joan’s menu included a coffee. Our bill came to 37 Euro and 50 cent. Amazingly good value for unexpectedly good food.

Tuesday, 23 June – Cycling back to Collioure (day 4). Port Bacares to Saint Cyprien. This morning was cooler with dark clouds in the south, but the sky cleared as we cycled toward the mountains. It was an easy cycle today, about 25 km, zig-zagging mostly on tarmac dedicated bicycle paths from the coast inland to crossing points over rivers and then back toward the coast. The ride was flat and we reached Canet du Rossillon by 11:30am. It felt like we had arrived, as we had cycled to this destination on one of our training rides from Collioure. I no sooner said that to Joan then I got another puncture – the fourth in four days! Instead of just changing the tube, we decided it was time to change the tire as well. Joan cycled ahead in search of a bicycle shop while I wheeled Grand Cru along the beachfront promenade. We found a cycle store at 11:45 and the owner immediately informed us that he closed at noontime! But he found a few minutes to change the tire before closing for his two hour lunchtime siesta. Afterwards, as we were eating our picnic lunch on a bench overlooking the beach, on three separate occasions French pedestrians passing by wished us ‘bon appetite’! We cycled on the narrow stretch of land between the sea and the lagoon from Canet to Saint Cyprien. When we had cycled it previously there was a steady and strong head wind, but this time the breeze was behind us and the cycling was easy. We wandered around the Saint Cyprien plage area, and had a meat and chips dinner, and returned to the hotel to write and browse. We feel that we have arrived. Tomorrow we will stop in Argeles-Sur-Mer to meet friends for coffee and visit the market there and then cycle home to Collioure, our journey complete!

Wednesday, 24 June – Cycling back to Collioure (day 5). Saint Cyprien to Collioure. The morning was sunny and already very warm as we left Saint Cyprien on the last part of our cycle back to Collioure. We had cycled this route before during our training. We stopped in Argeles-Sur-Mer for coffee at La Noisette and to meet up with Alan and Tracey. As we had guests in the house we had to wait until they had departed before going there. We arrived about 2 pm: triumphant in our achievement!

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