Vive la liberation!

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Geo: 44.5264, 6.40133

So, we wake up amidst an apricot orchard. There are worse ways to start your day! I walked over to find someone to pay, and ended up in their little shop, so I picked up a couple of apricots, and a jar of apricot jam along with my €4 for the night. We headed east toward the town of Crest, where the feed zone was for that day.

We found a spot to park, and started setting out the flag. I thought I'd grabbed the Colorado and the Canada flags, but apparently, the Holland flag – when folded just so – looks like the Colorado flag. So we were putting out the maple leaf, when we were in a position to do so.

A car pulled up and parked next to us, and between the language we heard, and the "NL" on their plates, we deduced that they were Dutch. Naturally, Dejo struck up a conversation (as his parents emigrated from Holland in the 50's, so Dutch was spoken as much in his home as English was). This family (parents and 2 young boys) were on holiday in the area, and thought they'd catch a little bit of the Tour as it went by. The younger of the boys was afraid of “poppets” – people in costumes – and we were able to assure him that there weren't any such things on the caravan. We had talked up the caravan, telling them of the bounty they would receive.

We had decided today to aim for the first collection zone, to see if our chances of getting a water bottle might be better there. Dejo decided to make a stand near one to the Tour arrow signs, in hopes of getting one. “Arrow signs?” I hear you say…..

So, the logistics of this Tour thing are eNORmous. You've got the cyclists and their immediate crew (directors, soigneurs, drivers), and you've got the caravan personnel, but you've also got press, people to set up the feed zone signs, people to put up and collect trash bags, people to put up and take down the VIP village, and a whole host of others I probably don't know about. Lotta people. And the Tour tends to go through small towns, not on the major highways. So they put up signs to point the way for the Tour. There are specific signs that are color-coded, to direct the technical trucks one way, the caravan another way, etc. But they put up these skinny, fluorescent yellow arrow signs, pointing the way of the Tour itself, through the windy roads of these small towns. And these arrows are a bit of a trophy, especially with the camping-car crowd. And we wanted one.

We had tried to spot an available one at a few other spots (after the race had gone by – it seemed unsporting to take them before the folks for whom they were intended had gone past), but hadn't been successful. But as we were driving to our spot for the day, we noted that there were 3 of them within a fairly short span. So Dejo went back to that area, and found that at least 2 were still there, so he planted himself by one, in hopes of being the first to try to liberate it. I headed a little further into the collection zone. The race went by fairly quickly (they were FLYing that day—averaging 10 kph faster than the fastest calculated times on the time sheet), and I found that the 1st collection zone was more of a “Go ahead and dump all your wrappers from earlier in the race here” than a “chuck your water bottles before you get new ones” zone.

I waited there for him, once the race had passed, and when I spied him coming up the hill, there was a sign sticking out of his backpack – hooray!! He asked if maybe we wanted a second one – there was still one left down there. Well……at the risk of being greedy…….Yes. So we headed to the sign, and found that maybe there was a reason that it hadn't yet been freed. When they post them, they apparently use wire, wrap it around the post, twist and cut. And in the process of cutting the wires on this one, it had pinched them together, so undoing it wasn't as simple as just untwisting it. But after a few minutes – and with the help of my Swiss Army knife – we got it undone, and were on our way with 2 trophies.

We watched a bit of the race on our iPad, then had a bit of a nap (yes, in fact, this is a running theme – it makes you dozy, sitting in a warm car!), before watching the end (a climb up Mont Ventoux – killer hill!). Then we were on our way to the next destination.

We drove towards Gap, into the French Alps. It was just a gorgeous drive, and we happened across our first bad weather of the trip – a 10-minute rainshower that actually served the purpose of cleaning off our windshield. Coming down from the hill into Gap, the view across the valley was amazing. I commented that if we found a parking spot to admire the view, that would be nice. Dejo saw a spot and turned in, but it was more of a driveway. We realized too late that we didn't turn it wide enough, and heard the sickening “crunch” of the van's underbelly making contact with the sloping cement wall marking the turn into the driveway. I hopped out, guided him off the wall, and we decided that maybe we'd look at the view from elsewhere. All in all, the damage could certainly be worse. But it's a pretty decent gash, anyway. We'll see how much of a dent in the deposit that causes.

We headed for an aire in Savines Le Lac – a pretty lakeside town, and a spot that offered electricity, if not much view. We pulled into one of 2 remaining spots in this popular aire, and puzzled out the payment info. A quick dinner of warmed-up rotisserie chicken & Spanish rice, then walked into town to see what we could see. We were figuring there'd be fireworks that night, since it was Bastille Day, but the town is apparently saving them for the day the Tour de France comes through town on the 17th. But wait – does that sign up there really advertise a rodeo? Here? Tonight?!? Let's go see if we can find it! And we did find the little dirt arena where it had been, but we were too late. Pity – that would have been priceless.

Oh, well. A little more blogging (though no uploading, as the cell signal here is super-weak), and it was off to bed.

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Photos

Ours is the black campervan
Which makes it unusual