Keep your wife in the gutter

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All the stories you've heard about crazy French drivers, high mountain roads with no crash barriers and lanes so narrow you have to breathe in when you pass another car are true. But more about that later ...

The main purpose of our trip to the French Pyrenees was to watch a stage of the incredible Tour de France. We left London early on a Friday morning for the long (and rather boring) trip to Stansted airport for our cut-price airline flight, which despite rumours was not bad at all. We arrived in the early afternoon in Pau, a city at the foot of the Pyrenees mountains where on a clear day you get a magnificent view of the surrounding scenery. It was overcast and cloudy and we saw nothing.

Despite our beginners French classes our first attempt at conversing with the locals was a comedy of errors, as we tried to speak in our terrible French and the guy at the car hire counter tried to reply in his awful English. We managed though and took off in our tiny 2-door towards the centre of Pau, with Andrew behind the wheel. Taking my job as navigator quite seriously I imparted the advice that I think I received from someone in our French class to 'keep your wife in the gutter', which makes sense when you are driving on the wrong side of the road, and the wrong side of the car. As if this wasn't enough to contend with there were about five roundabouts between us and Pau and trying to change gears with your right hand takes some getting used to (or so I'm told). After a detour around the backstreets of Pau and the running of a few red lights (the stoplights were tiny little five foot poles set well back from the intersections) we arrived safely and headed to a great little bakery to indulge in a lovely baguette (no-one makes them like the French!) followed by a pain au chocolat for me and a pain au raison for Andrew. We once again stumbled along with our French but found everyone to be friendly and accomadating, mostly greeting us with big smiles. We stocked up with supplies and headed back out on the road to our overnight stop in Gavarnie. We drove through picturesque little towns where the buildings reach right to the curbless roadside and tiny little one way roads snake their way in between. Our first sight of the mountains was much more beautiful than I expected and the vistas just got more and more spectacular. We drove through the town of St Pe de Bigorre and then on through Lourdes, a very popular site for religious pilgrims where apparently an image of the virgin Mary has been seen.

The weather was sunny and warm so we stopped for a cold drink at a beautiful little bridge over-looking a river with a small township called Luz St Sauveur built into the sides of the ravine through which it ran. As much as anything I think our nerves also needed a rest - the further into the mountains we got the more and more anxious moments we experienced as the roads grew narrower and more windy and the drivers coming the other way seemingly more reckless.

We arrived at the beautiful little town of Gavarnie just before dusk and glimpsed our first view of the Cirque de Gavarnie, a spectacular 3000 metre wall of sheer rock, covered partly in snow and separating France from Spain. The town was all cobble stoned roads and mountain chalet hotels but did have its share of tourist tack. Rather exhausted by now we drove the ten minutes back to the local campsite only to find that there was no shop there so we had to head back into town to get fuel for our stove ...... this could have been a very costly mistake! Driving out of the campground we must have relaxed and had a momentary lapse in concentration. We came around a corner and saw a car coming the other way straight towards us. Andrew put his hand on the horn but to no avail, realising at the last minute that in fact we were driving on the wrong side of the road. He swerved and we made a lucky escape. Very lucky indeed! Our nerves were completely frayed by now so we stocked up on some French beer and chips and headed back to relax by our tent and count our lucky stars. We had bought fuel for our brand new camp stove with the help of our guide book and limited French but somehow things got mixed up in the translation and we ended up with the wrong fuel, and spent a frustrating half and hour trying to boil enough water to make dinner. Luckily we had a tranquil view and the clear mountain air to counter our challenging day!

We woke the next morning to a glorious sunny day with bright blue skies and headed off on a trek towards the Cirque de Gavarnie. After parking in the village carpark (we decided to drive on the correct side of the road this time) we headed up a walking trail that went slowly but steadily upwards. By mid morning the weather was scorching and we were very glad to find icy cold water in the mountain streams. Unlike Australia you can walk in the middle of summer in France and be surrounded by gorgeous rolling green hills covered in wild Irises and various other flowers of yellow, pink and other assorted colours. It was one of the prettiest walks I can remember going on anywhere in the world. As we got closer to the gigantic wall of rock the crowds increased and we got a great up-close view of the many snow covered crevasses and numerous waterfalls. Walking in France is very civilised and at the end of the main trail there was a restaurant with fantastic outdoor seating complete with incredible views, icecream shop, souvenirs and cold drinks. Perfect! We walked back along the main path that went straight down the middle of the valley and was full of people walking and horses carrying those people too lazy to walk to the vista themselves. We stopped on the way back by a shaded bubbling brook with crystal clear mountain water and ate fresh baguettes with local ham and cheese.

Our afternoon drive to Saint Lary Soulan, where we would base ourselves to watch Le tour, was spectacular. It took us back to the town of Luz St Sauveur where we stocked up with more supplies before heading over the Col de Tourmelet, one of the major mountain passes which is often included in Le Tour. It was an absolutely terrifying experience! I was at first concerned that our tiny little car would not make it up the mountainside but it managed with ease. The real problem turned out to be the endless switchbacks, lack of crash barriers, sheer drops, narrow roads and crazy French drivers in campervans coming in the other direction with their vehicles protruding onto our side of the road. Ahhhh! After one particularly hairy corner where we came face to face with a campervan I was so petrified I was ready to get out of the car and walk the rest of the way. However a few minutes later we thankfully made it to the top and stopped to admire the view and look at the statue of a bike rider which was dedicated to the cyclists of The Tour. The rest of the drive was more sedate (though only marginally) as we drove through little villages, winter time ski chalets and past hundreds of cyclists riding the same roads their heroes do. We stopped at a look-out with beautiful views into the lush green valley where we were headed and spotted a stunning slate grey medieval town set in the midst of it all.

We had not been able to book accommodation and were expecting to be camping rough in the fields with thousands of other people already assembling there, but we were lucky enough to get a spot in the campgrouund - although the facilities were only marginally better than au natural! We were surrounded by Spanish accents and orange t-shirts as St Lary is right in the middle of Basque country.

We awoke the next day to another hot sunny day, packed our bags, went to the bakery to buy a baguette and headed up the Pla d'Atet to reserve ourselves a vantage point to watcht the cyclists whizz past. The town was absolutley alive with thousands of people and the associated vehicles and locals selling food, drinks and souveniers. We walked uphill for nearly three hours and the whole time there were cyclists riding up past us. The hillside was lined with people and every spare patch of grass was occupied by campervans, their occupants having barbeques or relaxing in deck chairs. By one o'clock we had chosen our vantage point and all that was lef to do was wait....and wait...... and wait. Luckily the people watching was interesting! At about 4.30pm the Tour caravan appeared - a long line of sponsors floats complete with tacky music and pretty young dancers. In the scramble for goodies that are thrown from the cars one of the only things we were lucky enough to grab was the chance to win a trip to where else but South Australia! We haven't gotten around to entering that competition just yet.

When the cyclists finally arrived it was a group of three, then two strugglers, followed by Lance Armstrong and Ivan Basso. It was a blink and you miss it moment (but Andrew also tells me that it is a moment that will remain forever frozen in his mind, seeing the greatest Tour de France cyclist that has ever lived at his peak doing what he does best - amazing and unforgettable). The crowds cheered, blew whistles, waved flags and some even chased the cyclists up the hill sprinting after them for the short time that they could keep up. The cyclists kept coming, spread well out for almost an hour, which is a very rare occurance in this race and showed just how tough a day it had been for them. It had been a long day for us too, and we still had to walk all the way back down the mountain. As we plodded along we were surprised to see the cyclists riding back down past us at incredible speeds .... I guess they figured they'd slogged it all the way to the top they might as well enjoy the ride back down. Last thing I would have wanted to do after the day they'd just had was get back on my bike!One of the most fun parts of the day was walking past all the famous cyclits sitting in their team cars as the incredible volume of traffic queued to leave the town.

We went into the town of St Laury, which is a gorgeous traditional ski village, for dinner - a lovely traditional cassoulet and cote d'or ice cream. The town was absolutely full of dirty, hot and exhausted revellers and we had to wait hours for dinner. As we drove back to the caravan park around 11pm we looked up to the mountain we had been on earlier in the day and realised that there were still more cars coming down the mountain road and the traffic jam through the middle of the town was only just clearing.

The whole Tour is an amazing spectacle that has an absolutely incredible, almost cult following. It is something we will not forget and feel very lucky to have experienced.

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Comments

[mum and dad m]

wow
Well that was one great holiday. I think the toure here is great but that is very challenging.

[Danielle Osborne]

Hello
Your travelblogs are amazing and you must be having a wonderful time - thanks again for putting me on the list - take care