| Day # | 37 | State of Legs | :-) |
| Distance (miles) | Distance (km) | Ascent (feet) | Ascent (metres) | Punctures | |
| Today | 39.6 miles | km | 1837 feet | metres | 0 |
| Trip Totals | 1346.2 miles | km | 45975 feet | metres | 0 |
| Today's Route |
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| Route So Far |
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Travelogue
It rained in the early hours of the morning last night and we couldn't help but wonder what the day might have in store for us. But there was nothing to worry about. The weather got better as the day went on and we're now sat comfortably in the bar of our campsite in Liques, in the parc naturel des caps et marais d'opale. M1 is blogging. M2 is eating ice cream. All is well with the world.
The first half of the day's 40 mile ride followed route EV4 north to Boulogne-sur-Mer. We were never far from the coast and sometimes could see the sea. We rarely cycled on the road itself, more usually cycling in a separate, good quality path by the road. It was good but at times a bit noisy, thanks to the traffic passing alongside us.
10 miles or so into the ride, M1 noticed M2's bike making a continuous scraping noise. On inspection it transpired that her cycle rack had somehow popped out from inside one of the cable ties that had been used to lash it in position a couple of days ago, when we'd discovered that one of the machine screws that holds the rack to the frame had been lost. We stopped and removed the panniers from M2's bike. M1 re-seated the rack in the cable ties and tightened them again. They seemed pretty secure. On remounting the panniers though, M1 noticed something about M2's TBWNN that was different to The Mule. TBWNN has more frame mounting points than The Mule and not only were some of these not in use, but these spare mounting points have machine screws in them doing absolutely nothing! Brilliant. Clearly one of the spare screws could be liberated and used as a substitute for the missing screw to hold the rack properly in place. We decided to press on and to take care of this once at the campsite. M1 is delighted to report that this has now been done and M2's bike rack is officially (properly) repaired!
We cycled through Boulogne without stopping other than to take a few photos.
We continued north from Boulogne, hugging the coast.
A few miles later, in the town of Wimereux, we turned east and left EV4 behind for now. We quickly found ourselves in countryside on much quieter roads.
The road was steadily rising most of the time as we headed away from the coast, but was never particular testing. Not until we got close to Liques, that is! Only a few miles from our destination, we hit a fairly tough hill which was about a mile long and had a gradient of about 11%. And might I remind the dear reader that these bikes, laden as they are, are heavy. But.... we made it. And we've done harder. It's just that we've had an easy time of it lately and legs have short memories!
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| At the top of that testing hill! |
The campsite is on the other side of Liques and very nice it is too, which makes a pleasant change because let's face it, campsites are a mixed bag, aren't they?!
Lunch has been eaten and included a couple of delicious salmon quiches and bread with Roquefort cheese and of course, tomatoes, all eaten sat on our picnic blanket by the tent.
The word I think you're looking for is "Yum"! :-)
We have a total of four more days of cycling left on this trip, two of them in France and two in England. Where did all that time and all those miles go?
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