Where's Bertie? After another day of hard work, he's sitting in the Aire at Capbreton, where he's been a few times before. I think it costs €8.50 to stay here at this time of year (inc. Electricity and wifi), but the money collector hasn't been around yet.
Weather: Overcast and cold.
It must have been warmer last night, as the heating didn't kick in until 0545 this morning. Unfortunately, I thought it was firing up because it was 0715 - the start time I'd set last night, so I didn't roll over and go back to sleep. By the time I looked at my watch, wondering why my alarm hadn't gone off, I was wide awake. With Mick still slumbering, I opted to listen to my audiobook, rather than springing into action. When I did get up, it was to a cold room, but I've now set not just the timer, but also adjusted the clock to local time...
On the road just before 9, our first stop was nearly 3.5 hours away, in the village of Reignac. Over breakfast I'd identified another Voie Verte that I could use for today's run (an easy task as they're all on a map on a Voie Verte website), and found a car park we could use to access that Voie Verte (rather more time consuming, involving a lot of StreetViewing).
The stop/run/lunch/go worked as well today as it did yesterday, particularly with the car park being less than 1km away from our route south. The only two slight marring elements were:
1) the lack of a boulangerie nearby, combined with our lack of bread;
2) the realisation, having spotted a rash on my abdomen whilst getting changed for my run, that the appearance of the rash, combined with the odd discomfort I'd been feeling in my back on this morning's drive meant that I most likely have shingles. I went ahead with my run as I feel fine (save for the discomfort on my back, but even that was fine whilst I was running), but I fear this may scupper my marathon, in less than a month's time. Annoying, as I so seldom enter races, and having got 90% of the way through training for this one, I only finally entered it last week.
Today's Voie Verte wasn't the most inspiring location, but it was traffic free and required no navigation.
Next stop after lunch was for fuel, which didn't go entirely well. Thwarted by a height barrier, a wrong turn then sent us the wrong way along the motorway. We got ourselves back right and the next fuelling attempt was successful (189c/litre).
Earlier in the day we'd forked out €20.30 in tolls to use the motorway for 115-ish kilometres past Tours and Poitiers, then later, past Bordeaus we employed our usual leave at J18/rejoin at J17, same again at 12/11 to avoid tolls on the A63. At the end of the day, however, with the light fading, we adjudged it worth another toll to save 15 minutes (€3, as it turned out). Thus we pulled into the Aire here at Capbreton just in the last dregs of daylight, and wasted no time in applying Bertie's insulated face mask and plugging him into the mains (in fact, within a minute of arriving, I had rice cooking before Mick had even got the face mask out of the boot).
Still no decision as to where we're going tomorrow. There just aren't enough hours in the day for all this driving AND for considering such issues. Maybe we'll toss a coin (not having any darts to throw at the map).
Weather: Overcast and cold.
It must have been warmer last night, as the heating didn't kick in until 0545 this morning. Unfortunately, I thought it was firing up because it was 0715 - the start time I'd set last night, so I didn't roll over and go back to sleep. By the time I looked at my watch, wondering why my alarm hadn't gone off, I was wide awake. With Mick still slumbering, I opted to listen to my audiobook, rather than springing into action. When I did get up, it was to a cold room, but I've now set not just the timer, but also adjusted the clock to local time...
On the road just before 9, our first stop was nearly 3.5 hours away, in the village of Reignac. Over breakfast I'd identified another Voie Verte that I could use for today's run (an easy task as they're all on a map on a Voie Verte website), and found a car park we could use to access that Voie Verte (rather more time consuming, involving a lot of StreetViewing).
The stop/run/lunch/go worked as well today as it did yesterday, particularly with the car park being less than 1km away from our route south. The only two slight marring elements were:
1) the lack of a boulangerie nearby, combined with our lack of bread;
2) the realisation, having spotted a rash on my abdomen whilst getting changed for my run, that the appearance of the rash, combined with the odd discomfort I'd been feeling in my back on this morning's drive meant that I most likely have shingles. I went ahead with my run as I feel fine (save for the discomfort on my back, but even that was fine whilst I was running), but I fear this may scupper my marathon, in less than a month's time. Annoying, as I so seldom enter races, and having got 90% of the way through training for this one, I only finally entered it last week.
Next stop after lunch was for fuel, which didn't go entirely well. Thwarted by a height barrier, a wrong turn then sent us the wrong way along the motorway. We got ourselves back right and the next fuelling attempt was successful (189c/litre).
Earlier in the day we'd forked out €20.30 in tolls to use the motorway for 115-ish kilometres past Tours and Poitiers, then later, past Bordeaus we employed our usual leave at J18/rejoin at J17, same again at 12/11 to avoid tolls on the A63. At the end of the day, however, with the light fading, we adjudged it worth another toll to save 15 minutes (€3, as it turned out). Thus we pulled into the Aire here at Capbreton just in the last dregs of daylight, and wasted no time in applying Bertie's insulated face mask and plugging him into the mains (in fact, within a minute of arriving, I had rice cooking before Mick had even got the face mask out of the boot).
Still no decision as to where we're going tomorrow. There just aren't enough hours in the day for all this driving AND for considering such issues. Maybe we'll toss a coin (not having any darts to throw at the map).
You are not far from the start of the GR10 at Hendaye.
ReplyDeleteThat was indeed so. It's always a highlight to drive over the rise to the south of Biarritz and see the distinctive shape of La Rhune (where we had adventures with horses in the first night of our GR10 trip) ahead of us. No photo of it today, as the cloud was obscuring all but the mast atop the summit.
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