Mark arrived last night from Greece. Looking nicely tanned. Good to see him again. With everybody still sleeping after a late night, we went for a run. Ran up to St M d Campan and then back. My foot seem to be OK. But for safety sake have all but given up the idea of trying to run off my toes.
Got quite a late start and headed down through Bagnere over a really nice little route down to the outskirts of Lourdes. The Canadians mean business. They hade a pace line going and were really hammering along the valley floor.
Hautecam would turn out to be the toughest climb of the week. I suffered like a dog. For starters it was as hot as hell and maybe I started to fast. But needless to say with about 2k to go I ran out of puff and had to stop for a break. Fortunately even a 10 second break makes a HUGE difference. Also as so often is the case I stopped probably 100m from where the climb seemed to flatten out a bit. (only 8%)
Hautecam has 2 summits. One where they finish the tour stages - which is just a big parking lot. WITH NO WATER. This forced us up another 2k to where the ski lift is that at least has a kiosk. With cokes a mere R30 for 200ml. Bought 2. Nearly forgot Nicky's camera on the counter. Would not have been thrilled to ride up again to fetch it.
Rode back down to St Saeveur for lunch - which turned into another bit a hammer session. And it also started to rain. Yuck.
St Seaveur is really a beautiful village. Heard that it has won the prize for one of France's most beautiful villages. Easy to see why. Think if I had to plan this trip again, I would consider this as a base.
We bought a few things from the supermarche and watched the Canadians buy a Lot of things. I'll be honest I was not in the mood to get going again. And if knew what was waiting for me I would not have moved.
The climb up the Tourmalet was probably one of the hardest things I've done on a bike. I nealry died. The 1h30 it took to get up felt like 13 hr. There were many places that I stopped enjoying myself. Getting to the top was more with a sense of relief than achievement. The guys were spread all over the mountain with some losing more than 1hr30 over 22k's!!!!!! They had lots of photo's though.
That night went into Bagneres for supper. Had a good laugh at the Canadians. Not a quiet bunch. Learn't what a "Dirty Sanchez" and a "Donkey Punch" were. DEFINATELY CENSORED READING. Eventually leaving just befor 1 am. Only to see a another group of about 10 people arriving for supper.
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