Yesterday's transfer day was not worthy of its own post. Suffice to say that we got from point "A" to point "B" without incident.
Today started out as a perfect riding day. It was cooler than we have experienced which was a welcome relief from the oppressively hot days earlier. Jackets and leggings were in order. The prospect for rain was a low probability with at most low intensity precipitation. Things don't always go as forecasted.
The route took us east from Tredion towards the River Oust with a turn to the north to the Castle town of Josselin. We followed the 16 km paved bike path along the river which served as the tow path in an earlier time.
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| The best part of navigable rivers is they are flatter than flat. |
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| As we wandered along the cycle path there were more photo spots than time would permit. Bridges are always an attraction. |
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| In order to make the river navigable they would build a dam about five feet high to create flat water behind. |
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| Getting from one flat section to another requires a boat lift in the form of a lock. Depending on whether you are going upstream or down you power your boat into the lock, the gates close and water is either let in (raise the boat) or drained out (lower the boat) to the desired level. Tracking the elevation of the path, each lock raised or lowered the boat about 2 meters (~6 feet). |
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| These warning signs are along the path cautioning drivers not drive over the edge. Not sure how the parent and child sign fits into the equation. |
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An older and far more attractive bridge. Stone makes everything look better.
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| The canal has a name, of sorts. It runs about 300 Km from Nantes on the Loire to Brest on the most northwestern point on the Atlantic coast. Since we road upstream to the north we can assume the termination point is in Nantes - a long way. |
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| A gothic style church with an uncharacteristic modern looking clock. I am sure there is a story behind this anachronism but did not stop long enough to solve the mystery. |
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| Oh No! Look closely and you will see the ripples caused by rain drops. It started as a mere drizzled but that was not to be. We pressed on through the rain hoping beyond reason that the forecast would come to fruition and the rain would be light and short lived. Not so! |
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| As documented on our previous rides along the French canals there is a lock with a house where the lock keeper (not sure his/her proper title) lives. On more heavily traveled canals with more boat traffic this is a challenging job. On the sleepy Oust it is about as demanding as the Maytag repair man (for those who remember that commercial). |
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| A place to call home. Life on the river is quiet and serene. |
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| Our river destination and the Castle at Josselin. |
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| Kim can't wait for the coffee and pastry stop. Even a little rain won't slow her down. |
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| This is Laurence of Champagne, IL. Another American in love with biking in France. He is a thru biker with special paniers for transporting wine. One side for red and the other side for white. As the rain intensified we offered to buy the coffee and find a dry place inside. Getting acquainted is always fun, especially if we both speak the same language. His son lives in Denver and daughter-in-law works for a resort property in Vail. Small world. We exchanged contact info and will try to get together when he and his wife are in Colorado for Thanksgiving. |
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| Not sure what this sign says. Ask Kim since she took the picture. |
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| More photos of the castle. |
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This town is worth exploring, but not today. We will take this ride again and walk the medieval streets on a dryer day.
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Okay. This is where a great day turns into a disaster. After coffee we bravely pushed on through the ever intensifying rain. After a short, but valiant attempt we decided that our 12 miles back home was insane. We were very wet, very cold, and really concerned about riding on the rain soaked roads. So we retreated to our coffee stop (also a hotel) and asked the desk clerk if we could get a taxi back to our Airbnb. No one has a van that could take two passengers and two bikes so we decided that I would drive back in the taxi and bring the car. Kim found a spot to wait out my return and I directed our taxi driver to Tredion and the location of our house. I was still wet and cold but jumped into the car and drove the 25 km back to Josselin. After loading the bikes we headed home. Once inside we peeled off our wet clothes, put on warm and dry ones, and relaxed after the ordeal. This calls for a bottle of Champagne, or maybe two. Hopefully we will be a bit smarter next time. If we would have waited a while the rain got lighter and stopped. We could have made it back wet and tired, but saved the 50 euro fare. Next time we will treat a chance of rain as an absolute certainty. Hope we don't find ourselves in the same situation on our eight day tour at the next stop.
Over the course of many biking adventures today was the first time we had to abort a ride due to rain or weather event. We did encounter a severe Mistral storm near Avignon in 2021. Since we were on a self guided tour the operator arranged to transport our bikes and the four of us to the next location before starting out. Smart move.
