Day 3

Monday, May 1
Abbeville to Lyons-la-Foret
123km

Great route today. Wonderful scenery. Lousy weather. It was cold, windy and rainy the entire ride.

Last night, we stored our bikes in a self-storage garage down the street. Retrieving the bike this morning made it clear that we were in for some bad weather today. I wore all of the warm and waterproof clothes that I have here...and managed to stay relatively dry and warm.

Again, I was completely impressed with the little roads in France. They are PERFECT for cycling. Nice pavement, no cars and lots of dips, sweeping turns and climbs and switchback decents. Since there was pretty good visibility, we really let loose and built up a lot of speed on the decents...which is a lot of fun. I can't get over how narrow the roads are. Some were only about 2 or 3 meters wide. There was a lot more climbing today, with some beautiful views from the tops and a lot of small wooden-house villages.

I rode with John (a big Australian) and Roger (a shorter bald guy from Norfolk England) again for most of the day today. A few times I'd drop off to cycle with some of the other cyclists that we met up with, but I always seemed to end up back with John and Roger. No one on this trip is particularly fast, but most maintain a very respectable pace.

At one point, Roger got a flat at the top of a big hill. Since John had already gone down the hill, I stayed to help change the tube. I got half an apple tart as a thank-you.

Most of the shops in France are aparently closed on Mondays. Since today was a bank holiday, even less was open. I bought a chocolate crossant and a mini-keesh in Abbeville to tide me over. In the end, we did find one open resteraunt on route, where I had a toasted ham sandwich with cheese on top called a "croques monsieur". Yummy. My appetite is definitely increasing with all of the cycling.

At the resteraunt, we met up with Steve and his wife Charlie and their friend Tara. They all ride mountain bikes and are pretty funny. They are quick but the stop a few times a day for coffee (from flasks) and flapjeacks. (Enery-bar type stuff made with oats and honey...I though a flapjack was a pancake. Is that a wierd British thing or am I confused?). Charlie is also the authority on directions, so we'll frequently run into them several times a day after we make a wrong turn.

After meeting up with them, we stayed together for the rest of the ride. Amazingly, with both Charlie and Roger on the maps, we made a wrong turn and ended up several km off course. It was a beautiful, sweeping downhill...which was a lot nicer on the way down. Oh well.

Finally, I wanted to mention that www.multimap.com seems to be a good website for locating french cities...just in case your not exactly sure where these little French towns are.