Last ride of the Euro Velo 6

The "last day" blog really should start the evening before the last day, when we rode into Nantes, France. This river-front, bustling city is full of French charm and urban sprawl and seems to go on forever. We made it into town around four in the afternoon, and our map showed us a few decent locations for camping nearby, so we had some time to visit the city. For three of the camping grounds we saw no signs, no caravans and no camping ground. We asked several people along the way and they all shook their heads, asked how old our map was and told us that their hadn't been camping here in years. Drat. We rode around aimlessly for awhile and then back into the city, where we had heard a camp ground truly existed. we found a carnival next to a beautiful church, a college and finally the camping ground... BUT it was closed for the season. Double drat. It was starting to get late, and we had no real options for sleeping. free camping is pretty impossible in a city, and only vaguely possible once we made it outside the city sprawl. There was a campground about 30km out of town, and if we rode with all our reflective gear and flashing lights on, we could probably make it there by ten or eleven at night.

We set of following a fairly nice bike lane down a busy city road towards the coast. We had just barely made it to where the traffic was decreasing and the city was starting to give way to suburbs when a nice looking silver car pulled up next to us and rolled down the window. Inside was a young, well-dressed french man and asked us where we were headed. He said that he had toured Europe for nine months on a bike with a friend, and he wanted to help out a fellow cyclist. He told us the road was "no good" and we must not go any further, and offered for us to stay "chez moi" meaning at his home. He seemed genuine enough and the offer of staying in a warm home with a bed was a much better offer than the cold, dark ride we had in front of us. We agreed, and he led the way back through the city (back-tracking through the same places we had been for the third time that day). He drove slowly with his flashers on in the bike lane,and we hurried to keep up with him. He led us to a grouping of nice apartment buildings and showed us inside. His flat was the smallest apartment I've ever been in, with just a small kitchenette and living space, adjacent to a small bedroom, toilet closet, and small shower/laundry room. He lived there with his pretty, blond girlfriend, who had decorated the place to look really cozy and sweet. the place was so impossibly spotless and tidy I felt immediately like a barn-yard animal caught in a church. We all sort-of awkwardly introduced ourselves (their names were Thomas and Mary) and showed us some photos of his own cycling adventure. You couldn't help but be impressed: he had traveled through twenty-one countries through snow, rain and sun. He boasted of his record of twenty days without a shower, and record 80 kph downhill speed. Between my French, his English and local wine, we passed the night easily chatting about cycling and eating cheese.
We slept on an amazingly comfortable cot, and in the morning Mary made us petitdejeune and then rode on her bike with us to the edge of town, where she showed us a good way out of the city. And to think that the French are rude and selfish. Nonsense! People in general are rude and selfish, but every country, every town and every subdivision there are a few true gems just waiting to be found.

The door that got us a free drink

We hadn't gone but 30km when I stopped in a small community to take a photo of an old church door across the street. A middle-aged man leaned over the railing of a small porch of a local bar and inquired loudly where we were traveling. We've gotten used to this aggressive sort of conversation style, many people we've come across have no problem imploring into your life. This man was really interested in what we were doing with our bikes and all that stuff in his little town. We said we on a trip through Europe, having traveled over three thousand kilometers so far. This floored him. "TROIS MIL KILOMETERS?" his excitements reached epic proportions "Trois mil? Ooooh! Venu! Venu! You must come for drink!" He was practically hopping with enthusiasm. To be honest, he was in a bar with some rather local-yocal fellows and I wouldn't be surprised if the table they were sitting at had perminate marks from their butts being constantly there. Nonetheless, he shook Todds hand and kissed my cheeks and ordered us a drink. We were introduced to the other fellows at the table, and they all asked about our little trip. Where we had been, where we were going, were we crazy? When we finished our drink, our new friend took off his imaginary hat to us and place it on his heart, wishing us "Bon Traval! Bon Courage! Bon Chance!"Then he gave us his address, begging for a postcard and yelled out some cheesy stuff roughly translating to "I give you all my heart in respect and adoration" (something that only sounds good in French) and waved au revoir!

We made it to the coast by late afternoon, and stopped outside the tourist information center to find out where we could camp. A nice French guy from Bordeaux carrying a trailer full of camping gear said "Bonjour!" and struck up a conversation. Cyclists are so good about always chatting each other up. Turns out he had just biked from Bordeaux (the next big city on our route) and had a couple maps he didn't need. It was great! so far, we have been just giving away tons of maps, we usually are traveling the opposite direction of the other cyclists and just end up giving away our maps... but for once, we got a map! What a superb last day.

We headed for the best campsite around and booked two nights. This place is like resort camping and we took advantage of the place and jumped into the heated indoor pool (it's getting pretty cold this time of year, the outdoor pool just wasn't appealing). There were only two other couples in the entire place, one middle aged, and one elderly, and no attendants on the slides... so we figured we'd just make ourselves at home. The two couples watched us going down the slides as if they had no idea someone besides an eight-year-old ever slide down them. Pretty soon however, they joined us (it just takes one crazy person to influence the masses!)and we had a heck of a good time.

They had a nice restaurant on the camping ground, so we cleaned ourselves up (meaning, I put on my one skirt and mascara and Todd put on a shirt) and made our way to the restaurant. We celebrated making it to the ocean with a bottle of wine and a lovely french dinner. After we ate, we took a walk down to the beach and climbed onto a big rock and watched the moonlight dance on the water. We did it...the plane left us in the middle of Eastern Europe, and we found our way to the Atlantic Ocean.

Now we just have to make it to my job in two weeks (no prob).