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NEWARK NOTES from the Secretary

June 2006 - part 2

Brittany, sparingly, on 28 miles per pint

Our inebriate friend would have been in for a rude awakening if he'd stayed in the garden much longer. Shortly after we left, the skies, already grey, darkened, and after firing warning shots for about half an hour, the heavens opened for a typical summer shower. By one of those strange coincidences, we happened to be passing a café, where we made a round of coffee last an hour while the storm passed over.

The lengthened coffee stop meant that our tradition of under-achievement would be maintained; we'd intended a look round Pontivy, which we managed, briefly, and then turned north, heading for the small town of Mur-de-Bretagne. It turned out to be at the top of the biggest hill we'd climbed all day, and, once again, the hotel was closed for the night. The proprietor rang ahead to the next town and found us rooms in the hotel there, so it was back on the saddles. The next five miles were along a beautiful wooded gorge with a stream and waterfalls, but, frankly, we were too tired to appreciate it. St Gilles Vieux Marche may have been a ville d'un cheval, but the hotel was comfortable enough, and served an excellent meal.

We'd hoped to have two nights at the furthest point so that we could ride out for one day without panniers, but we realised that whilst it would have been possible to get to St Malo in one hop, it would have been a bit long if anything had gone wrong. As if…. Besides, the other guests were a bit noisy when returning, which put us off the place a little, especially when they repeated their performance rising early in the morning.

The next day we headed off towards the coast, hoping to get to one of the smaller resorts east of St Brieuc to give us an easy run for the last day. When checking his bike over before starting out, Ray noticed that one of his pedals, which had complained slightly earlier in the tour and been told to shut up, had shed all the balls from its outboard bearing, and now looked likely to throw in the towel. Faced with the prospect of riding on the spindle, we rode even more slowly than usual to the next town on our route, Quintin, where a replacement pair of pedals was found. After a coffee stop and a quick look at the town, we headed towards St Brieuc for lunch. This was the only town of any size we'd encounter, apart from St Malo, and, with a combination of a map that wasn't designed for such work, signs designed to keep motorised traffic on the main roads, and cycle route signing that did its usual disappearing trick, was a bit of a nightmare to navigate.

Eventually we found our way out, on the right road even, and ended up at a resort called le Val Andre, which had all the right things but still managed to make Skegness in March (see last issue again) look a hive of activity. Eventually we found a hotel that was open and booked in, before a meal of take-away pizza eaten in the local park, one of us having decided that the French cuisine didn't suit him. The evening ended with the World Cup in a local bar with a totally indifferent audience. Not to mention a totally indifferent game.

Our final day on the road was to take us back to St Malo, and we had time to put a loop in, so we continued east Cap Frehel, through some spectacular coastal scenery together with some spectacular coastal hills. If we were looking for birds we would have been disappointed, though the usual twitchers that inhabit such places were there all right, as were the usual crowds of tourists; once again, us included. We wheeled our bikes past the "No cycling" signs to the end of the Cap, where we took the obligatory photos before heading inland for coffee and later lunch. Having decided to avoid the coast road, which went uncomfortably close to the airport, we missed the tidal barrage at the mouth or the Rance, but were partly compensated by two spectacular bridges across the inland end of the estuary at Port St. Jean; the older suspension bridge that we used being somewhat dwarfed by the modern concrete structure carrying the N176.

And so by not the usual lanes back to St Malo. Arriving later than planned, we discovered that a couple of conferences had filled most of the hotels, and thought we might have to ride out of town. Then, right at the entrance to the port, we discovered a small two-star hotel that had some vacancies. Talk about landing on our pieds. That evening we explored the picturesque old port and some rather pricey bars.

Having considered the ferry food expensive, we stocked up on baguettes and wine from a local shop before boarding the boat. John even persuaded the wine waiter to uncork one of the bottles for us; he has the cheek of the devil at times, but we had paid to be on board after all! There is one ferry on this route; it goes to France by night and returns by day, so we lost a day of riding for the crossing.

That evening we arrived in Portsmouth and were met by Brian's cousin who'd looked after his van for the week. He drove us to our B&B and left us to fish and chips eaten on the prom, before sampling the local watering holes.

Two days later, back at work, it was like I'd never been away, but it was great fun while it lasted.

Mike Graham

Page updated 29/06/06