Tour De France - Part 3

(In what's turning into a much longer series than expected, we continue with Alpe D'Huez.)

The day had arrived, it was our first time seeing cyclists, and we jumped right into the deep end. People don't just casually check out Alpe D'Huez, it's more of a life experience. And somehow we decided that it would be a great spot to get our first taste of Tour de France spirit (not to mentions spirits!).

So, the plan was formed: wake up early and drive to Bourg d'Oisans (town at the base of the climb), pick up some beer and food in the town, pick out a low-key spot near the bottom, get drunk, cheer on Team Chipotle. Sounds simple enough.

We got to the town, followed the line of cars as we looked for parking, and then accidentally started driving right up the mountain. There was a lot of "oh crap, what do we do now?", "can we turn around?" and "this is CRAZY" going on in our car as we continued up and up the mountain.


It's not like we could just pull over and turn around to go back to Plan A. There were cyclists everywhere, cars everywhere, and drunk spectators everywhere (keep in mind, it's now 9:30 am). There's no going back to Plan A, definitely Plan B time. Our real worry was that Plan B (find somewhere to park NOW!) would turn into Plan C (can't find parking because people have been camping on this mountain for a week, driving over the top, end up somewhere back in Italy again), and we definitely wanted to avoid that.

Through some divine intervention, we managed to find a spot on the side of the road that wasn't taken up by a tent, car, motorhome, or group of drunk Germans, and pulled over. A very helpful cop informed us (in both French and through frantic hand gestures), that we had to turn the car around so that it was facing down the mountain (turned out to be a great idea when we were trying to get off the mountain later).

So, we were parked. Halfway up the mountain. With no beer.

We were in quite a dilemma, time for a big decision. We could walk back down the way we came, find a shop, and resume Plan A. Or we could walk up this mountain, find a shop, and resume the last half of Plan A (the drinking and cheering part). We decided it would be a waste to come all this way and let a silly thing like climbing a mountain get in our way. So we started up.

About 8 kilometers and 3 really long hours later, we made the summit. We picked up provisions at the top (baguettes, beer, wine... I knew bike jerseys were good for something). We then found our spot, just above the 3 km mark and began to enjoy the fantastic scenery of Alpe D'Huez.

A new plan to sew pockets like this into all of our shirts was hatched shortly after we realised how easy it is to carry bottles of alcohol in them.

The beer went a lot faster than we thought (stupid 250 ml bottles), but luckily the tour started to roll through just in time (for us to crack open the wine). The caravan came through about an hour before the first riders, and handed out loads of free schwag.

Luckily for us, our neighbors along the barrier had updates coming to their mobile and were giving us the heads up on what was happening down the mountain. Then the riders came through.

Carlos Sastre basically won the Tour at this exact moment

It was a fairly slow trickle of riders, all coming up alone or in groups of 2 or 3. The mountain had destroyed the main bunch and shattered them across all 23 switchbacks.

A slightly larger group makes it up the crazy, crazy mountain

At last, the peloton came rolling through (and probably still faster than I could ride on flat ground)

It was time to head back down the slopes. Along with a few tens of thousands of other fans. We met up with some fellow Chipotle supporters (Americans, but living in Switzerland now), who had been camping on Alpe D'Huez for a few days and they brought us down some shortcuts through all the switchbacks. We repaid the favor by giving them a (very slow) lift down the rest of the mountain.

All in all, it was a blast. Jacob got his picture on the Chipotle team website. We got to cheer on our team, and watch some fantastic cycling. Only a few hours later, and we made it out of the crowd and back to the hotel.

Check out the full Alpe D'Huez pictures.

Up next, the final part - Lyon and the Time Trial.

Tour De France - Part 2

Leaving Milan on Tuesday morning, the real heart of our trip (for me and Jacob at least) began as we set off to conquer Alpe D'Huez. With our trusty Google Maps directions in hand, we drove from one autostrade (Italian for highway) to another, a quick stop for one of the best lunches I've had in a while, and then on into France.

Our lunch stop... delicious

First a few points about driving in Italy and France.

• Petrol is expensive (€1.50 / litre = $10.60 / gallon, makes that $4 gas seem like a good deal, huh?).
• Tolls are even more expensive.
• Driving up mountains is both insanely fun and insane depending on if you're driving or in the passenger's seat.

So, once we got into France, things got interesting. Despite being the best (true that, double true), Google Maps is also completely out of it's mind. I'll direct your attention to steps 25 - 42 on the following directions. This is where we left the nice, fast, safe highway (with it's expensive tolls), for the craziest, most switchback-y roads I've ever driven on. First, up the Col du Glandon, where we got our first taste of the real alps.

On top of the Col du Glandon

Then we proceeded to go even futher afield and onto the D212f (that's the road name), aka, the smallest "2-lane" road I've ever been on. I'll highlight this little portion of the trip to give you a taste of Jacob's horror with me behind the wheel. (Just kidding Mom, I was completely safe and in control the whole time... no matter what Jacob tells you.)

Luckily we made it to the hotel (which was on top of another mountain, with fantastic views), and planned for the approaching day.

View from the hotel

Alpe D'Huez, coming up.

Pictures!

I still haven't gone through the 800 or so pictures we took of cyclists, but for now, check these out.

Jacob in London

Milan and Lake Como

Driving through France

The rest should be up whenever I get around to it.

Tour De France - Part 1

So Jacob came out for a visit, and we certainly packed quite a bit into the week and a half he was here. Touring around London, beautiful Milan and Lake Como in Italy, climbing Alpe D'Huez, eating our way through Lyon, not to mention meeting (and drinking) with Team Chipotle! Those stories will come shortly; it was a long trip, so I'll try to break it up into bite-sized pieces.

The general itinerary for our first few days: London, Milan, Lake Como, Milan. Luckily for us, Laura was able to take some time off work and join Jacob and me for this leg of the journey (and act as our Italian translator).

(Before we get into it, let me point out a fact that Jacob is sure to bring up... yes, I did manage to leave him waiting at Paddington station for 2 hours on Thursday morning. But seriously, I was prepared for customs to take at least an hour, plus the plane being a bit late, plus time for baggage claim, plus some extra time to catch the train. How could I have known that Jacob would take something like 5 minutes in customs and somehow bend the space-time continuum and arrive at Paddington at 7:30 instead of the expected 9:30? Oh right, cause the same thing happened when Mike Roy came here... so, maybe I'm not so good with picking people up at the airport.)

Anyway, we had some fun in London for two days, drinking our way from pub to pub mostly, all the while calling colleagues to remind them of the fact that it was 3pm, we were hammered, and they were working. Add to that getting in the requisite fish-and-chips meal, I think we pretty much had London covered.

I may have already mentioned that I love pub names in London. How can you beat "The Coal Hole"?

On Saturday, we all packed up and headed to Milan. We managed to get our rental car (and were thankful not to have to drive on the left), found our hotel and checked out the main attractions in Milan (aka. the Duomo and copious amounts of gelato).

In front of the Duomo

Mmmm... gelato.

Up early the next day for the easy drive to Lake Como. Beautiful. We checked into the hostel and walked around, taking in the sights. The city itself is fantastic, very old and picturesque streets, and the lake is fantastic. Nothing quite like being nestled in the Alps, sitting on a bench in the sunshine next to Lake Como (eating some gelato). The only downsides were that we couldn't go swimming right from the shore (too much muck around the harbour) and a 30 minute rain shower that evening. Other than that, it was fantastic.



Monday morning, up and walking around Como for some more pictures, then back to Milan to drop Laura off at the airport. Jacob and I went back into Milan, managed to find our new hostel (and not get a parking ticket in the mean time), then set off for the center of the city agin. Some more time near the Duomo, sitting in cafes, and a visit to the fantastic Peck, walk around the shopping district, then back to the hostel to find dinner and a few litres of vino.

Tuesday started the real Tour de France journey... but that will have to wait for part 2.

Notice something different?

Bobby (finally) gave me administrative privlages on our blog. What does that mean? I'll be playing around with colors/photos for the next few days to try and make it look less like a blog kept by a a 40-year-old man. Have patience.

Another New Link -------->

My friends are so international. I've added a new link for my friend Julia's blog (from my job in DC). Julia won a Fulbright fellowship to do research on slums in the Philippines (read her blog to learn more), so she'll be living in Manila for the next 9 months.

Enjoy!

If you're watching the Tour de France...

Watch for Jacob and Bobby. They're in Southern France this week following the bikers around (in a car, not on bikes), but they should be on the sidelines for the vast majority of it over the next few days.

But, since Jacob and Bobby are the only two people I know who actually watch the Tour de France, this post may be a waste of time....