Big Ben' s Bike Blog

  Day 12; Exploring Paris. The Versailles railway station is in front of our hotel. It is a beautiful fin du siècle railway station, a pleasure to get on the train. Ben pushed Es in the only train that was departing at the very moment we arrived at the platform, leading to some marital tension because we were not sure at all where this train was heading anyway. The train and the marriage were heading in the right direction so we arrived in time at the Picasso Museum for an exhibition on Picasso and Rodin. After the exhibition we made a long walk through the city. Place des Vosges with a light lunch, coffee at the Centre Pompidou, a very interesting explanation about the repairs on the Norte Dame, the Sorbonne, the Pantheon and finally the Gardins de Luxembourg. We took the train back to Versailles at the Boulevard St Michel and ended a very enjoyable day at an Indian restaurant. Time for bed now, tomorrow 102 km to Beauvais.

  Day 11; Mousse au Bloc de Frein  75 km Chartres 09.00 with some drizzle. Within a few miles we were outside town heading for Versailles. In Rambouillet the drizzle changed to more serious rain and we took refuge in a restaurant. On the table next to us were other refugees, a German family who were on their way to the Atlantic coast. These cyclists looked so smart and clean that the rest of the day we were discussing how on earth they managed to look like that in these conditions. After our usual caffe creme we decided to get going, the beauty contest was already lost to these Germans and we’ d better show them what a real cyclist was up to. By now the rain was pouring from the sky. Before Versailles there were two short climbs and descents; Ben had more and more trouble using the brakes in the rain. When we arrived in Versailles there was no braking left and inspection at the hotel learned that the shimano brake pads had completely disappeared and changed into a substanc...

  Day 10; Orleans- Chartres in the rain, 75 km Especially elderly French give us thumbs up all day. I guess we are the reminder of long forgotten times when the tandem was popular in France. France had some famous tandem builders like Rene Herse, but also Peugeot, Gitane and Look had a tradition of building nice tandems. Cyfac in the Bourgogne still makes some very nice tandems…. In the ENFB magazine in Holland (an organisation that promotes cycling, and has fully jumped on the electric bike) recently stated that not many tandems would be sold now the man who wants to cycle with his wife buys her an electric bike. They could not be further off the truth; tandeming is a team effort as riding after your hubby on one of these accu bikes is making the wife a lesser part of evolution. So far on emancipation and tandems. We woke up to the familiar sound of raindrops on our Orleans roof. Breakfast was provided from a local bakery with a broken down oven, it was an excellent excuse ...

Vorden-Rome Nog 4 dagen en dan gaat het gebeuren.  De voorbereidingen zijn bijna klaar en de route is ook in grote lijnen uitgewerkt. Al jaren wil ik graag deze route gaan fietsen, eerder fietste ik naar Santiago de Compostella en dat was erg inspirerend. En ik ben nou eenmaal gek op fietsen. En soms is er gewoon geen duidelijk waarom, dan moet het gewoon. De route zal eerst naar Reims gaan en daarna draai ik de Via Francigena op. Dat is de eeuwenoude route waarop pelgrims van Canterbury naar Rome trokken Vanaf Lausanne zal mijn zoon Lucas me komen vergezellen en dan fietsen we samen de laatste 1000km naar Rome. De hele afstand zal ongeveer 2200 km zijn, in drie week komt dat dus neer op een dikke honderd kilometer per dag want er zullen ook dagen zijn dat het tegenzit. En in Rome zal Esther ons komen ophalen en de rol van reisleider op zich nemen. Het moet gaan gebeuren op mijn zwarte Moulton APB, voor de achtergronden van deze bijzonder fiets verwijs ik naar de website...