Jan. 19, 1999 By Eric

"Now it is a strange thing, but things that are good to have or days that are good to spend are soon told about, and not much to listen to; while things that are uncomfortable, palpitating, and even gruesome, may make a good tale, and take a deal of telling anyway." - from The Hobbit by J.R.R. Tolkien

Tibet was an example of things that are uncomfortable.

But the days so far in France have been good to spend and so should be soon told about. The only thing uncomfortable is the weather - we're bicycle touring in winter for the first time. But that's not really a problem. The great thing about winter is that we can carry yogurt in our packs and wine in our water bottles without worrying about either one going bad.

In fact, the morning we left, Jean-Marie and Pierre gave us ham sandwiches, yogurt, and put wine in out water bottles. I've made a point of always having wine with us ever since. And just as she did when I rode across France in 1991, Nathalie sent me off from Le Montel with a saucisson (sausage) from Auvergne.

Surprisingly, staying cool has been the most difficult. I start the day wearing a long-sleeved silk shirt, a button-down cotton shirt over that, a fleece coat and finally, a raincoat. When it's 40 degrees outside, on the first hill I'm already too hot so I peel off the fleece coat. Also I wear bicycle gloves instead of the heavy ski gloves I brought. I sweated too much in the ski gloves.

Just before we left Le Montel (Nathalie's parent's home) I played a couple tunes on the adventure horn. They sounded good in the courtyard in front of the U-shaped house. It was a crisp, clear, 40 degrees. Next door is an 80-cow dairy farm that smells exactly like my Uncle Johnny's farm in Elder's Ridge, Penn., though the barns and sheds here in France are made of stone instead of wood and metal.

At the end of the 200-meter drive from Le Montel to the main road we had an impressive view of the 12th Century castle Busseol. The castle comes right out of a giant protruding rock. It's hard to tell where the rock ends and the walls begin.

Pretty soon we realized that in this part of France, you are always looking up at some impressive castle. Thousands of small volcanoes have created perfectly shaped hills, ideal for building fortresses on. Busseol is typical. We had toured it the day before. They had showed us the strong room, with two meter thick walls where all the occupants sealed themselves, equipped with weeks worth of food, in the event of a siege.

Joan asked if the strong room had ever been used. They said, "Many times." And there are so many similar castles! I would have hated to be around when all those fortresses were necessary.

Now, I suppose, the equivalent of a strong room is the passenger compartment in a car, with all the air bags around. French drivers are statistically some of the worst in the world. But we weren't too worried. I rode in France in 1991 and found the drivers to be very courteous to bicycles. Cycling is, after all, the national sport.

It's been the same on this visit. We get lots of thumbs up signs from drivers and often people near the road say, "Bon courage" (good luck) as we pass. I feel like everyone likes me.

But it hasn't been easy. All day long the first day we went up and down, up and down, up and down. The roads on our excellent Michelin map are red, yellow, or white, the red ones being the biggest and busiest. We chose white roads whenever possible because there's so little traffic on them. On white roads we can ride side-by-side and practice speaking French.

However, the white roads ignore things like drainage patterns and grading. They're hard work, but peaceful work. Our mantra has been, "if we can ride the Himalayas, we can ride anything."

Maybe Tolkein was wrong after all. I've written 500 words about a wonderful ride, and I've only gotten us 200 meters from where we started!

We missed a turn just about 10 km from Le Montel. To get back on track we passed through a quaint little town called La Roche Blanche (the white rock) because of an unusual outcropping of white limestone filled with caves. Then we went through another quaint little town called La Crest probably because it's on the top ofa huge hill.

From La Crest we had a great view of a giant valley. The topography looked a bit like rural Virginia, near the mountains - a nice balance of cleared land and forest. Here and there amongst the landscape were towns very unlike Virginia. Steep sloping black roofs crowded around tall steeples, protruding, no doubt, from medieval cathedrals.

La Crest itself, like the towns it looks down upon, has great little narrow stone streets, some just wide enough for a car, some not even that wide. The old buildings have short doors, tiny windows -- sometimes in odd places, and strangely angled walls. I love it. It's wonderful to wander around these places. Though the middle ages were awful, wretched times, their remains are undeniably quaint. Vicious but cute. Just like polar bears.

After La Crest we descended quickly to (yellow) highway D213. I mention this only because D213 is uphill for about 15 km, from where we caught it all the way to the tiny town of Verneuge. We started at about 500m above sea level, and reached over 1000m above sea level (1,600 feet of climb). Along this road we chowed down on our ham sandwiches, yogurt and wine. At the top, the hillsides, the pine forests, the fields, and the roadsides were all covered with snow. Fortunately the road itself was clear and dry.

Joan and I both remembered a picture from the book "Miles from Nowhere" (about a couple who bicycles around the world) that shows the author riding through the snow in Europe. When reading the book years ago, we both thought that was pretty hard core and we would never do such a thing. Not when we could be taking refuge in the Southern Hemisphere instead. Yet here we were, doing the same thing. At least it wasn't snowing on us.

The snow made everything especially pretty. We really enjoyed the last 20 km. So much so, that there's not much to say, except that it was very hilly. Constant climbing and descending.

We arrived in the ancient town of Orcival (pop. 287) at just about dark, around 6pm. Orcival has a remarkable old cathedral (they call it a Basilica, not a cathedral but I'm not sure why) from the 12th century. We had already seen a lot of cathedrals but this one was definitely a little different. Among other things, it is made of volcanic stone and has a large octagon shaped tower instead of the usual rectangle. It was nicely lit at night.

The next morning we walked around inside. It truly was awe inspiring. Its huge ceilings, intricate colorful stained glass, gothic arches crossing everywhere above us so mathematically perfect, and above all, the silence. I was hyper aware of my plastic tipped shoelaces tapping on my boots with every step.

Orcival had about 10 hotels, 9 of which were closed when we got there -- and we were the only guests at the one open hotel, as far as I could tell. This really was the low season.

By 7pm, there was not a bar or restaurant open in the entire town. For dinner, all we ate was part of the sausage Nathalie gave us and the rest of the wine her father gave us. We couldn't even get a baguette to go with it.

Next: More great white roads

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