Day 12 – Headwind

A beautiful sunny morning and Jackie started the day on the beach reading the cycling magazine given to her yesterday by the kindly man just after the fish fingers (c’mon – keep up!).

Spent a relaxed morning pottering around Brantôme, looked at the abbey (great stone staircase!) and had breakfast outside by the river. There was a police dog exercise taking place around the town with surprisingly cute hounds sniffing out trouble.

We had planned an easy day today, just 29 miles to Tourtoirac. Some climbing but perfectly manageable. Trouble is that we were heading east, contrary to the rest of this trip which predominantly goes southwards. Our day’s riding started with a huge headwind which barely let up all day. Very hard work indeed.

We stopped for a picnic lunch on the steps of the town hall in a small place with a Saint in its name. A woman stopped her car and came to tell us there was a nice picnic bench just around the corner. How thoughtful. We moved there and thoroughly enjoyed the leek tart that Jackie had bought in Brantôme this morning.

More riding into the wind. Saw two people in orange overalls working on the barrier equipment at a level crossing. It looked to me like a scene from a 60s Bond film or a Michael Caine movie, with saboteurs disguised as workmen.

Stopped for afternoon tea in a quaint village. The lady who ran the café photographed our bikes as part of her evidence gathering towards her campaign for bike parking facilities. Jackie and I shared one of her homemade cakes, chocolate and walnut, and had a brief chat with her which I think was probably about excessive bureaucracy in local government. Went to a local shop and bought food for picnic dinner tonight.

Last leg of battling against the wind. By the time we arrived at the campsite we felt that we’d had a much harder time of our 29 miles today than we did on yesterday’s 41 mile trip. Today was supposed to be easy!!

We were the only people staying in the campsite. We chose the flattest, most level pitch and promptly made it look skanky by chucking our stuff all over the place. The swimming pool looked inviting but a little too cold to indulge in this evening.

We ate our picnic dinner beside a small aviary containing a red parrot, a yellow budgie and a cockatiel. Their chatter sounded lovely although I guess they were probably lamenting their lost freedom. Dinner was a potato and onion tortilla, celeriac remoulade, spicy tortilla chips, a jar of guacamole and a baguette. Bar of choc for dessert. Yum.

To bed, extremely tired from fighting the wind all day.

Miles cycled: 29

Total miles: 459

Metres climbed: 560

Good things today: