Sunday, October 18, 2009

The Tour de Paris-Tours

Pchaw to the Tour de France – we have a better Tour, one that goes right past our front door! Last weekend, 155 riders set off from Paris (or Chartres, fairly nearby) on the gruelling 230km ride to Tours.

It was won by the Belgian Philippe Gilbert thanks in part, it must be assumed, to his attention to vital details such as choosing the perfect rider to get into the slipstream of on the home strait. The runner-up, Tom Boonen, was most disheartened by his own mistake there... (What about the very kind Exuder of the Slipstream, I'd like to know)…

For I understand little of this kind of stuff – what’s most memorable for me is the joyful gathering of neighbours to watch the race whizz past our very pavement, with the sharing of Almost-Champagne and Nibbles.

We gathered last year too, but made the mistake of not realising that the riders came in two chunks – not only the Elites (or Proper ones)... (I don't mean that, I mean Super-Experienced ones), but also the Espoirs (Aspiring Star ones). The Espoirs race an hour before the others and last year, we all thought that was the end. They were Going Like the Clappers, after all…

It was only when George put the TV on later, that he noticed something very like Our House on the live coverage of a bike race. Sure enough, a quick peer out of the window found a helicopter circling, closely followed at ground level by the Whoosh of a second clutch of racers.

Well? Everbody else was fooled, too…

This year, George took up position at the top of the slope well in advance and armed with super-charged video camera, while I popped down to banter gaily with the other spectators. They’d been there since before the Espoirs, and were suitably merry.

If my French were more equal to the multi-dialect SpatterChat that is a street gathering, I’d have gone out earlier too. As it is, twenty minutes of vague nodding and slipping in the odd completely inappropriate sentence, is enough. For everyone…

The ambience, though, is convivial and patriotic, with yells of “Vive l’Angleterre aussi!” generously tucked in. There were about twenty of us, and it was a great chance to cement relationships with, for example, the couple who’d only moved in a week before (I’d launched myself at them while walking past one day, but this time they showed no anxiety whatsoever).

There were two wise-looking elders in the best seats (cushions on their picnic chairs), and various people of the vicinity. We discovered that the horrid, rotund neighbour who drives right up our exhaust is, in fact, quite a nice person, as are the gang of shady-looking second-homers who were leaning on the fence opposite (keeping it between them and us).

In fact, when retired Hélène impressively caught the water bottle flung to the crowd by one of the Elites, she took it across to the ten-year-old. (She may have suddenly realised it had been heavily dribbled-upon)…

Disappointingly, that was the only Present flung this time. Usually the very long publicity caravan has staff chucking tee-shirts, caps and sweets into the excited masses, and there is much gnashing of teeth and elbows to grab a prize.

A few years ago, George and I went to see the Tour-Tour de France, but in the galaxy of delights raining down, all we managed to catch was a wizened bit of dried sausage. And I had to really shout at that evil little child, too… Wasn’t his Puncture Repair Kit Enough?

We don't know if the Paris-Tours will happen again next year - there are rumours it will go a different route. How we'll miss the flashing lights, the motorbikes, the smiling, waving policemen and the loud hailers screaming: "Get Out of the Waaaay!"

19 comments:

Expat said...

That sounds wonderful Dolores! Best we get is Santa passing by on a big red fire truck every December. He does throw sweets though...

(JW: I'd love to comment on your blog, but I don't have a google account or any of the other means...)

Dolores Doolittle said...

Hi Expat - Santa with Sweeties - Enormous Joy!

Are you there by chance, JW? If you go into Settings; Comments, you can let Absolutely Anyone comment (risky though it may be!). And plump for Pre-moderating and the like.

But from the whizz-brain cut of your posting, I suspect you know all this...

JW10 said...

Hello Dolores

A good few years ago I followed the Tour De France on TV, I loved looking at the scenery and all the little villages it passed. The recent drug furores put me off it a bit.

Lots of young men wearing Lycra (?) doesn't appeal to me, however, I know you just went outside to meet the neighbours!

Expat

Thanks to Dolores I have changed my settings. Sheepishly I will admit I was fizz-brained when I began the Bizz. You are now free to comment, I think.:-)

JW10 said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
JW10 said...

Sorry Dolores I double clicked my last comment and have deleted one of them.

One of these days I'll get the hang of this internet thingy.:-)

Dolores Doolittle said...

Hello FizzBizzed! It's weird, isn't it, how they don't just delete a comment and make it disappear, but feel compelled to replace it with, A MIND WAS CHANGED HERE! Anyway, don't do it Again!

Yes, the Tour of beauteous villages is delightful and Yes, the Lycra can be a smidge distracting...



Yes, it is a Delight to get a glimpse of all those beautiful villages, and George really enjoys that aspect of

Dolores Doolittle said...

DAMN! JW, you only double-clicked, whereas I CHANGED MY MIND, and now it's displayed everything and I Can't Delete It!

Ho Hum...

JW10 said...

This frayed thread is fretening to have a tourniquet.

Double clicks, deletions, men on bikes (incidentally the great Freddie Mercury song Bicycle race was inspired by Le Tour), a wide random selection of topics.

I am ready to post. Careful now. Just one click. Steady. Close eyes and hope for the best. Missed.
Try again. Fingers in ears. Countdown in my head. 5, 4, 3, 2, 1...

Dolores Doolittle said...

A Dazzling Success, JW. I've decided not to Let my Fingers Do the Walking until I've pondered deeply upon my words.

I was fascinated to hear your snippet about Freddie M's bicycle song - what a wondrous showman he was.

And on that Thought-Provoking note, I'll stick my fingers in my ears too

Canary Islander said...

Sorry I'm late - I've been busy building some lounge wall cabinets.

I'm not too sure about all this double-clicking that's been going on around here, but it reminds me of my left knee. It's got a completely torn medial meniscus, which was probably caused by over-energetic cycling, and it clicks. Loudly.

Trick-cycling was all the rage in my younger days, but click-cycling wasn't. Jolly useful though, if you haven't got a bicycle bell.

Lance Armstrong was training here in Tenerife recently, and whizzed around our island hills with great aplomb. I sped by in my car, but heard no clicks.

Clickety-click is bingo-speak for sixty-six, isn't it?

Dolores Doolittle said...

Hello CI, How splendid to see you again with your merry tales of double-clicking!

You are exceeding gifted building cabinets, specially with a faulty Medial Meniscus...

Actually, we could do with your skills here at the moment - we bought two Enormous bookcases in a house clearance recently, we had to take them to pieces to get them out of the house, and they've been in our garage in even more pieces ever since.

As for Clickety-Click - George's mum is a bingo fanatic and these days they just read numbers out like robots apparently. Where is the Thrill in that?

Jon in France said...

I wonder if they draw lots to see who's going to be the slip-stream provider for the day. Or perhaps there are riders who specialise in being slipstream providers and they get awarded different prizes in a much quieter ceremony after the Big One has finsihed. Someone must know...

Dolores Doolittle said...

Yes, Jon - drawing lots would be fair. But I think these highly talented & death-defying providers deserve a raucous ceremony with Gigantic prize, for surrendering their egos so valiantly.

(And not falling off in front of the ego-egos)

Canary Islander said...

The wall cabinets are up! Yippee! Strange thing is, the door handles look just like a pair of cycling clips (the horseshoe-shaped plastic thingummys that cyclists clip over their ankles). Mind you, I didn't have any cycling clips, so I just stuffed my trouser legs into my socks. Trouble was, I always forgot to unstuff my trousers after I'd parked the bicycle and gone walkabout. I remember people looking at me strangely.

Why is it that when you are forgetful, you can forget everything except your own forgetfulness?

Dolores Doolittle said...

'Why is it?' CI - it's just the penance you have to pay for your years of taken-for-granted Brilliance...

(You remember those, surely)?

Your cabinets sound wonderfully Avant-Garde!

Canary Islander said...

Yes Dolores, (or perhaps no?).

I think forgetfulness is a side-effect of an increasing focus on the future. I mean, it goes without saying that we can’t lose focus on the here-and-now; otherwise we’d all be doing silly things like getting onto our bicycles the wrong way around and hanging our wall cabinets with the doors facing the walls. Active people, like the riders in the Tour de France, must be doing forward-thinking and facing the right way around all the time, and as such they must be a wonderful example to us all.

So my personal motto for this year (or the rest of it, which is as far forward as I can think) is to do lots of forward-thinking. I’m relying on you to remind me of this as when required in the future.

Do you do lots of forward-thinking like wot all those cyclists do?
:-)

Expat on the road again said...

Heigh Ho...off on my travels again tomorrow to beautiful Northern New Jersey...where they had SNOW last week.

I shall take the train. Methinks a few hundred miles or so is too far to cycle, even with a tail wind.

Anyway, the train has a bar.

Canary Islander said...

Snow? Brrrr! We often see snow on the top of Mount Teide, which is the huge volcano in the middle of Tenerife. There's a company that drives you up to the lunar landscape at the summit, and then you can cycle all the way back down to the coast through clouds and pine forest. I've done that often (except the cycling bit).

Have a great journey, Expat! :-)

Dolores Doolittle said...

CI - what an Inspirational comment on Forward-Thinking! Yes! I do tons of it, but in the Oh-God-Mustn't-Forget-To manner that leaves one in Constant Turmoil...

How fabulous to go up the lunar volcano. Tenerife seems to have an example of absolutely everything!

Hi Expat on the Road Again! Your last line particularly, made me laugh like hell!

Hope you're having joyous times inbetwixt the working ones.