As usual, after breakfast we prepared our bicycles for the daily stage, loading our travel luggage and fixing/adapting the last details. The number of participants has risen to 10 with the addition new “fresh legs”: Mauro and Alice (she rode already yesterday) have joined us!
But this morning it is possible to feel a strange excitement among us.
The Alps with their strong ascents, snow and cold are gone. The longest stages of yesterday and the day before with its frequent uphill and downhill are over.
Today we’ll ride to Provins and tomorrow we’ll push our pedals towards Paris!
Everybody is happy and relaxed to see our target so close, but we know that in any case our planned 110 km will be possible only with our commitment and effort.
After some minor problems for a gps not working correctly (maybe it was as tired as us for the long tour…) and a map with a fake connection between two streets, we started our way to Provins.
The day was quite cold and we also found thick fog (probably one of the few weather conditions still missing in our trip) during the first uphill. But the landscape at the top is amazing. Over the green sea of grass on our right we saw only the top of a line of power windmill, like flying technological ghosts of green energy supporting us while we pushed our pedals. The rest of the day was almost ordinary, with the a new puncture in Roberto’s tyre, some passages through a forest and the frequent ups and downs on the French countryside road.
In Provins, beautiful city part of Unesco heritage, we met Thomas and Romain.
They guided us to the apartment where we had planned to stay this night. The bad news is that it is 18 km far from Provins. The good news is that these km are almost in direction of Paris and that means that we’ll have shorter ride tomorrow.
We decided to go for the shortest way, the normal traffic road, but it was almost a nightmare with the fast cars and trucks driven not so far from us, the dark road… and the tiredness in our body.
To stay all together in a big apartment the last night before Paris is a clear opportunity for the eve celebration. And what is a good way to celebrate for a group of starved Italians (we’ve started to call ourselves “locusts” for the incredible starvation we have all the time due to our long distance ride)? To prepare a big carbonara’s pasta!
We had a very nice and relaxing dinner together and as usual we checked our weather forecast prepared on a daily base for us by Matteo Zanetti of Class Meteo (thank you Matteo for this: it has been always very useful and appreciated!).
And now… let’s go to sleep, as tomorrow Paris is waiting for us.
Care e cari, che gioia sentirvi così vicini a Paris.
Il diario è sempre molto coinvolgente.
Un pensiero intenso da Merano-Meran.
A domani (cerco un haiku per l’occasione!)
Bruno
I hoped to see you this morning at Le Bourget.
Are you there?
Well done!!