Tour de France: Day 33 – 35
Day 33: La Clusaz
This was a hot day with lots of downhill followed by two cols. We zigzagged all the way to Albertville before heading up the Col de Saisies. This was a tough col with many kilometres of 7 percent. The weather was incredibly hot and a lot of the riders suffered in the heat. It was not clear at the top exactly where the summit was so we went within a kilometre of the summit before we had a break and lunch then proceeded to the summit. Fortunately the next col for the day was half the altitude of the first one. This was the col d’Aravis and this is used frequently in the Tour de France. La Clusaz was a lovely town with some amazing cheeses and meats. We purchased some meat and cheese and spoke with a French man at the supermarket who was very pleased to hear we were New Zealanders and who wanted to hear all about the All Blacks. Fortunately Bruce was on hand to share the latest on the All Blacks. It has been fantastic to get in after our days biking and sit down and watch the Tour de France. Some of the climbs such as hautacom are cols we have climbed therefore we are very excited to see how quickly the riders go up the climbs – it really is incredible!
Day 34: Evian
This day was the direct opposite of day 33 in that the first col was the easiest col, the Col de Colombiere followed by the harder one of the col de journey plane. Twice lance Armstrong faded on the Joux Plane because he did not eat enough. I left early on this day with one of the riders from Christchurch so that we could try and avoid the heat of the day. This was a good approach as we took it easy on the first col and had plenty in reserve for the second col. There was an option of doing additional kilometres to enjoy the view of Lake Geneva coming into Evian. This was an additional climb and was challenging but well worth the effort. Lake Geneva is very impressive and it was really enjoyable to be near the water after days of mountain landscapes and scenery. We dipped our toes in the water and could see across the lake to Lusanne in Switzerland. This was similar to the experience of being in Qatar and being able to look across to Saudi Arabia. Some of us were able to have a quick dip in Lake Geneva after tea. The scenery started to look more and more similar to Switzerland.
Day 35: Bulle
Today marked our first day in Switzerland. It was very unusual to be biking with our passports in our bike tops as we prepared to cross the border. It was very low key as the border staff were not interested in a bunch of tired cyclists coming into Switzerland. Initial impressions were that this is a very patriotic country. Many had flags adorning houses, silos and even tractors- not something witnessed in France. We climbed the final of the 21 cols to be covered in the tour and it was evident the Swiss are not as particular as the French with the 1 km marks up the col. This was difficult for determining how much further to climb to the top but it arrived before long. We are becoming experts at gradients; temperatures; weather etc on the trip. We are all also becoming very skilled at descending, reading the road conditions and cycle etiquette in Europe. We have 3 days in Switzerland.
