Non aux ours!

Since last I blogged, Mr M has been in the wars. Though thankfully not with the bears mentioned in the title.

Friday started off well. By late morning, he'd reached the top of the Col de Tourmalet 2115m; probably twice the size of Snowdon or was that Ben Nevis? Huge, anyway. And when Mr M texted me, he thought that the worst of the day's cycling was over. Taking 3 hours to climb up, the descent should have been around 45 minutes.

He'd reckoned without all the bumps and lumps and gravel; as previously mentioned the route is being prepared for The Tour. As he rode down Mr M punctured his front tyre, lost direction and fell down with a bang! (He now takes back much of what he's said about helmets; he could hear his one hit the ground!). Anyway, when he'd got up and brushed himself off, he discovered that his back tyre was flat as well...and of course he'd only one inner tube left. What to do? In the end he repaired the back tyre and went on his way, stopping periodically to pump up the front one.

Now came the problem. Mr M is returning to the UK next week for a couple of days for a family funeral, and he badly needed to get to his planned destination that day, in order to pick up the hire car that was going to take him to the airport. And that town was two huge hills away. In the normal way of things he'd have limped on as best he could and done the ride the next day, but knowing that time was against him, that wasn't an option. The town was a four hour walk at least.

So, off he went. The ascent of the first hill was made in blistering 35C heat, then as he started down the descent, the heavens opened. By then Mr M reckoned that his only hope was to somehow find a passing cyclist and beg an inner tube off them. Or find a town, with a shop. However, no town, no cyclists, no shop. A Belgian car did stop and on hearing of his predicament said that they thought that there was a station nearby and that he might be able to travel from there.

Some time later, with no station in sight, what should heave into sight again, but the Belgian car. 'No', said the occupants;'there's no station after all - but can we give you a lift?' Which is exactly what they did, (Mr M says he felt quite guilty about messing up their car - what with an oiley, messy bike and him being covered in gravel and blood) but the elderly occupants were really good about it. I gather that the man had done some cycling in the alps in his younger days. So he got a lift as far as the hotel where they were staying, leaving Mr M one more hill to negotiate bfore he reached his destination.

Strange as he says, that Belgians have provided him with both the lowest and the highest spots of the trip so far.

Still , still some way to go, and he really did need to make good time. But how - with two knackered tyres? (By now he was pushing the bike). Well, coincidence of coincidences - when he was dropped at the Belgians' hotel, what should he see parked out in front, but a familiar minibus. He'd met a group of Brits the day before who'd been on one of these cycle tours when your luggage is transported ahead of you. He'd been talking to the driver about his ride then, and now, here he was again! Had he any spare inner tubes? No problem! So on rode Mr M, collected the car, and called me this evening from his hotel near Luchon.

So, what's all this about bears? Well, as he's been riding through the Pyrenees, Mr M has seen a number of messages scrawled on the rocks and fences Non aux ours Or even Oui aux ours scribbled through and replaced with Non. Strange. Until he remembered hearing reports about the current programme to release bears into the wild! There've been tremendous differences of opinion about this with farmers worrying about the possible danger to their animals.

Mr M reassures us that he has not yet met one of said bears; and even if he did, said bear was far more likely to be afraid of him than otherwise. I do hope that's true!