Foix

May 30, 2014

Montsegur, some rain, and a misstep

Last night Rachael whacked her toe, hard, against a sill in the doorway to the bathroom of our hotel room. It was very painful, a bit swollen, and a bit bruised. It doesn't seem broken, but we are of course worried about what this would mean for her ability to ride in the morning. Fortunately, this morning the swelling has gone down and she is comfortable in her cycling shoes so we decide to proceed as planned.

The day began easily enough, as we followed quiet roads through the villages south of Mirepoix. We took a small detour from our route at Lagarde, seduced by the evocative ruined castle above the village there. Shortly before noon we stopped at the first place large enough to have a store, Bastide La'Sur L'Hers, to pick up provisions for lunch. We were lucky in the timing - 5 minutes after Rachael left the charcuterie, the shutters came down for the midday closure.

The village proved to be a well placed refuge or us, because while Rachael was shopping it began sprinkling; and within another five minutes the rains came down in earnest. Fortunately, this is a Bastide village and directly across from the store is a large covered shelter, characteristic of Bastide towns. We wheeled our bikes across the street and set up shop in the shelter, staying there for about an hour as we ate our lunch and watched the rain. We had company - soon, a party out on a hike (4 adults, 5 or 6 children) dashed in also, and we were entertained watching them pass the time in a variety of tag-like games. One of the men wandered our way to check out our bikes and chat - he spoke excellent English - and we were surprised to hear that he had stayed in Portland/Vancouver a few years earlier in his work as an engineer for Hewlett-Packard.

By about one, conditions improved enough that we set out again; and although it still sprinkled off and on, in general conditions improved throughout the rest of the day. Next up on our route was the noteworthy climb to Montsegur, a village beneath the famous ruined Cathar castle. We were lucky in our timing and got a good view of the castle - the greeter at our hotel told us later in the day that it is typically buried in the clouds.

From Montsegur we enjoyed a fast 1700' drop and then began climbing again, up to Roquefixade - another village beneath another ruined Cathar castle. Then, a flattish ride to the outskirts of Foix, when we abruptly dropped 700 feet to the town.

In the room, we checked out Rachael's foot. It had been fine during the ride, but we were aghast to see how discolored it had grown during the day. We're anxiously waiting to see what it looks like in the morning.

Net elevation gain: 4,100' today, 48,300' total.

Video clips: Montsegur: https://onedrive.live.com/redir?resid=73ED18EEC8BA7424!551&authkey=!AKKCRmchdXF7fHA&ithint=video%2c.mp4 Approaching Foix: https://onedrive.live.com/redir?resid=73ED18EEC8BA7424!552&authkey=!ACQHhP1lfI3bebA&ithint=video%2c.mp4