July 5, 2023
Rochefort-Samson to Cognin-les-Gorges
About 15 minutes after I headed to bed last night it started lightly drizzling so I messaged James to tell him to bring the trailer inside. Luckily he did this before it started bucketing down. A thunderstorm passed pretty much right over us and the simultaneous lightening and thunder woke Tobias. Its the first time that he's woken in fright of something and been able to communicate it with us. He said "mama hold on" when I put him back in his bed so I snuggled with him for a while.
It was clear again in the morning, though a little cooler. Tobias was happily occupied on the playground while we packed up. There were a couple of french kids older than him - maybe 7 and 3. The older one was incredibly gentle and very cautious on the big trampoline with Tobias. They seemed a bit confused by why none of us would communicate with them though.
Although the morning was mostly downhill, we started off climbing out of our campsite. The nearest bakery we found on the map wasn't for 12km and we hadn't gotten our order in for bread on time, so I was stoked when we came across an epicerie in Hostun and we stopped for bread and coffee. It was another 5km of descending to Saint-Nazair-en-Royans where we stopped for lunch. There was a nice looking place on the water and the menu on the board looked reasonable so we sat down and they brought us the menu and it was about 3x the price I expected. I went back and checked and realised that I had read the menu for the wrong restaurant. We used Tobias as an excuse to retreat and pick up sandwiches and treats from the bakery.
Back on the bikes we crossed the river then immediately hit a seriously steep climb and my choix Chantilly very nearly came back out the same way it went in. Thankfully once we reached the top it was nice riding away from the busy highway down below and we both agree (with hindsight) that it was worth it. The whole afternoon was spent riding through walnut orchards. We haven't really seen much walnut cultivation until today, and now it seems to be all we see.
Almost an hour into Tobias' nap, when he normally wakes up, I was descending and heard a very abnormal noise coming from my front wheel. I brakes as fast as I could and saw my fender cutting into my front wheel and watched my tyre deflate as I watched helplessly. I thought a walnut had caused my fender to flick up, but James had spotted a piece of metal with 2 nails sticking out which turned out to be the culprit. Conveniently we were just entering Saint-Romans so had a car park to spread out in. We managed to change the tyre and get on the road again all before Tobias woke up.
From Saint-Romans we descended down to cross the Isére river for the first time then we immediately hit another unexpectedly steep ascent. I was pleased Tobias was still asleep in the trailer. We descended gradually through more walnut orchards before crossing again near Izeron. The last stretch into Cognin-les-Gorges was pretty boring on a straight road through yet more walnut orchards with lots of traffic.
We stopped at the store for icecream and dinner supplies. Inspired by the days riding we had walnuts with beetroot and goats cheese and pasta because we still need some carbs. We are staying at a small farm camping just below the gorge with a very friendly owner. To Tobias' disappointment there was no playground or ride on mower, but he rode his bike around much more than he has recently.
Tomorrow is a longer day to Grenoble but we join the cycle route along the river and have significantly less climbing than we've faced over the last week. Its been beautiful, and worth it over a flatter, more boring, route. But we are both feeling it in our bodies and are ready for a rest day in Grenoble on Friday.
| Heart | 1 | Comment | 0 | Link |
Today's ride: 37 km (23 miles)
Total: 2,120 km (1,317 miles)
| Rate this entry's writing | Heart | 4 |
| Comment on this entry | Comment | 0 |