Rain: Rest day in Albi

August 4, 2015

The rain today came as welcome relief from the heat of yesterday. I quickly decided that I was going nowhere, and would instead take a day off to do errands. First up, laundry. Then to the permanence to try to get a price for a custom built touring bike. Most of the constructors don't want to really talk about what I want, but rather about what they want to build. But I did find one builder who promised to give me a quote, as soon as the Semaine was over and his repair business died down to manageable levels. So I gave him my shopping list, and went off to find lunch.

The airfield cum campground had a restaurant called Mc Adams, and the kind people there set me up with wifi and beer. Lunch was melon with slices of Parma ham, escalope of turkey in sauce Provençal, and tarte aux pommes for dessert. Then back to the tent for a nap. More wandering in the afternoon, meeting a few friends and looking at bike stuff. Dinner again with friends, salad, veal cutlet, cheese and tarte again. Easy day, all,around, which I badly needed.

Meet Louis Romande. Louis is the founder of Randonneurs sans Frontiers, a confrerie of Cyclo-voyageurs. At the tender age of 85 he has "only" done about 10,000 km this year (last year he did 12,000). His annual spring trip to Spain was interrupted by a train trip because all the passes through the Pyrenees were closed by snow.

This is the younger of Henri Bosc's two bikes. It's a 1966 Alex Singer randonneuse, hand built to order, of course. The older bike is a 1954 Rene Herse randonneuse, but Henri decided not to bring it this year. I couldn't get Henri to pose for a picture, but he is well known as the apostle of the 650B, the wheel size of these marvelous old bikes. Jan Heine of Bicycle Quarterly fame is a convert to that style of cycling. Oh, yes. Henri hasn't missed a Semaine fererale since 1956.

There are always a lot of foreigners at the Semaine federale, hence it is called the Semaine federale internationale. The largest contingent is from England. And the English have a certain reputation. You will guess what it is when I tell you that the bottles in this picture were accumulated by two Englishmen of my acquaintance in just three days.

Today's ride: 18 km (11 miles)
Total: 776 km (482 miles)

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