Anthony Bourdain:   “If I am an advocate for anything, it is to move.  As far as you can, as much as you can.” 

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On the road again! We are excited to be jumping into early summer weather with  gorgeous scenery, sandy beaches and the laid-back pace of southern France.

In the fall we left our bicycles in Toulouse, so after a brief stop in Paris and a quick TGV ride we will be back in the “Pink City” of Toulouse with its gorgeous terra-cotta brick buildings blanketed in southern sunshine.  Departure day is April 24th.

This trip will be our longest to date at three and a half months.  We will cycle across a big chunk of France, take the train to Northern Germany and start cycling again at the border of Denmark, then on to Sweden and Norway before flying to England.

What a variety of scenery: the Mediterranean coast, Provence, the Rhone, Alsace, the coasts of Denmark and Sweden, the fjords of Norway and final cycling days between London and Oxford.  We can’t wait!

We are a bit more casual on the preparations for this trip, hopefully the experience from our previous tours will aide to transition from city life to nomads on bikes living outdoors.  We are comforted by the fact that most of what we need is already in France, except for our camping gear.   After two trips in which we have stayed in small hotels and B&Bs through Portugal, Spain, the Pyrenees and the river valleys close to Toulouse, we will be back in our tent.  We love that France is so well set up for camping -in great locations and not expensive.  As always, when there’s rain in the forecast, we can book into a hotel for a comfy bed.

If we haven’t been doing detailed trip planning, we have been doing lots of reading and dreaming about where we are going… but we haven’t got beyond France.   Interestingly, a lot of our perusal is about the delectable opportunities that Europe provides for the palate.   Steve’s been chuckling over his serendipitous library find, Dirt by Bill Buford, about the gastronomic food scene in Lyon.  Ann is ready for Provence with Peter Mayle’s A-Z Provence with its entertaining list of cuisine and local facts.  She’s looking forward to trying such things as: Anchoiade, “a fiery, fishy delicious purée”, Banon “a noble goat cheese which must lie-entirely covered in chestnut leaves that are secured with raffia to form a kind of rustic gift-wrapping" and a Bouillabaisse, “preferably of the Marseille variety, variously described as a soup of gold, a mystical experience, a magical synthesis, beach food, a divine seduction, or the reason God invented fish”.   Anthony Bourdain’s books are the source of wise quotes about travel that have been great to reread (as the quote above) and Stanley Tucci’s Taste, My Life Through Food has given Ann a few new ideas for simple camp pasta dishes. She has two recipes ready to go, Pasta Fagioli with cannellini beans and marinara sauce and Spaghetti con Zucchini all Nerano with zucchini and three cups of Parmigiano-Reggiano.  (I’m not sure if Stanley would be impressed with the image of us trying to concoct some of his mother’s revered family dishes over a single butane burner.)

During this final week of preparation we want to review the books and maps of Scandinavia before they go back to the library, but if not, we’ll just have to hope that everything turns out fine, as it usually does on our trips.

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Patrick O'HaraI hope you have a side trip planned through the Verdon Gorge. Plus, Moustiers-Sainte-Marie is a town not to be missed.
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