All that elevation we gained yesterday afternoon as we climbed our way to the top of the valley to our hotel we lost first thing in the morning. We went downhill for the first 3.5 km. We ran into a Route Barree sign, but simply ignored it, said cheery bonjours to the workers, who seemed not the least bit perturbed by our presence, and carried on.
We went right back down to the river and started up the other side of the valley. A nice 5 km climb to start the day! The legs were fresh though, and the CN strapped my handle bar bag (also known as the feed bag) to his rear rack to give me a break. It really helped. We played with the trucks again, but they were so respectful it was amazing. I am also getting so used to riding on the road I hardly notice them anymore.
That is the train station. A TGV pulled in as we stood there. Hmmmm. I wonder if he was going to Avignon? We were still going down at this point.
Oops. This guy didn't make the corner and took out a few branches. Approaching it we thought it was a goofy European parking job, but then we saw his front end.
We pulled over at a wide spot on the way down to take in the view. Look at those poor working stiffs on their way up who probably don't even notice it.
We stopped at Fort Ecluse to look at the lower fortress. The upper fortress is accessible to climbers but you need the equipment. Climbers were arriving as we were leaving. Unfortunately the lower fortress closed for restoration work at the end of August, reopening September 29th. It was pretty great to see from the outside though.
Then we had the Fort Ecluse tunnel to contend with. No way around, we had to go through. I do not like tunnels. The noise, the darkness, the narrowness, the fear of not being seen. Ugh. Unbelievably as we stood, with me psyching myself up for it, a car stopped, waved us through and held up traffic while we pedalled as hard as we could. So we only had noise from one side of the tunnel. If you have ever done it you know how unnerving that noise can be.
Looking back at the tunnel. Even Keith admitted his heart rate was up. Blessings to that kind man who made sure we were safe.
Then shortly after that we rejoined the Via Rhona. We stopped for lunch at a trailside bench and coming the other way was Ruthy from Oregon who is touring on her own for a week. She has jam! We enjoyed lunch together and compared notes on the route. We forgot to take her picture!
This squeaky, noisy freight train came by to disturb our peaceful lunch today.
After lunch the ride was lovely for a fair piece. We did swoop down into the valley again...it was glorious, but we knew we were going to pay for it! We also realized Ruthy must have just climbed up that section.
Meeting them on the bridge. We did a quick exchange of the usual details, squeezed by each other with a lot of laughter and away we went in opposite directions.
Once back on the proper trail the riding wasn't exactly easy...it was almost all up, but the bike path was great and we knew we were close to our goal of Archamps. We climbed almost 3000 feet today (sounds more impressive than 900 metres) and we were ready to relax.
