Menton to Saint-Laurent-du-Var

June 29, 2025

Two days ago in Nice, when Al bought his jersey, he was offered stickers for the cols he’d ridden. None of the climbs we’d done were in the selection (they were arranged in a fancy tea-bag box); all were local to Nice except Alpe d’Huez, which we’d skipped in favour of Col du Galibier. So he chose Col d’Èze since we were planning to climb it on our last day. Now we had to!

The challenge was going to be the weather. Today’s forecast high was 33°C in Menton and temperatures have not been dropping much at might, even next to the water. So we set the alarm for 5 and were on the road pedalling by 6:30.

The Col d’Èze sign is actually a bit below the high point of the ride and was about half way. We got there around 8:30, having made a few photo and regrouping stops.

Monte Carlo. We saw its underground train station and this view from above.

Èze, I think. Looks worth visiting on a future tour when the weather is more temperate.

Then it was a breezy descent all the way to Port Lympia.

I’ve been meaning to take a photo of a Route des Grande Alpes sign—we’ve seen plenty—but I don’t think I ever actually stopped to do it.

Lots of pleasure boats in Rade de Villefranche-sur-Mer

We turned on to the piste cyclable La Littorale with the intention of following it essentially all the way to our hotel. However, it was closed, physically blocked off and with police to enforce it, from near the war memorial. This was well before the Ironman start/finish/transition area , and the ride and run courses both head east from there, so I guess this extra couple of km of closure was because here was the last turnoff. We decided to walk our bikes on the wide pedestrian path, at least until we were out of sight of the cops.

It’s a very long beach down there and Ironman runs almost its full length.

We ended up walking a long way. The waterfront road was closed to vehicles, the piste cyclable was fenced off for use as the cycling course, and there were a lot of people milling about. There were also forklifts zipping up and down with big cardboard crates of racers’ transition gear, each individual’s stuff in a bag with their race number. We noticed that there were separate transitions for swim-bike and bike-run and later an area of bags with “street clothes” which we heard later is normal for Ironman events.

We don’t remember IM Canada in Penticton being quite so over-the-top, but that was probably 20 years ago. Definitely no forklifts!

Al’s photo of one end of the IM bike area. I think competitors parked their bikes and ran on a mat to another transition area get their shoes as they were running barefoot.

Once the fencing ended, there were orange cones designating the outbound and inbound IM cycle course.

We finally got far enough past the centre of events that the spectators were few and we could ride again. Of course, that ended as we neared the busy roads leading to the bridge across the Var because IM was routed on the cycle path. You can tell the quality of a cycle route when they can use it for an Ironman competition. Luckily, we weren’t the only non-competing cyclists do we followed others to find our way across the river. The route we intended west of Le Var was again taken for Ironman so we had to loop around a bit, arriving at our hotel at 10:30 for a 14:00 check-in time. It felt a lot later than 10:30!

We got our bike cases, safely delivered by La Poste and stored by the Ibis Styles Nice Cap3000 Aéroport and were offered space to pack our bikes in the hotel’s underground parking area. It was decently lit, not too hot, and essentially empty. We finished and brought everything up to the lobby with an hour to go before check-in time. We decided to wait and get cleaned up before heading across the street to the giant Cap3000 shopping centre to find something to eat. (Now you know why Cap3000 is in the hotel name. I’d been wondering too.) Sitting in the lobby, we were given access as soon as our room was ready, at 1:45.

The boxes looked almost like when we’d shipped them off in Lyon almost 6 weeks ago.

We got to the mall and wandered around looking for one of the promised 50 restaurants. It seems the word “restaurant” was used for anything that sold ready-to-eat food when claiming that there were 50. The first one we saw that looked like it offered proper meals said its kitchen was now closed. The second one was “nonstop” and had items that appealed to both of us so okay then. It was busy, perhaps because it was one of few or the only one still serving after 2 p.m.? It was only 2:30 but it *is* France (and our first time in a French shopping mall).

We were seated indoors, though we were offered the choice because this restaurant also had an outdoor terrace with a view of the sea. To give you an idea of how hot the day was, absolutely nobody was sitting outside. Inside was air-conditioned.

Al ordered a “smash burger” (we’ve been seeing these on menus everywhere on this trip and were wondering what they were) and I asked for salade burrata but was told it was sold out. Drat! Perhaps we shouldn’t have waited for our room and showered first! I guess I’ll have a smash burger too because I don’t usually care for the French version of Caesar salad.

Not what I really wanted for a last lunch in France: burgers and beer.

After lunch we wandered around the busy mall (air conditioned! and it’s Sunday), where I bought a book for our granddaughter’s second birthday next month. It’s in French, of course, but was translated from English and it’s definitely North American!

Just a hint that we think our granddaughter should enter French Immersion when the time comes.

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Today's ride: 41 km (25 miles)
Total: 1,313 km (815 miles)

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