June 9, 2019
Évian les Bains to Montreux
A Wet One: What a Difference a Day Makes
Last night we sat on the edge of the lake before dinner and had a drink while enjoying the Évian les Bains Festival. Then we ate dinner on an outdoor terrace overlooking the lake. I was in a tee shirt. No sweater needed. The sky was blue, the weather was perfect.
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We didn’t get back to the hotel until 10 PM (which is why these pictures are in today’s entry) and it was a beautiful evening.
We knew the weather forecast was to change, but we were a little surprised when we woke up to rain. The forecast had become a little more grim overnight. We relaxed over breakfast, chatted with the lovely couple next to us, and watched the rain. We discussed simply taking the ferry to Lausanne, finding a hotel and spending the afternoon at the Olympic Museum.
We actually rode down to the ferry in the rain to check the schedule and our luck was good. The ferry was leaving in a few minutes. We made the bone headed decision NOT to take it and ride to north of Montreux instead. How bad could it be?
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As it turns out, it was a major test of the wet gear day. It really rained. Non stop. Not sprinkled, not gentle rain, it was big bounce off the road rain. Steadily. Sheesh. At least I have shoe covers, so my feet were warm and dry which makes a huge difference. Keith resists buying a pair and then when it rains like this says “I should have bought shoe covers.” It makes me laugh every time. His shoes weighed about 2 kilo each by the time we got to the hotel.
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Then we had a navigation conundrum. We were on a huge bridge headed for the Autoroute. We could see our bike route, but couldn’t figure out how to get to it. There was a canal between us and the bike path. Keith is really missing Open Cycle Maps. We spent some time on the bridge (in the pouring rain) trying to figure it out. We thought we would be able to see where we went wrong from up there. That didn’t work. Swimming was looking like an option, which wouldn’t have really mattered as we couldn’t have been much wetter. Then we bailed to below the bridge, where at least we were out of the rain. There we found the tunnel under the train tracks, the bridge over the canal, and we were back on track.
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After that we flew into Montreux where we ate lunch in a restaurant. It was not picnic weather. We also made a mutual decision that epic though the day had been, the smart thing to do was stop. I had been teasing Keith for the last 10 km about what I was willing to pay for a Montreux hotel room and it went up about 50 dollars a km. As we left the restaurant he turned to me and said “Let’s go find a campsite.” Oh my goodness he makes me laugh.
So we are warm and comfortable in the Hotel Tralala. It is terrific. If the rain stops we may go hunt down Freddy Mercury. Queen had a studio here and made seven albums in Montreux. We saw him two years ago when we were here, but have a renewed interest since the movie.
An interesting issue is that this weather has settled in for a few days all over France and Switzerland. I said to Keith we should take the train somewhere and he said where?? I suggested Avignon, our standard joke, but the forecast there is for rain on Monday and Tuesday as well. It is also in completely the wrong direction of course.
So tomorrow we shall see. We are certainly going to be riding, and we don’t see how it could possibly be a repeat of today, but we have read that optimistic people are actually delusional 😂🤣😂.
That last spike was the ride/hike to the Hotel Tralala. It was virtually straight up from the lakefront. It is 7 in the evening here and dark and raining. Freddy Mercury may have to wait until our next visit. We are going to investigate the hotel bar!
Today's ride: 43 km (27 miles)
Total: 2,103 km (1,306 miles)
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