Day 107: Vesoul to Abigny sous Varennes

June 2, 2023

Hills, Hay and Headwind

“I want to have an éclair everyday!” Patrick declared when we entered France and so far no luck until today. Patrick says when he comes out of the boulangerie with two eclairs, “The coffee is just here on the corner,” he adds. Success in Port sur Saone

In the morning we have breakfast with Catherine and a friend who’s in town for a music performance. We say our goodbyes just before 8 and head out towards downtown Vesoul. Ride with GPS has a good route figured out for us, it is just very convoluted with many twists and turns requiring Patrick to check the tablet frequently.

Looks like a "bike rodeo" to teach kids to ride bikes

Eventually we exit the city and get back in to the countryside. We cross a highway a couple of times before descending to a small town on the Saone River. There is a boulangerie and coffee place a few shops away, we enjoy our first eclairs in France! We cross the Saone and start another climb. There are at least 4 major climbs today. Sometime today we will cross the French continental divide where the water flows south to the Mediterranean and north/west towards the North Sea, we have no idea where though, there are too many hills today.

1994, toasting with eclairs Patrick's reaching 40,000km completing RTW.

The ride is very nice though, mostly on quiet rural roads, some only a car width wide. We pass through several small towns, none of them have anything except houses and old Chateaus, and in some we don’t even see people. There are a lot of large farmhouses abandoned. “There are hay bales as far as the eye can see,” Patrick declares. Farmers are hard at work mowing, piling the hay in long rows and then rolling into big round bales.

There's a bench and shade, we decide to stop for a food break

We miss our turn by about 75 meters back, but we get to see the Abbaye de Cherlieu

The wind is partly against us today, we struggle for a bit, then get a tailwind, then turn again with a headwind. By the time we get close to our destination it has become tough. RWGPS has given us a very nice route today, except for one hiccough where we are sent into a farmer’s field on a track that dead-ends at a large ditch. We have to backtrack several kilometers.

"We are about 10km away to the campground," Patrick says. Ride GPS sent us this way.

Except RideGPS sends us down this road.....

.....that ends in a farmer's field......

Patrick checks out the road, only there's a big ditch at the end. So we backtrack to the main road and go a longer way.

The campground tonight is in a small village with no shops at all. We found it on Googlemaps and are happy that it actually exists. The field is behind a large old farmhouse, there is nobody at the restaurant/reception when we arrive, but plenty of posted instructions. We find shade under a walnut tree and take our showers. A plug-in in the restroom lets us charge our tablet. With the complicated route we are relying on our tablet and GPS, but it has been difficult to find charging places in campgrounds. You either buy electricity for your camper, or there is nothing.

“The café is open, do you want something to drink?” says the man to Rachel as she leaves the shower building. It’s a little after three and he is the owner of the camping. Rob is Dutch and has had this campground for two years now. There are many Dutch in the valley. We are given the traditional glass of “champagne”, “it’s bubbly but not the real champagne,” he says. We chat with him for a while and listen to music streaming that Patrick says to Rachel, “this is your music” as it’s from the 60s, 70s, and 80s. And there is WiFi!

He checks us in and explains the tally sheet for us to keep track of what drinks we might help ourselves, gives the rules of the campground and where we can pitch our tent. Usually a request for a meal would need to be placed the day before arrival; he has agreed to fix us dinner tonight. We still have our emergency meal but would like to keep it as the next 3 days we are camping where there will not be anything nearby. Rachel has carried it from the beginning, so why not for a few days more.

View from campground the church not on the top of the hill, but the higher point above the town in the valley.

We are the only guests in the campground. Across the road in a field we see horses and llamas, in the other direction the church in the town. “The clock on the church had been broken, and I didn’t realize how much I relied on the ringing,” Rob says as we hear the time of day broadcast. At 7pm, the church bells ring and ring. Rob’s wife explains in the old days the bells would ring a long time at noon and 7pm to let those working in the fields know to stop and have a meal.

Dinner is awesome: salad, a Thai vegetable/rice dish and ice cream for dessert.

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Today's ride: 72 km (45 miles)
Total: 4,335 km (2,692 miles)

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