Day 20 - Lacanau Ocean 85 kms - " The Atlantic Section All Dished Up"!

Kev and I were still recovering from last nights massive ice cream cone fest when we gathered our possessions together, said goodbye to our friendly hosts and made our way a couple of kms around to Royans ferry departure point to La Verdon sur Mer an Isthmus only 20th minutes away by ferry but  100+ kms by car !

Crossing over we disembarked to the tune of a brightening day starting on a beautiful bike trail that ran aside some long forgotten railway.

After a short distance we entered Soulac ser Mer passing on the outskirts a copy of the Statue of liberty some suggest made by the original designer in Bordeaux, taken down by the Germans in WW2 and later on miracuously found. It also celebrates the famous French general Lafayette who passed this way in 1777 to take part in the American war of independence.

We had coffee at Soulac and found a baquette shop for later sustenance before departing and almost immediately losing Noel. Sending Kev back to find him was risky but successful. The wayward Wolstencroft reckoned he'd got stuck behind a couple of cars.

We finally escaped to the countryside on good quality roads that helped us to maintain a lively 25km + speed for numerous kms to the town of Vendays Montalivet where we had lunch in a quiet setting opposite the church.

H sussing out the local toilets came back traumatised after visiting the church having found the toilets were Asian squat types - for what purpose we don't know but we thought it a good idea to hit the road again setting off towards the coast on a combination of forest cycle trails through reforested areas.

Here we picked up one of the most unusual bike paths we'd ever ridden on. Quite simply just a narrow concrete channel barely big enough for a single bike. The path weaved itself through out the forest and was magical in parts and rough as hell in others !

Forest track !

We decided to place the group's most expendable rider Noel up front figuring that we could always get another treasurer if things went wrong !  The danger to Noel was two fold 1) suddenly meeting someone coming the other way when rounding a corner 2) ploughing into an unforeseen pothole !

Kev recreates Noels' loss of control !

While Noel did well avoiding no.1 he didnt't do so well at no.2 hitting a broken section of concrete filled with sand ! Wearing sunglasses in the forest he had about 1/4 of a second to realise that his next few moments were going to be filled with pain ! Survive he did although he ensured for the rest of the day that Rick took over the dangerous point duty role ! 

Near Lacanau Ocean

After a fair bit of collective complaining the boys finally rode on to a much better surface into the sea side resort town of Lacanau Ocean. 

Finding our way to our appartments may have been been challenging but not half as much as the check in process was. After signing over our next of kin as a deposit H our minister for hotels / accommodation and general mischief, communicated with the lady at the reception that we wanted a secure area to store our bikes. When she offered us a room H thought she meant our hotel room and quickly said no!

Her next option was to allocate us at cost (5 euros) effectively a large closet place hidden in the cellar area of our apartment down a narrow confined corridor.

To say it was claustrophobic was an understatement and when the lights went off both Noel and i quickly retreated leaving Rick to disassemble his bike to fit it in !

Finally with bikes put away it was time to take relax by stacking up with supplies from our nearby supermarket knowing that tomorrow is a rest day and there are laundry facilities to be had !

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