Even though there was no need to rush our usual system still took affect - Rick wakes up, Rick makes enough noise to wake Noel up, I wake up , I can't make enough noise to wake Henley up so usually have to throw things at him which results in returns of verbal abuse. Rick and Noel go to breakfast, I follow then Henley drags himself along barely awake ... the system had been in place and working well now for over 5 weeks !
We were up taking a relaxed breakfast and debating what type of finery we should wear for our parade into Nice , stinky bike gear or stinky grease / mud covered bike gear !
With the decision made we packed and then made some emergency repairs to my bike - a few cable ties to stop the broken pannier rack arm lowering any further then a unique double cable tie holding the rack up under the seat post just in case the weakened side (damaged when we tried to straighten it) should give way and drop on my rear tyre and act like one pretty damned good brake !
With repairs signed off by our in house Engineer (well Noel told me he was qualified) and reviewed by our technical expert Henley in his Stevie Wonder glasses it was time to set off for our final leg.
Rick led us off on a bike path from the hotel to join up with the famed Nice Promenade with views of the beautiful Azure coloured waters of Nice. After 2,500 km's we were finally here !
We had managed this pretty effortlessly other than one turn where Noel threatened to take us on to an expressway and were soon parading down the promenade into a stiff headwind wondering where all the celebrities had gone who were meant to be welcoming us into town !.
We made slow progress on the bike path enjoying the views while also enjoying not being on the road before we arrived at Nice Airport where our first challenge of the day started. Pick up our hire car, pack 2 bikes into it and send Noel and Kev on to our hotel by bike while Rick and I navigated by car to the same destination only 6-7 kms away - simple !!!
If you have ever entered an airport you'll have noticed that they have millions of signs making driving let alone cycling to a particular spot difficult. What made Nice Airport and for that matter as we later found out later most of Nice a nightmare, was that the city is in the midst of building itself a tram line straight through the city to the airport.
Somehow we negotiated our way in traffic through the extensive works to the Car Hire companies in Terminal 1 to be told that we needed to be at Terminal 2. Cycling to T2 was busier again requiring you to best space yourself between moving cars and go for it. I soon became separated from the guys following. I navigated my way to T2 somehow ending in the wrong lane and having to lift my bike over a barrier to reach the arrivals / car hire section and wait.
Waiting for what seemed like a fair amount of time and wondering where the other guys were I suddenly heard Noels voice from above. Somehow the guys had ended up taking the pick up / drop off ramp and were now on Level 1 in the Departures area !
After they got their way down Kev and I went and did a quick recon to make sure our car was suitable for 2 bikes and our potential bike boxes. The words Kev and navigation don't go well together so it was time for us to split up. We bid adieu to Noel and Kev sending them on their way by bike while Rick and i went by car having loaded up our car with our disassembled bikes.
A statement of how bad Nice's road system is with regard to traffic works is that by the time we'd navigated through Nice's mess Noel and Kev were already at our hotel - the only problem now was there was not a spare inch anywhere to park so were relying on Kev to get our car park authorisation for the next door public / private car park!
Somehow the instructions that Kev got from the front desk became less and less clear the further underground we went into the narrow laned car park.
By level 4 we were somehow required to activate a full length door with a key card and a key pad. After rolling the car numerous times over the sensor plate and waiving the key card around aimlessly we finally got down the " I do not speak english" car park attendant to greatly complicate the matter.
After much angst we somehow understood that we had to hold the key card against the key pad while activating the ground sensor and voila the door finally opened !
By level 4 we were somehow required to activate a full length door with a key card and a key pad. After rolling the car numerous times over the sensor plate and waiving the key card around aimlessly we finally got down the " I do not speak english" car park attendant to greatly complicate the matter.
After much angst we somehow understood that we had to hold the key card against the key pad while activating the ground sensor and voila the door finally opened !
After pulling out all our gear and disassembled bikes we took them up to our room and headed out for a coffee co-incendentally near a bike store where we scored luckily our first bike box - now only 3 more needed !
It was time now for Kev (our resident bike box expert) and self to head through Nice's nightmare traffic in search of 3 more bike boxes !
Nightmare it was, complicated by a big soccer match scheduled in Nice but H successfully navigated us to a bike store some 10 kms away. While he raced inside I had to roll back and forth in the stores drive way as there absolutely nowhere to park.
With no result from store 1 (They'd had their boxes picked up mid week) it was around the corner to another large store. This time H scored securing a very large e bike box but only after having to pay a 10 Euros ($15) ransom for it. Extortion it might have been but at least we had a fall back option if we got desperate.
Exhausted after all the running around we arrived back at our hotel negotiating peak hour traffic. We rested up before heading down to a local restaurant to celebrate the completion of an amazing tour (more to come)
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