Well that´s it I´m abroad. Breakfast is a croissant and jam and coffee.
It´s nice and early because I want to get to the south of France by tonight. I´ve set the sat nav to Montpellier by going down mainly pay roads but also with a couple of country bits.
I thought for some reason that now I was past Paris that it would be sunny and warm. Wrong it´s cold and dark. Oh well I´m on the bike and loving seeing the countryside around me.
As I´ve said the petrol stations are great because when you get to one it tells you how far the next three are so I was able to judge a lot better when I needed to stop for gas. Another good thing is about the services in France is that many of the have what are like picnic parking areas next to them so that you can fill up, get something to drink and then park up and you would not think that you are near a motorway.
I´ve now been on the road for about three hours when the sky becomes a lot darker so I pull in to one of these lovely picnic areas and put the water proof covers over my bags and cable tye a clear bag over the TomTom. Then just as I get to Lyon the heavens open. I don´t mean a drip or two but all of sudden I can´t see because there is as much water spraying up off the roads as there is coming down. A lorry came along side me on the left on the slip road and the water came right over the top of my legs. I was soaked!!!!
Now the sensible thing I here you say is pull in and wait for it to stop but this is me and I think it can´t last long cause I´m abroad and it´s August so I carry on. And I carry on and the rain doesn´t stop for 120miles. It did slow down after I had negotiated the city streets of Lyon.
I even stopped at a service station when I thought it had stopped, went to the loo, came out and it started again. Who would have believed it the storm was going my way!
Finally after the rain and completing 780 miles form home the sun came out!!
Now I was nearing my destination I had completed 380 of the 440 miles I was going to do today and I had dried out of the rain water and now I was wet with sweat! Can´t please some people!
I was quite chuffed with myself I had got to where I wanted to be and found a FirstHotel with a great room, with a toilet and shower!! Heaven! The guy understood a bit of English as well and gave me a room so that I could take the bike right to the door, throw the bags off and straight into the room. Brilliant. I had everything I need a shower and bed and it only cost 45euros. Cheap at half the price.
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