Ballard's Tour de France: June 9, 2014: Provence Bike Tour

Our bike routes this week are going to take us to small hill towns in the Alpille ("little Alps") and Luberon mountains. Today we rode to St. Remy with an optional 13 km ride to Abbaye de Frigolet. We met for "route rap" at 8:15 this morning and were on our bikes and on the road by 8:40. Our basic loop to St. Remy was only 25 miles (hilly, of course) so Becky and I decided to also do the optional loop to Abbaye de Frigolet. The problem was we needed to be at the 21 km point on our route by 9:30 or there was a very good possibility we would miss the 11:15 olive oil tour and tasting.

Becky and I screamed out of the hotel parking lot so we would be sure to make the 9:30 cut-off which, in retrospect, was probably not the best idea, since we missed a few turns along the way and lost precious time. We got to our 21 km point at @ 9:45 where the two other guys who were going to ride the loop with us, Rob and Don, were waiting. These two are very good riders and took off at an 18-20 mph pace. We kept up with them (for the most part), but my legs were feeling it by the time we got to the top of the hill at the Abbey. By that time it was 10:10 and, in order to make the 11:15 tour, Sara had recommended we leave by 10:20. We wanted to explore the Abbey since it was quite picturesque and subsequently didn't get back on our bikes until 10:40. Again, we screamed down the hill and rode 18-20 mph on the flat roads, and we made it to Moulin du Calanquet for our olive oil tour only a few minutes late.

Along the way, we caught up with three other riders from our group, one being Mary, who had gotten separated from the rest of the group and found herself lost somewhere on the road to Avignon. Thank goodness, she had the contact numbers for Sara, Pablo and Maud (our support van driver) and Maud was able to find her and drop her off with another couple in our group so she could ride the rest of the way in with them.

We had a picnic lunch in the olive grove after the tour and tasting (these picnic lunches are always a treat) and then got back on our bikes to ride the rest of the way to St. Remy, where we visited the psychiatric hospital, Saint-Paul de Mausole (previously a cloister), where Vincent van Gogh stayed for a year. After the tour, we could either shuttle or ride back to the hotel. Rich had already decided to shuttle back. Becky and Jerry rode back and Lee, Mary and I went in search of a gelato before heading back via shuttle.

In the evening, we met on the patio for pastis, a French liquor similar to ouzo or sambuco, and a game of petanque (like bocce ball). We divided into teams, men versus women, and the women won! All in all, a very good day.