Note to Teresa
Back to work now, you're not being paid to read this rubbish! ;-)

Saturday 17th May - Saint Marie de la Mer to St Mitre les Remparts

A great morning's ride across and through the heart of the Camargue; generally very good riding but just with a few wind-blown sandy sections that needed a little ploughing through!

Real pink flamingos in evidence today. Some fast busy roads followed the crossing of the Petit Rhone by Bac but, tails were up today and we finished ahead of our notional programme at Camping Sarl Felix de la Bastide.

Dutch owned and inspired, it has possibly the best atmosphere of all the sites we've stayed at and, probably worth a revisit for the hospitality alone! Our traveling exploits seemed to quickly circulate the site and local celebrity ensued.

Friday 16th May - Aigues Mortes to Saint Marie de la Mer

As we were just ahead of our original programme (and after the previous day's trials), we decided to have a leisurely morning in Aigues Mortes (walled city blah blah blah - but beautiful ;-)). 

It turns out, Lot's wife was a much bigger girl than any of us could've imagined!

There was a moment when Andy was desperately trying to helpfully remove himself from a German lady's photo shot, only to finally realise that as she continued to pan around, he (or more likely his ludicrous luggage) was her chosen muse ;-)

Turned out to be one of our best cycling days yet. Saint Marie de la Mer appeared to be having its own version of the Appleby Horse Fair so, campsite options without  a chrome encrusted caravan were somewhat limited but, it transpired that for others, there was a fantastic site down the road where a pink flamingo would spit into your swimming pool at no extra cost!

Thursday 15th May - Marseillan Plage to Aigues Mortes
(Confessions of an early rising camper)

Getting up early can be a bit of a chore sometimes; this morning I rose to see a member of the campsite staff (oblivious in their chalet) preparing for the working day ahead. Ordinarily bathrooms have opaque windows but such luxuries may need to be spared in straitened economic times. In her naked mode she applied her make-up in a small retracting mirror, while the peripheral vision remained mine to behold :-) (She was a little less blousey than as she appeared later on reception)

Great start to the ride on a voie verte to Sete (a boardwalk for Otis Redding to be proud of).
A head wind gusting 40-50mph thereafter provided a little more focus for our potential 'f'ing and blinding!!! Hence the lack of photography for the day!

Later, dodged a snake!

Ultimately, arrived at an excellent campsite where reception thought we looked a little knackered! 

Wednesday 14th May - Mirepeisset to Marseillan Plage - Club Med 50-51

This was to be our final day on the Canal du Midi proper (in parts). En route to Beziers we linked with the canal a few times but also took advantage of some swifter and smoother road options to keep progress moving along.

Approaching Beziers we linked more fully just before its fabled Nine Locks. Now we all know that guide book writers need to inject some hyperbole along the way (how else would their toil be recompensed) but a 'great wonder' of the canal might be stretching it a little. Very fine, relatively impressing but, certainly nothing that Foxton Locks couldn't knock into a cocked hat (and have a couple of pubs up its sleeve to boot!)
Branch out UNESCO! 

Heard our second "he's loaded" comment of the trip from a British tourist; how some people can read blood/alcohol levels at a distance I'll never know - I was certain the bottle of Pastis had gone down un-noticed at breakfast!

Largely great riding through to the Med from Beziers save for those moments when obstacles conspired to put back muscles out!

Reaching the Med has felt like one of the biggest milestones of the journey - close to home but with a few of the toughest days yet to come. There was a certain mathematical symmetry with our campsite location; 50m from the sea and 50 miles from anywhere that you could get a tent peg in the ground!

We took the little liberty of toasting ourselves on the beach ;-)

Tuesday 13th May - Carcassonne to Mirepeisset  - The Rough with the Flat!

The canal route out of Carcassonne was much as the guide books had suggested; pretty good surfacing (in the relative context) for the first 15km then 'chemin as you find it'. It was a great day's riding on reflection but, some of the hardest going we've yet experienced through seemingly level terrain. When we stopped for lunch at a lock, we found that in the 'snack-bag' on the trailer, vibrations on the trail had been such that the lid had come off the salt pot and every grain had been thrown out of the holes.

That the Canal du Midi is beautiful there is no doubt, that it is a promotable cycle route there is a little more doubt, that it is a UNESCO World Heritage Site is in no dispute - that UNESCO is headquartered in France is no coincidence?!

We left the canal about two-thirds through the day, in part because our obvious camping option was off route but also due to the atrocious surfacing and the need to concentrate entirely on the approaching metres of terrain.

It turned out to be a blessing in disguise, as the canal can fix you in a very narrow visual corridor; the 'escape' into the countryside was a real additional treat. 

The Road to Royan

We have a few video clips of the trail in the can but have struggled to get them uploaded while en route.
Our Cinematographer back home (thanks Budge) has passed this fit to share. We'll try to add more when we can but that might end up being at journey's end.

You can paste the YouTube link - http://youtu.be/XINwb6xDulE

The link has also been added as a page on the blog so you can hopefully link directly from here.