If you never experience anything like what hit us half an hour ago at the TDF time trial, it’s not something you should wish for. Rain, hail, thunder… And suddenly much colder… Thankfully we chose to watch this stage from a small town (Saint Apollinaire) so the sides of buildings provided some shelter. But wow, this place was transformed and only now it feels hospitable. Pretty wild here in France!

The paragraph above was posted while on-scene, trying to type on an iPhone keypad in pouring rain & hail and discovering that it doesn’t work so well under those conditions! Fortunately, that was only a small part of the day, a day which began at a fairly-reasonable hour, setting the alarm for 7:35am, out of the hotel by about 8:20, a bit later than planned, but not too bad. Breakfast down the road at a bakery, then an 80 mile or so drive over twisty mountain roads to Gap, where we left our car at the train station and headed out by bike to the time trial course.

Why leave the car at a train station? Because we thought we might be taking the train back rather than riding, but that’s not how it worked out in the end. After the race, we arrived at the station at 6pm, an earlier train had left at 5:45pm and the next one not until 7-something. Since it’s only 10 rolling miles to Gap, we braved the next incoming storm and got back a whole lot faster than our ride out.

Today was our “option” day; the ‘Tour isn’t passing by close enough to make it practical to see (and we’re going to get plenty of ‘Tour viewing in the next 5 days straight!) so instead we chose to do a ride local to the Grenoble environs, something we could ride directly from our hotel to. And if anybody ever gets the idea I’d rather avoid driving, they’re right!

We’re staying a few miles out of town, in St Egreve, nestled in a valley between the Vercors and… something else. We’ve ridden the Vercors; we’ve seen the steep stuff on the other side, and wondered why there weren’t roads going up there. A quick check of mapmyride and strava confirmed my worst fears. There are roads going up there, but very few people ride them. Why? I guess it depends how you like your roads. If you enjoy Sonora Pass, Ventoux, Redwood Gulch, China Grade… then D105 up to the Col de la Charmette might be for you!

First a trip to one of the few bakeries in this town, for breakfast and “spare” cokes to bring with us for refueling. Next a stop to pick up more sunscreen, and then the main event. Up, up, up and more up. I’ll have photos soon but ran out of time for this entry due to having to plan tomorrows big day at the time trial. But we survived, had a good time, and downed more coke, orange juice, water and lemonade than you would have thought possible. So yes, we’re staying hydrated.