Two years ago, a friend got me into cycling and watching the Tour de France. This year I am in London. At the last minute, Kevin and I decided to go to France to see the Tour. Originally, we had only planned to see the last stage at the Champs Elysees, but on the day before heading to Paris we started looking at the train schedule going to Nantes for Stage 19, the individual time trial. On the morning we left for Paris, we only had our flight tickets to Paris and hotel reservation in Paris, but nothing to Nantes.
Like many other people, we were so looking forward to see Lance Armstrong succeed in his 5th consecutive win on the Tour de France. Stage 19 was a very important stage for Armstrong this year as his strongest competitor was very close behind him with the overall time. While Armstrong was racing for his yellow jersey, Kevin and I were racing against time, finding our way to the train station, wondering where the race was in the city of Nantes, and wondering if we could find a hotel to stay in Nantes.
The weather on that day was terrible: rain was all we had. We had our umbrellas, but a rain coat or Gore-Tex jacket would be more ideal for being a spectator. Of course, Kevin and I didn’t pack for the occasion. Kevin’s wind breaker is not water resistant and I had a Gore-Tex jacket, but I left it in Vancouver, so I didn’t have proper clothing with me, either. Even before the end of the race, Kevin and I were soaking wet despite having our umbrellas. Our shoes were covered with mud … it wasn’t pleasant at all. But despite all that, we had a pretty good spot to see most of the cyclists after the finish line. I know they finished the race already, but since they slowed down, I could take some good pictures. Armstrong did well on his time trial.
Trying to be back to Paris as early as possible to get a good spot to see the Tour, we picked the earliest train ride. Poor Kevin had eye irritation from yesterday. My guess was that is was due to the rain, and since we were soaking wet from head to toe already, even if something had gotten into his eyes, he wouldn’t have been alerted to it until the irritation started. So after we got back to Paris, the first thing was finding a pharmacy to get some eye drops in hopes that they would solve the problem. Later, after we got to our hotel, Kevin’s eye hadn’t gotten any better, so we decided to visit the emergency. Of course, we weren’t lucky enough to get the right hospital on our first try, but we got to the right one after getting the directions from the first one. After some Metro rides, we got to Bastille for the hospital. As Kevin and I were debating whether we should go back to the hotel to rest his eyes or if I should go see the Tour without Kevin, we found out after the hospital visited that the Tour would be passing by the area. We had enough time to sit in a restaurant to have a quick lunch and got out; found a good spot to see the pre-tour advertisements before seeing Armstrong and other cyclists.
After watching the Tour at Bastille, we raced to Champs Elysees to see the finish. Of course, we didn’t know where the finish line was. Although we didn’t manage to see the excitement of the cyclists fighting to cross the finish line, we did manage to see the parade at the end, which was awesome. The wait was long, but we got in the front row (well I got in the front row) to see the wonderful parade celebrating the 100th Tour de France. We cheered for many of the previous Tour winners, and Armstrong winning his 5th Tour. Cyclists with their teams, each paraded down Av. Des Champs Elysees, waving at their fans. Our camera battery had decided to die on us right before the parade. Oh well … we were there all the way cheering for all the cyclists and enjoyed the wonderful parade.
Click here to see pictures….login: kevinguest; password: guest.
Wow! You two are quite the travelers I am vicariously living through your blog. Kevin hit the nail on the head when he referred to your travel journalism.