TOUR de FRANCE - Phil & Jill

It all started on the walk from the station to La Provence - the name of our apartment here in Colmar. Phil saw the yellow banner saying that the Tour will pass through Colmar on Wednesday, 10th July. We had seen yellow bikes all over the station too but had no idea of the significance. Sadly we will miss the actual tour by a few days.

Then as we have been strolling around there are banners, notices, novelty displays everywhere.

Then he found this mug saying in French....The man, the myth; The cyclist - the legend!!!

So one thing led to another and he found himself here......and met Lucas

Then 2 electric bikes went out the door for a day's riding with the priviso that Phil could manage the pain. The minute I got on the bike I could tell how responsive it was to the Bosch mechanism. Well it didn't take long and roadworks barred the way out of town. An elderly lady slowed down on her bike and I said that we were lost and explained where we wanted to go. She thought we were German and was surprised when we said Australian. She examined the map carefully with Phil and then in very fast French explained left, right, left etc and then ssid 'suivre moi'....Phil was dumbfounded at the French but I quickly said..
Come on let's go. She said....follow me!! Just like old times. Right person at the right time. She took us to start of Rue Than which we knew led us to the Canal de Colmar.

We have ridden in this area before 6 years ago coming from Basel in Switzerland which was only another 79 kms from where we rode to today, to Neuf-Briesach. So although heading in that direction we headed to the village of Marckolsheim instead to see new country and chasing the memorial of the Maginot Line.

It is too hard to describe how we felt riding along together on an all familiar canal voie verte - bike path which used to be the tow path where horses pulled the boats laden with produce to wherever the market was for that particular load. It was flat, good surface on a sunny day, with beautiful reflections along the way. What a dream come true!!

We saw and heard lots of nature-birds dinging in the trees, families of swans, cormarant, families of ducks and the winner - a deer which had been drinking in the canal ran right in front of Phil back into the forest and to her waiting foal. I was lucky to see both mother and baby.

A couple of boats passed us too. One just a guy having a quiet cruise diwn the cansl and the other a full day river cruiser which appeared that all the clients were having a gourmet meal. This prompted us to have lunch too and we found just the right seat in the shade with a beautiful view and pulled out our fresh baguette to have a picnic lunch canalside.

We reached our designated village but the signposts to the Maginot Line memorial didn't have any signage so after going about 5kms on and still nothing we decided to turn back and not get sucked in just going and going. As a
reward for his super human effort Phil had afternoon tea in style - a lovely lemon meringue pie at the prettiest lock house cafe we found on route - Cafe La Coccinelle. What a delight.

As I am sure you are aware the Alsace area has historically changed hands between France and Germany. Most of the town names are in German. We did catch up with Eurovelo 15 (an old favourite); and a St James pilgrim path sign.

After the delicious afternoon tea we ambled back to Colmar with Phil using all the attributes of the electric assist to get him along and complete 42kms - his own Tour de France. Tonight panadol is God's gift to Phil but he is well pleased with himself that he has found the strength to do one of the greatest joys of his life - ride a bike freely along a French canal. A bonus day!! Yeah!!