Goodness me, we’re heavy.

First blogpost in nearly a week, reflecting our gentle, slow progress from Saintes Maries de la Mer in the Camargue to Marseille (just to have been there, really), then up – in every sense of the word – north into Provence.

Where we’ve been staying with cousin Lal (her Rodier grandparents were my great-grandparents) and her still-sailing husband Christian (at 88, just back from skippering his yacht across the Atlantic, I ask you!) on the Western fringes of Provence with a direct view from their house to the summit of Mount Ventoux.

Which, this time with very heavily-laden Daisy, we’ve not climbed, as we did on solo electrics when last here seven years ago.

From Lal’s, we borrowed their car to drive out East for a couple of days deep into the Alps to visit Maggie Scorer, whom we last met at home in Sheringham in 2015 when we hosted her, her bike-with-trailer and her labrador Oscar in the back as they set out on, wait for it, a 5000-mile tour of the entire UK coastline.

Maggie’s been here in France for the best part of eight years, but, like us in her mid-70s, is now moving back to the UK, trading what must the most spectacular views of any dining room we’ve ever sat in for the grey and rainy coast of Eastern England.

On which subject, we’ve again, as last year in Germany, been extraordinarily blessed by the weather gods. Rainy today before setting off north from Lal, but vastly better cycling conditions this past month than we would have had if we’d stayed in England, with one of the wettest and coldest Mays/Junes in years.

Climate change, anyone?

One of the reasons we’ve slowed down this past week is the realisation (duh!) just how heavy and slow, even with our electric assist Pendix, we are in hills, of which there have been a LOT as we’ve circumnavigated Mount Ventoux.

So rather than cycling over to old Uni friend John’s near (hilly) St Etienne and then heading across (hilly again) to Geneva and up through Switzerland (more lumps…), we’re now pedalling pretty much straight north, along the Rhone (wines to die for, and of) through Lyon and Dijon towards Strasbourg.

About which more later, with probably another very long gap between blog posts.

In the meantime, a selection of the pix uploaded at last as we pause at an Ibis Budget alongside the Rhone,

Cousin Lal and Christian, with guests, outside their gorgeous, idiosyncratic Provence home where they’ve lived for 30 years now.
Jutta and Christian getting on well on an evening walk around beautiful Nyons.
Our view of the summit of Mount Ventoux from C&L’s place, telephoto.
Just desserts, a philosophical moment in Ventorol.
Cycling gloves a’drying
Arles Colisseum – one of the best preserved outside Rome, 2000 years old.
Arles towers – and note that now you see the cars.
And now you don’t. VERY clever Google Pixel editing.
Picturesque Arles streets with ugly van.
Ugly van editing out magically by very clever Google Pixel AI
The Arles hospital where Van Gogh was sectioned, as we would say today in the UK. He painted it of course beautifully.
Van Gogh’s cafe of the stars. Now closed, over tax evasion and leaving behind a slew of terrible reviews on Trip Advisor.
The famous Van Gogh starry sky Cafe sadly but deservedly dead.
Our luggage…
Daisy has behaved herself brilliantly on this trip. But occasionally, repair work is needed…
Poppies, and Mount Ventoux in the distance
The quite extraordinary view from Maggie’s dining room. For real.
Us outside our hotel in Marseille…
Gritty Marseille, where the Arc de Triomph is now a public toilet.

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