Day: 16
Route: from Chartres to Paris (and back) by train!
Distance: 0 miles
Height: 0 ft ascent
Time in saddle: 0hrs 0mins (for us at least)
We had heard that there were some other cyclists pottering around France so we decided to intercept them on our rest day...meaning we just spent today in Paris.
An early start, an early trip to the boulangerie and an early train saw us arrive in Paris in time for a quick coffee before hitting the Louvre in advance of the tour groups, although a decent proportion of the population of China was still present.
A fabulous museum, we took the masterpieces walking tour with an audio app, a few favourites being:
- De Milo
- Victory at Samothrace
- The coronation of emperor Napoleon (where incidentally 200 people are pictured of which 75 are identifiable, including a chap who was painted with the face of Julius Ceasar despite him not having been there)
- And of course this lady needs no introduction (but the idiots in front might).
Weary and cultured (relatively speaking of course) we left one of the greatest museums in the world and had lunch at a traditional Parisian bistro with tiny tables on the pavement, seats squished close together and predictably average and over-priced food. The only thing missing was the grumpy waiter. Our's was in fact chirpy and smily despite rushing around serving far too many tables.
Next we took a stroll up the park to watch the women's race lap round the course.
A few hours, a quick nap on the grass, a strange parade and an ice cream later and the men turned up too. Sadly Chris Froome wasn't in yellow and Mark Cavendish wasn't competing for the stage (which had been the things we'd been looking forward to when we planned the trip). None the less it was awesome to see them whizz by close up and we had a fab day out of the saddle in Paris.
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