Thursday 17 July 2014

Bonjour

Day: 6
Route: Le Bouveret - Collonges
Distance: 64 miles
Height: 3109ft ascent
Time in saddle: 5hrs 7mins

We spent last night in a rather odd B&B, which was actually a room in someone's flat. Our breakfast arrived on a little trolley which we took out to our little balcony. I can ignore the too soft mattress, the retro bathroom, the slightly dirty floor, and the early morning building noise because the breakfast was FAB. It wasn't posh, it wasn't refined, but unlike the previous months there was cereal, nice fresh bread, delicious home made jam, proper orange juice, hard boiled eggs (albeit spray painted pink curiously) and random things (apricots, cocoa powder and chocolate rice cakes). Needless to say we had a hearty breakfast and packed up the rest for lunch!
We set off in Switzerland, cycled to France, then into Switzerland, then back into France again. You'd be forgiven for thinking we cycled in a circle, when in fact we cycled along the beautiful road along the south bank of Lake Geneva, where curiously the border bends and twists between the two countries:
There actually wasn't much of a border at any point, just some empty infrastructure and some guards looking bored (we figured the posting there must be a punishment given there is NOTHING for those chaps to do. They also had a boat of border guards patrolling the lake border, presumably looking for foreign fish). Despite this, our entry into France was met with much excitement (not least as it's a language we can manage) and lots of silly French accents (from us rather than the locals whom we assume have sensible ones).
We cycled through some beautiful towns, most notable being the decadent Evian and the quaint medieval Yvoire, our lunch stop, all cobbled and bustling (although this photo doesn't capture either of these traits!):
More miles took us into the centre of Geneva, then we had a rather mean hilly final 15 miles or so to a small village nestling in the hills where feeling a little low on sugar, we inhaled a late afternoon pain au chocolat before making it to the B&B where we are spending the night, which has perhaps the most comfy bed we've seen for months.

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