France Cycling Trip 2011, Part Thirteen

Sunday was the last day in Vicdessos, before we moved on to Arreau. After the race on Saturday, there was an option of a ride or a hike. All of the people who chose the long version of the race did the hike and all of the folks who chose the shorter version did more riding. My body just said "no f*cking way" to more riding without some rest after the race yesterday. It was a great hike.

We were dropped off about halfway up a mountain atop Vicdessos and walked all along a ridge up there. It felt good to work some of the sludge out of my legs. It was hot though. But the views were quite rewarding. To say the least. Below is Vicdessos.

There were a lot of beautiful flowers up there. More than I imagined. I took a lot of photos.


After the hike we had a bit of free time, so I did some laundry (we did ours by hand and hung it on a line to dry) and packed up for the move to Arreau. For dinner, it was our last night at Dave's. Salad had some of those wonderful pickled beets along with some potato salad and fresh tomatoes.

Entree was a duck kabob with fries and beans.

They asked us how we liked our duck and of course I said RARE. We had a food safety person on the trip and she voiced her displeasure with my selection. I showed her exactly how rare it was before I consumed each and every bite with much satisfaction.

Dessert was a flan/cheese type of cake, more on the flan side. Very nice.

Here is Dave and his wife. He served, she cooked. Wonderful people who got a standing ovation from everyone on our last night.

Later on to celebrate our last night in the cabins, there was a wine and cheese party, to get rid of stuff before the move. A lot was drank and this stinky cheese was awesome. We had a huge wheel of the stuff. I saved the label from the wheel, it will make a good addition to the small memory book I plan on putting together someday.

We were rewarded with a simply awesome sunset. Vicdessos was good to me.

But I was glad to be leaving. I had been rooming with two other guys for six nights now and the cabins were tiny and I was getting intimately familiar with their sleep patterns and other - sounds - that were being made. I had been told that the hotel we were going to in Arreau was better and it was a little more like being in civilization.

Honestly I thought I would miss all the mountains around Vicdessos that I had climbed. Nothing could have been further from the truth. There were a LOT more mountains to climb. With the big race day behind us, I was excited to see and do more. And more I did.