A weeekend in the Ardeche

[MooN]

 I wa navigating the 1st day of our 3 day trip to the Ardeche and the first stage of day one went something like this

https://goo.gl/maps/QQrWRDJd9jMbtFFJA

Boring roads that we'd all ridden many times as its our main route south from here avoiding autoroutes but on roads majour enough for actualy " making progress"> The idea being to get far enough south by lunchtime so as to be straight into the fun bits after lunch. I'd planned a decent first stop at 1.5h out cos we're all either so old as to need to stop and piss regularly or so fucked up physically that an hour and a half is about the limit of saddle time before necrosis sets in. ( the excuse I use is that one of the guys is riding a fireblade 1000RR with a fuel range of about 6 miles ( I exaggerate, but only a little...) as 4 of the bikes were carrying pillions, I'd planned the stop at Magny Cours ( race track) where there is an autoroute style fuel station with clean toilets, decent coffee and fuel all in the same place. One of the group ( whom I shall call Jean-Michel, cos that's his name) was dissapointed at the stop os there wasn't any beer available... at 09h30 with 6 or more hours of riding ahead...! I was forced to admit that the need for draught beer at the morning fuel stop hadn't even occurred to me.

The 2nd stage went without a hitch, though I had failed to take into account the bank holiday weekend traffic a St Pourcain sur Sioule ( cos untill now I've never been anywhere on a summer bank holiday weekend) which is a majur bottle neck as you have to cross the river there or add miles to any southbound route not on the autoroute> tis lost us about 15 minutes on planned timing but I wasn't overly worried as, or once, we had reserved a restaurant for the lunch stop so 15 minutes either way wasn't going to cause a problem. I nearly caused an accident as we rode through the industrial suburbs of ClermonFerrand and for some reason I had a brain freeze at a red light, with us turning left across the main drag I stopped at a green light ( convinced it was red) which tokk the following bikes somewhat by surprise 

Lunch was good, as always but I can't remember what we ate. It was hot when we moved out for the afternoon stint and all liners were removed from jackets, summer gloves came out etc etc. We refeulled and headed off for this route for the afternoon. I hadn't planned a stop bt counted on finding a bar in one of the villages we were passing through. 

https://goo.gl/maps/heRHB7Qu2iVE7Auc8

There wer some fairly majour strom cells moving up from the south and I had to alter the route a couple of times on the fly in order to avoid them. At one point, I stopped the group and put my rain liner back in my jacket, suggesting the others do likewise, despite the clear blue skies overhead. I told them we were heading straight into a big storm front in the next 15 minutes. some did, some didn't  and boy did they regret that decision. Withinh 5 minutes of moving on again it came down so hard that there was standing water on the road that couldn't drain off quick enough and visibility was down to less that 100m. I pulled off into the first available place to stop and the rain stopprd as instantly as it had arrived, but not before those who hadn't prepared for it were drenched through to the skin. it had found it's way through my rain gear in a couple of places too, all in the space of less than 5 minutes! The good thing is that they now all think I have some super rain forcast app on my phone that they don't have access to...

At one point I was very glad that my sena intercom was not linked through to the others cos the GPS took us down a couple of VERY minor roads with grass down the middle and, at one point, a huge pudle right across the road that I was worried some of them might refuse at. Being out in fron I had just seen a renault Clio in front of us drive through it without flinching so I was able to put on a show of confidence and ride straight through ( to be fair, if I hadn't just seen the car go through I would have hesitated as there ws no indication as to depth or bottom) 

We got to the hotel with enough time to shower and change before Apéritif time with thunder banging of the valley walls and lightening flashes looking like heavenly speed cameras et every straight bit of road, but just had time to get the bikes under cover befor it started raining again. 

Aperatif: purchqsed from the village butcher

 

out of focus due to the large amounts of pastis consumed...

food was good too:

salade de chevre chaud

followed by a large lump of red beef ( can't remeber the cut cos everything was a little blurred at this point) with a Cépes sauce. The dish to the right was what we would call a "Treuffade" here but had another local name. Potatoes, sliced and cooked in a cream sauce with "lardons" ( bacon bits).

Having destroyed any and all of the good work done over the last few weeks to reduce cholesterol count, I proceeded to kill myself with a desert containing more sugar than my annual allowance in one serving. There is no photographic evedince of this as I threatened to kill anybody who informed my wife or doctor...

[boboneleg]

Nice one Chris.  I've been through Clermont a couple of times and it strikes me as right shithole.  Le Puy on the other hand is glorious, I may be heading back that way from Italy in July.

I like the look of the salade de chevre chaud, was it proper stinky ?

[XTreme]

So you went away to eat then Chris? 

And that food looks like the sort of shit that @Pedro eats!

[MooN]

16 minutes ago, XTreme said:

So you went away to eat then Chris? 

 

Mostly, yes. 

there's also the fact that the only tie I could take photos was when we stopped, so eating and drinking mostly.

[MooN]

Sunday turned out glorious, 8 am breakfast

scary picture.

 

I wasn't navigating the rest of this so the route is a bit vague but something like this on sunday morning

 

Lunch was at Les Vans 

" Pintade facon Tadjine et legumes de saison"

followed by a proper "Créme Brulée" that hadn't been fucked about with by adding chutneyed marmalade of bean shoots or whatever the pansy fucking parisien parisites thnik is fashionable now... 

it was 31degC acording to the sign in the square and I could rally have done with a wee siesta, but there were many more hairpin bends and tight twisty valleys to do before the end of the day so we set off again for this bit

the river to the east is the Rhone and top right is Valence, to give you an idea of where we were.

there were still some nasty storm cells in the area but we managed to avoid most of them, running just under the trailing edge of one and the leading edge of another during the afternoon. We were Lucky because the storms were dropping hail and a couple of times, around a bend the temps would rop 20deg in 100m, you'd ride into a wall of fog lifting off a rapidly cooled road surface and see piles of hailstones along the roadside, suggesting a storm had gone through only a few minutes before us. One of the girls managed to get a couple of pics

 

we got back to the hotel without problem and pretty much repeated the previous nights debauchery, starting with Pastis and finishing with Liqeur de Verveine...

 

 The hotel chef said he'd made a special effort for us and his "two wheeled trout" was excellent:

 

[Pedro]

2 hours ago, MooN said:

( whom I shall call Jean-Michel, cos that's his name)

That made me smile 

 

Good stuff, too. Nothing like a properly "watered" nice meal at the end of a riding day, although you guys seem like you do serious lunches too.

[XTreme]

2 minutes ago, Pedro said:

That made me smile 

 

Good stuff, too. Nothing like a properly "watered" nice nice meal at the end of a riding day, although you guys seem like you do serious lunches too.

Bag of chips outside the chippy in my day!

What you say @Clive?

[Clive]

18 minutes ago, XTreme said:

Bag of chips outside the chippy in my day!

What you say @Clive?

We did not have a chippy in the village,  a mobile one came round on a Saturday evening.

Or a couple of Kippers off the Cockle man who came around the welfare, they fooking stunk.  

[XTreme]

7 minutes ago, Clive said:

Or a couple of Kippers off the Cockle man

You had a Cockle Man? 

[Clive]

3 minutes ago, XTreme said:

You had a Cockle Man? 

He sold Cockles, Mussels, Prawns and Kippers, Fuck knows what his proper title was.

[boboneleg]

I'm really liking the two-wheeld trout

[MooN]

2 hours ago, XTreme said:

Bag of chips outside the chippy in my day!

What you say @Clive?

that's because you're a phucking filistine!

[XTreme]

20 minutes ago, MooN said:

that's because you're a phucking filistine!

I just don't get Posh Bikers!

[MooN]

Monday morning came and we were up with bikes loaded before breakfast at 8, one of the "panzerdivision" ( BMW RT 1300 which a really want to baptise Hideous Barge but I think that would be plagierising Jeff (?) who called his bike that?) so as there are twwo of these horrendous machines + an R 1100 in the group I have given them the collective noun of "Panzerdivision" ) was not joining us for the ride home as they were continuing south and east for a weeks holiday. So 5 bikes set off back north with a plan to stop and feed at Thiers ( where the knives come from) twisties to start with, opening up through some fast winding N roads as far as Ambert, then a dash across the plain to Thiers. 

baking hot again in the sun and I, for one was happy to have an awning over the table even if it was only a buffalo grill with their usual slipshod service and factory manufactured food, it was quick and cheap refuelling excercise... well it would have been quick if they hadn't somehow managed to "lose" the order between waitress and kitchen, due to a " computor error".... it was pretty clear that the waitress had a max IQ of 4 and had not been sufficiently trained in the use of her fisher price "Me Pad" to the extent that she had omitted to push the send button once we'd all explained exactly what we wanted whilst desperately resisting the urge to grab her nose ring and shake her with it.... but I digress...

Whilst waiting for the driveling morons to concoct some more excuses, all less believable than the last as they weren't even capable of getting it straight amongst themselves, we decided that rather then face the long slog back up the route express the way we had come down, which would be heaving with road lice ( camping cars) and caravans trying to get home from the long weekend and causing chaos in the process, we'd run up to Vichy and then cut  north along the D roads via Decize ( where we stopped for beer / coffee/ pisser etc.) a bit like this:

 

Got home shattered. With the firm opinion that that was too far for me to do comfortably and the premonition that I was going to suffer all the following week> I wasn't wrong.

STATS : 1127km over the 3 days.

 

18 h in the saddle

 

avereged 5,1 litres /100km

 

average speed 61km/h

[MooN]

30 minutes ago, XTreme said:

I just don't get Posh Bikers!

there's a whole world out there thet you'll never understand Pete.

[XTreme]

13 minutes ago, MooN said:

there's a whole world out there thet you'll never understand Pete.

Spanish bikers do the same.....2PM they're in restaurants and bars having massive meals.

I go out to ride......not to eat! And if somebody comes out with me then that's the way it's going to be.

[Sir Fallsalot]

5 minutes ago, XTreme said:

Spanish bikers do the same.....2PM they're in restaurants and bars having massive meals.

I go out to ride......not to eat! And if somebody comes out with me then that's the way it's going to be.

Same here but when your on a road trip it's different. you wont be back at your house a few hours later where the wife has your grub waiting for you

[MooN]

26 minutes ago, Sir Fallsalot said:

Same here but when your on a road trip it's different. you wont be back at your house a few hours later where the wife has your grub waiting for you

same same. riding over a longer period means you have to eat elswhere than at home, when I'm on my own I can just as hapilly take a sandwich or buy one as eat at a restaurant, but this lot are burgundians and they take food seriously, it is part of their culture. I would no more expect them to eat a chip butty with a mug of tea at a trailer in a layby than I would expect any of you lot ( with the possible exception of Pedro) to choose the wine with a meal in a pukka restaurant.   horses for courses mate and each to his own. When in rome etc...etc...

[boboneleg]

56 minutes ago, MooN said:

When in rome etc...etc...

But, but you were in France ?

[Pedro]

50 minutes ago, MooN said:

would expect any of you lot ( with the possible exception of Pedro) to choose the wine with a meal in a pukka restaurant. 

Oh it’s most certainly a fact that I want wine at the end of a day on the bike. However, in Portugal having wine doesn’t make a meal any more “posh” per se, it’s the culture as I think also is in France, Spain, Italy…

[XTreme]

1 hour ago, Sir Fallsalot said:

Same here but when your on a road trip it's different. you wont be back at your house a few hours later where the wife has your grub waiting for you

I'm not talking about not eating if you're out a long time.

What I'm referring to is sitting in a restaurant for fucking hours during the day having multiple courses instad of actually riding.

Cos that's what they do here! It seems to be more important to them than being on their bike.

[MooN]

7 minutes ago, Pedro said:

Oh it’s most certainly a fact that I want wine at the end of a day on the bike. However, in Portugal having wine doesn’t make a meal any more “posh” per se, it’s the culture as I think also is in France, Spain, Italy…

If you'd ever tasted wine from the other side of the channel Pedro, you'd understand why they don't want wine. Same reason Pete can't understand why you'd spend hours eating a meal...  because in the UK eating is a simple refuelling excercise, to be done as expediently and efficiently as possible. Mostly cos they dont have or make anything worth spending any time appreciating. 

[Pedro]

I am not one for big meals at lunch if on a trip, but do enjoy something nice to eat. 
 

For mediterranean (including most of France) people, sitting at a table and sharing food and wine is the ideal way to socialize, that changes when you go north. The lack of those dinners is a culture shock for the southern people when travelling and getting to know foreign friends. Then we mistake this lack of comfort meals and breaking bread with being cold and unfriendly.

[MooN]

believe me Pete, there's nothing "posh" about this lot, thats just their culture. nobody's asking you tounderstand it

[MooN]

2 minutes ago, Pedro said:

I am not one for big meals at lunch if on a trip, but do enjoy something nice to eat. 
 

For mediterranean (including most of France) people, sitting at a table and sharing food and wine is the ideal way to socialize, that changes when you go north. The lack of those dinners is a culture shock for the southern people when travelling and getting to know foreign friends. Then we mistake this lack of comfort meals and breaking bread with being cold and unfriendly.

yeah but the brits arent cold or unfriendly, its just that their food is shit so they dont spend any time on it