F & S Day 17 16/07/11 Tailwinds and Turbines

Good night sleep in the woodland camp last night.

Drizzle to start the day, but all disappeared by about 1030.

Very long, straight flat roads meant some very high average speeds and some serious mileage done even before lunch! (70km before the morning break!).

This seems to be a really nice area of France - definitely more wealthy than the southern areas that we have cycled through over the last few days, and a lot more interesting architecture.

We saw a Francais des Jeux Pro Rider doing some moto-pacing behind a scooter just before lunch, no wonder they come to this area; the roads are almost all newly resurfaced and practically deserted.

After a lunch in a small village, when we rescheduled our ferry for the 18th; we headed out of the more forested area and onto the open agricultural plains. The early afternoon riding was EPIC; force 6 tailwinds meant that we were reaching 55kmph along the flat! as we sped through the fields and fields of Vestas wind turbines (probably made on the IoW).

Later in the afternoon, after what had been a very easy but fast few hours we turned a corner into the wind. That was not so good! we had the wind against us for the last 25km or so and it was seriously hard going.

Eventually knackered and satisfied with the amount of riding we had done that day (yet another century day) we washed at a village tap, then found a good campsite next to a lake. Good job there is only one more day of hard riding, as we are seiously beginning to feel it!