Final Day of Biking

Well that was the best Creme Brulee I've ever had in my life. I suspect it was because of the hint of lavender and mint in the creme and the fact that it was perfectly made. I found this delicious concoction in a restaurant, Chez Francois, in Avignon. The restaurant was off the beaten path, there beign no other restuarants on the street and it caught my eye because of it's 23 euro 3 course menu price. I think the chef/owner just recently started the place because it was quite empty when I got there, to the point that the chef even came out to talk to me in English for a little bit. Then when people did show up, I got the impression they were friends or family since they saying how great each of the rooms looked. For dinner, it started with a lentil salad topped with some heavily smoked pork belly. Then the main was a chestnut sausage with grilled apples and a saurkraut like thing on the side except that there were bits of ham it in and it was warm. On the side was a round of mash potatoes that even catherine would like. They were drenched in a fantastic olive oil :-)

Anyway, to back up. My day started in Gigondas where I got breakfast by going to the local store and getting a pear and a chocolate croissant. Then, I hopped on my bike and went down to Carpentras. This meant going back through Vaquerays and Beaumes de Venise, which I was more than happy to do. Carpentras is a decent sized town and like all the others, it's centeral area is basically pedestrian only with a church in the middle. The town's known for it's Truffle market because this is where most of the black truffles that come out of France get distributed to chefs or distributors from around the world. Of course it's not truffle season for another month or so, so there was less to see. However, I did pick up things for lunch later on. First stop was a fromagerie and bought a little itty bitty wheel of cheese for lunch. It was about 5cm in diameter, was AOC Picondon. I've seen these kinds of things all over the place, and and this one was goats milk. It cost 3.50 euros, so wasn't super cheap, but it was fantastic. Plus it taught me something when I ate it. It was a slightly stinky cheese, but the moldiness to it was mild enough that it didn't turn me off and allowed me to apprciate the great depth of flavour. I expect I could probably teach myself to like the blue cheeses if I slowly work my way up from something like this, just so long as I don't trigger the "eck, it's mold" taste.

By the way, I ate this cheese with a loaf of whole weat bread. Ok, not a whole loaf, but a good 3/4 of it :-) I'm just trying to be french. It's fun that the first thing french folks will do in the morning is go to the local bakery and get the bread for the day. I'm not just talking about a single loaf either. I've seen people walking with 5 baguettes in the hands. Or this morning at the hostel, one of the Moms came back with a box full of bread for the family. I think it was 3 loaves and 4 or 5 baguettes. Fun stuff.

After Carpentras, I went south. At the end of the day, I was shooting for Avignon, but the road from Carpentras to Avignon is one of the busier ones and my guide book said that there were a couple of interesting towns further south, so hey, why not. In total, my day ended up being around 50-60 km. I've really stopped keeping good track since my bike computer died and the GPS hogs the batteries. Anyway, further south is Pernes-Les-Fontaines; a town with tons of water fountains sprinkled throughout. Of course, the water had been turned off by this point, so I poked around and continued on to Ile-Sur-Sorges. This town is on an island in the middle of the Sorges river and there are a ton of picturesque, moss covered waterwheels turning away with the fast flowing river. The high school was out for lunch so there were a lot of young kids around while I ate lunch there in the sun in front of a water wheel.

After Ile-Sur-Sorges, it was time to head back to Avignon. The route was fairly built up and included a big climb up to Chateauneuf-de-Gagnoron. Cut little town, but I was quite ready to go back down the other side. I really like hills a lot better when I'm not lugging up an extra 40 pounds of stuff on my bike :-). Getting close to Avignon, the road sort of dumped me onto a bike trail. Before this, there had been plenty of bike paths, even on the 2 lane roads between towns (think of a bike lane on King Rd for those in RH or a lane on Fox Chapel Road for those in Pittsburgh), but I hadn't seen any bike paths per say. Well I found one. The weird thing is that my GPS actually knew about it and was trying to route me on it. It's the first time the GPS surprised me in a good way. I"ve basically taken to using it as a map and a reference of where I am, but not for directions.

Into Avignon, I went to the other side and across the bridge to the campground. Online, it said the hostel there was full, but I knew they had campsites, so I figured that I'd finally get to use my hammock, on the last day of biking. Well turns out that didn't quite happen. The guy at the desk said there weren't any sites with trees that would work for that, so I;d have to use the hostel. Of course, at least the hostel wasn't full like I thought. I did poke around the campsites and found a couple that actually would've worked. I don't know what he was smoking but whatever. I think the hammock really is best used if your hiking up in the wilderness, and not so much if your trying to stay at the same place as motor homes :-)

Well, that's it for the biking. Tomorrow I return the bike and head to Montepellier for my last day in France. I could definitely come back here. Hell I could easily see myself living here for a year. It's just so gorgeos, with a great lifestyle and great food.

Night.