The Velodyssey

Welcome to the Velodyssey! The name makes sense if you know that "Velo" is the french word for bicycle. The Velodyssey is the name of the recently completed (I'd argue almost completed) cycling route spanning the west coast of France, actually starting in England, requiring a ferry ride to Roscoff and going to Irun, just over the southern border into Spain. I'm actually well past all that now but backtracking for continuity.

I believe "Maz Pusi" is french for, "Welcome, friend." - At the French-Spanish border

The Velodyssey seemed the most logical way to get north from Spain and it passes through Biarritz, a french coastal town where I was most happy to reconnect with an old friend Adam Thompson. Adam works in a YWAM DTS base there with his wife Leah. For those not familiar, it's a Christian discipleship school and Adam pulled some strings to get me in as a guest speaker, booyah, to share about song-writing. I was also very happy to stay with Alan and Jo in Bayonne, more friends who hosted me wonderfully. I've spent, perhaps, too long travelling by my lonesome and being taken into a warm home to just relax, speak Kiwi and drink wine was something I really treasured. In fact, it was such a break from the travelling mindset that I've discovered I didn't take photos with any of them. That's a shame... Here's some France then...

France and Spain weren't always so chilled out about their border...

Saint-Jean-De-Luz. France is big into their hyphens.

Y'know, golden sandy beaches and stuff.

The cycling route was intent on taking me up every cliff top for the view.
Lots of climbing then free-wheeling.

Not sure if I was photographing the sea or my bike here.

Bayonne turned out to be some kind of cross-roads for crazy travelers. It's a staging point for many for the Camino Way, so that's a big draw card, but I bumped into all sorts headed this way and that. Two Germans, in particular, I met 3.5 months in to their proposed 5 year walk around the world. Or at least Europe and the Med to Israel to start with. They do about 20km a day, which doesn't sound like much but they're lugging 50kg carts around, strapped to their hips with breaks for going downhill and not including their gear, which boasts that supreme German efficiency, they're operating on a zero budget. No savings at all. They just ask politely, juggle for coins, siphon through supermarket rubbish bins, forage for berries, you name it. They've managed to last 3.5 months already and are very happy with what they're doing. I couldn't help but feel lazy after talking to them. Look at me, all riding 100km a day just because I can, while they're walking every step of the way, dragging those things behind them instead of riding them... And they manage to blog every night!

The Germans Tobias and Gartner and Petite Mo.

The Germans' crazy carts/

Petite Mo and her dog Gerard have been walking around France for 6 years.
Now they're thinking they might give Spain a go.

Gee, crappy photo, but Alan and his recumbent bicycle.

And a family of 4, with a custom-built tandem bicycle with a recumbent front seat.
The recumbent pedals have been brought right in so the 4 year old can pedal.
No free rides for that kid. The 2 year old gets the chariot trailer.

Things were going a little too smoothly after a while on the Velodyssey. Google suggested an alternative route through the forest which would shave 7km off the 200 ahead of  me. Great! I thought... I'll do that! Never do that. Stick with the bicycle paths, or at least a quiet but established highway, or you might find yourself spending over an hour pushing your very heavy bicycle through mud and sand forestry tracks in the baking hot sun, plus a further half an hour cleaning out the breaks, gears and chain using the tap at an old church and sacrificing your toothbrush. You just might...

This flooded path is intersected by a fairly deep little river/canal. Hard to see.
The man in red ahead of me tried riding through and went up to his neck in the water.
Thankfully, I was on hand to laugh at him and photograph his misery for the world to see.
He's also just discovering that the mobile phone in his hand his dead.

Definitely a trap. I had to get past a few of these.
I couldn't help remembering a story about cannibals in PNG using the old fallen tree trick.

Sometimes the forest is quite nice.

The night where all the creatures came to visit me.

A whole lot of mud, sand and swear words.
Impossible to ride.

I wasn't just imagining things.
They've built these animal bridges over the highways so the deer and pigs don't hit cars.

I had to leave the Velodyssey at Bordeaux and catch a train to Nantes in order to see Nathan and Emma while they were visiting family friends there. I lost out on 300km cycling, but got to spend 3 days with the most amazing, loving family instead. The De Gennes. Wonderful as that was, it made continuing my journey far more difficult than usual.

You have to harden yourself to a degree to travel alone for extended periods, forgoing many comforts that people often take for granted. In the De Gennes home, I was greeted each morning and bid goodnight with a kiss on each cheek. It was a startling experience and I realised how unfamiliar I'd become with any sort of human touch. I'm used to meeting new people and sharing stories and having people like and respect me, but the mother, Veronique, went further in showing love for me and concern for me. I experienced a healthy dose of mothering and became depressingly aware of how much that was missing in my life; to have someone else care for me.

After 2 nights I went to pack up my things and leave but found myself just staring dumbly at my bike and precious but few belongings. I started to wonder is this was all an act of selfactualisation, rather than exploration; if I had changed my life circumstances to reflect the lonely, burden-laden way I've been feeling inside for a long time. Veronique came downstairs and saw me and asked if I was alright, saying I looked tired, was I sure I'd slept enough? She has these piercing, honest, beckoning sort of eyes that you can't really lie to. I told her no, I'd slept enough, but she kept probing me with this look. I tapped two fingers over my heart and admitted, I'm tired in here. Tired in here.

I expected her to nod with an understanding that there are some things a man just has to deal with alone, that life just feels hard sometimes and then quietly leave me be so I could find my strength again. But no! She rushed in and embraced me with the most loving, heartfelt cry of shared pain and something in me broke. Love is a powerful thing. I can handle being sad, but being so loved was too much and I wept tears I didn't know I had in me, pouring out volumes of unspeakable pain from somewhere deep that I bury most of that stuff. She insisted that I stay, stay another night, don't go yet. You're not ready. She was right and it was some time before I could form the words but I gratefully accepted and had one more night away from the road.

I spent a while ashamed at my weakness afterwards, as I do my best to try and be invincible. Had I never visited them I'm sure I never would have been brought to that state but there was something so touching about the way that family lives and loves each other; the contrast with my loner lifestyle left me feeling so hollow. To anyone who envies what I do in travelling and seeing the world, know that it comes at a price and if you have the good fortune to be near a community of people that love you, don't take for granted what a beautiful thing that is.

I'm back on the bike now (metaphorically too). I made my way up the Loire River to Orelans before turning north and sit in a campground now just south of Paris as I write. It took a few days, but my appetite for the journey is back. I've had to slow down, hang out in castles more, talk to more strangers and remember I'm here to explore. I think I'd fallen into a pattern of just trying to knock out distance and get to Holland but that's not sustainable for very long. I'll leave the Loire River for the next blog. Here's a few more poorly chosen photos from the coastal ride.

Just a normal daily market in a small village in France where coffee saved me.
The villages are slowly dying, aging population and youth flocking to the cities and abroad.
Roaming markets like these seem to serve them better than every village having permanent but quiet shops.

Crazy network of trees here. Must make an awesome shady area when the leaves return.
I wanted to go nuts with fairy lights, but so little time...

I couldn't work out if this was someone's house or a museum.
Why don't we have turrets?

Nantes has a giant robot elephant. I'm not even kidding.
Some kind of tribute to the imaginative author Jules Verne, a local of theirs.
Oh how I wish it would run riot and attack the city!

The De Gennes (and some Batts)