It’s not a day for getting things

Neil McKinnon June 2023

It’s Monday. Monday in France is a lot like Sunday in France. Many places are not open. It is hard to get things.

Today we ride 70km from Cosne-sur-loire to Nevers. We consider it a commute day – more about getting from A to B than what we might see along the way. We ride along tow paths and some quiet roads, lose our route and find it again. It’s a pretty typical day of cycling in France, except for the things we can’t get:

• Lunch – oops, we did it again. We decide to eat lunch at a restaurant today and time it perfectly. But … Monday. The town we choose – Pouilly-sur-Loire has one restaurant open which is serving one dish: goat cheese omelettes. Omelettes are never my favourite. I can eat an omelette if desperate but I am losing the battle with liking goat cheese. The remainder of town is as dead as if it is Sunday. We eat nuts and a croissant left over from breakfast by the river.
• Orangina – we’re within 20km of the end of today, parched and water is no longer cutting it. Orangina would do the trick and power us to Nevers. But the universe says no.
• To Nevers before the rain starts – we had warning. Rain is thumping down at Decize where we are meeting friends tomorrow, but we are still parched in the sunlight at Marseilles-les-Aubigy. As we approach Nevers we are riding into a cloud as black as a wolf’s bottom. We are 2km short of destination when the skies open and dump apocalyptic rain upon us. We shelter for about an hour in a car wash along with many good citizens of Nevers who I’m guessing are trying to keep their cars out of the hail.
• Into our room without much instruction. We are staying at a funny little place where we are not allowed to check in until 5:30pm. We cannot go straight to our room. We must learn how to open the gate (using the very obvious buttons), order our entire breakfast and learn how to use the key to our room door. We are staying in a room in a beautiful house which our host says is his family home. The best thing: beer on an honour system so we can fulfil end-of-day beer obligations.

On the plus side, to counter missing lunch, once we’ve arrived in Nevers, found our funny accommodation, hung up our wet things, showered and consumed the end-of-day beer, we venture out and stumble across Comptoir St Sébastian, a Michelin restaurant with reasonable prices and vegetarian choices on the menu. It is sign. However, there are still things we can’t get:

• Sparkling rosé as an aperitif
• Cognac (for Neil) as a digestif.

Stats for today:

• Distance: 70.66km
• Climb: 115m
• Average speed: 17.8km/h
• Average temperature: 30C
• Moving time: 3:58:29
• See our ride on Strava

The beer picture

At the end of a day’s ride, our tradition is to enjoy a beer, and to photograph it for posterity. Today’s beer picture was taken in out funny hotel room with a beer from the honesty system. It’s a local Nevers beer and is very refreshing after a hot, long and wet day on the road.

Along the way today:

I told you today was not a day for getting things!