Stage Nineteen

My audience for The Tour today increased by twenty per cent with one extra person joining what had been four of us the day before.  It could plummet tomorrow with the two French hopes suffering a heartbreak of a day effectively ending the prospects of a French winner. The biggest catastrophe was Pinot abandoning after just 22 miles with a strained leg muscle.  He’d been surreptitiously nursing it for a stage or two, but truly exacerbated it yesterday, reducing him to a severe limp at his team’s hotel.  He made a go of it today, but was off the back soon with no teammates coming to his aid, knowing he was a lost cause.  His devastation was reflected with his tortured face and tears.  

And Alaphilippe finally relinquished the Yellow Jersey when Bernal made another solo break and the rest of the contenders shed Alaphilippe a short time later on the monstrous Col de l’Iseran, the highest road used by The Tour.  Alaphilippe was two minutes down on Bernal and one on Thomas and the others when he reached the summit of the day’s penultimate climb with an outside chance of catching them on the descent before the climb to the ski resort of Tignes, but a sudden storm that caused a mudslide across the road down in the valley resulting in the rest of the stage being cancelled, a very rare occurrence.  

Times for the stage were calculated at the summit of the Iseran meaning Bernal had inherited Yellow.  There were no protests from the riders or directors when they learned how perilous the conditions were ahead.  The riders began to be hit by the storm on the descent after they’d been informed that there day was done.  They could sit up and put on jackets from their team cars.  Alaphilippe knew he was doomed to lose the Jersey on the final climb even if he had caught up to Bernal, so he expressed no regrets, just pride in his effort to keep the Jersey as long as he did.  He is still in second ahead of Thomas by 28 seconds, but most likely will leak even more time tomorrow and will regrettably make it a French-free podium.  But the French can be happy for all his heroics and those too of Pinot in the preceding two weeks.

At least Bardet will bring the French some glory having taken the Polka Dot Jersey on the previous stage gobbling up 68 points to move ahead of Wellens by eight points, who had held it longer than Alaphilippe held his Jersey. Bardet said he could at last smile again after otherwise having a most dire Tour. 

Though Bernal has most likely secured the top spot with a 48 second cushion, the podium is still up for grabs.  Thomas in third is just 12 seconds ahead of Kruigswijke with Buchmann another 27 seconds back.  Thomas most likely will move up to second and Kruigswijke to third, unless Alaphilippe can overcome his long-climb defiencies and cling to second or third. The day’s downpour also wiped out portions of the upcoming stage, shortening it by more than half to a mere 59 kilometers, the final 34 of which are uphill.  

The crowd may have been sparse in the bar watching The Tour, but the Slow Travel venue a few blocks away was packed all day.  Nothing could speak more to the general French regard of The Tour than that there were 150 cyclists filling a theater down the street from the bar  watching a homemade movie about a guy traversing France on a donkey.  If the nation was truly swept up by the heroics of Alaphilippe and Pino this program would have been delayed and The Tour stage would have been shown on the large screen in this theater.  

Starting at ten, I squeezed in six programs, four about bike trips in France, another of a Belgian woman biking from Vancouver to Chile and the sixth about a guy traveling around France on a donkey.  Two were narrated on the spot as if they were slide shows, while the rest were all fully narrated films with the subject only having to introduce it then field all the questions afterwards. 

I couldn’t fully enjoy the slicker productions showing cyclists bicycling into the camera or past some site, as I imagined all the effort that went into setting up such shots.  It defeated the essence of being a tourist cyclist, just gliding along being at one with the moment.  I pitied the cyclist becoming preoccupied with making a production of their trip.  I much prefer the simple slide shows with cyclists reflecting back on their time on the bike.  One lose’s his independence and freedom when he becomes consumed with looking for a shot.  I was initially reluctant to carry a camera at all in my early travels, but now know I don’t have to look for telling shots, as I recognize them instantly.

Watching these travelogues I had to rely on the images to tell the story as my ear isn’t trained well enough to decipher much of the spoken French. If there’d been French subtitles I would have been fine.  I was at least able to laugh along with everyone in the audience when a map of one of the travelogues identified the various regions of France by their stereotypes—the northeast near Belgium was labeled “poor,” Brittany “alcoholics,” the Pyrenees “terrorists,” coastal regions “beaches,” and the Alps “skiing.”

The programs ranged in length from thirty to sixty minutes with Q & As that went on longer than there was time for, but could be continued in the courtyard outside the hall.  The audience, just as me, couldn’t seem to get enough of the French countryside—hay bales and rivers and canals and quiet narrow roads and camping wherever.  Even nuclear plants looked picturesque.  All gazed at the screen with rapt attention and no doubt pride in their country.  I could further marvel at how wonderful France is, as this festival is subsidized by government grants.  One didn’t need to bother with purchasing a ticket.  One could just walk right on in to the salle as if it were a public library.  

There were two main venues known as the North Pole and the South Pole.  The North Pole was an outdoor stage in the town center for musical acts and seminars such as bike repair and Raku.

The South Pole was the site of the 150-seat venue of plastic, stackable chairs and an open-sided tent with tables and chairs for dining and a friendly open space with couches

There was also a room that had dangling globes as decoration where vendors and bicycle organizations could spread out their wares on tables.  The atmosphere couldn’t have been more relaxed and friendly.  

This was a gathering of individualists.  Worn, tattered t-shirts was the garment of choice.  There was no Lycra to be seen. There was a wide range of bicycles and attachments.

The founder and director, Hubert, was a constant warm presence, introducing each program and thanking the presenter at its conclusion. He seemed to be ever bubbling with joy, happy to have this gathering in his village, where his wife is the town physician working out of their home in the lot beside the South Pole.  I met Hubert ten years ago when I was passing through Montpellier thirty miles to the south. He is drawn to touring cyclists and invited me to his home. I’ve camped in his back yard several times and could have done the same during the festival, but knowing all the demands on his time I opted to camp a mile out of town in a special wilderness camping area for attendees of the festival.  It adjoined the town campground, which was at capacity.  It was a biker’s paradise.

I regret I’ll only be able to attend the first two days of this five-day fest, especially since the program I’d most like to see isn’t until Monday afternoon.  It’s by Ted Simon, the Englishman who spent four years riding his motorcycle around the world in the ‘70s that resulted in the book “Jupiter’s Travels,” as fine a travel book as there is.