Sunday, Stage 15 and VeloVeritas’s last shift on Tour – so we headed for the biggest hill we could find to remind ourselves how special and beautiful France and this race really are.
Today we’re in the heartland, perhaps not deepest agricultural ‘France Profonde;’ the rural, simple, beautiful heart of the nation, not with the gorges and cols.
However, it’s quiet, lovely and some of the simple, striking images surprise as you drive the parcours.
The countryside is so varied with wheat fields giving way to raw rock which has forced it’s way up to the surface of the planet eons ago.
There are few things we associate more with France than the 2CV, Citroen’s low cost, reliable, simple transport for the masses with it’s high ground clearance and skinny tyre you can take one just about anywhere – and if you bash it, just unbolt the panel.
Pork sausage manufacturers Cochonou’s fleet of gingham 2CV cars and vans has been on the Tour ‘since grass’ – long may they continue.
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