Where The Tracks are Now

We did stick with our plan to ride the Canal bike trail to Bordaux, a really great experience. The canal does not have any commercial traffic these days, only private barges, some beautiful conversions of former work boats, and of course the many charter boats.

First night out of Toulouse we just camped on the canal bank, second night we asked one of the canal bank residents about camping on the bank outside his house and before we knew it we were in his backyard, then he waved his arms at a caravan on blocks in the yard and said we could use it if we liked. We did and for once it did not rain during the night, so we had dry tents for the next night.

The path this day took us past a Nuclear Power Plant, which seemed to be located alongside a small village and all seemed comfortable with the situation. The Garonne River was swollen with all the rain, water the colour of Tomato Soup, great tree trunks and assorted rubbish being swept along in the torrent. The canal ran adjacent to the river and we only saw it once every five or six kilometers. As the evening approached we went into a small village, had a beer at the local and enquired about camping. Mine host and several of the local lads indicated that the Sports Ground or the Canal bank would be ok, everyone would turn a blind eye apparently. On investigating the canal bank we heard people speaking in English, ¨Where are you from¨ Val asked, ¨New Zealand¨ they cried, pointing at the silver fern and NZ flag flying at the bow of their charter boat. They were from Christchurch, and one couple actually lived at Sefton!!

Next day we were approached by another Christchurch couple also on the same Canal, so we are getting some good chats in English at the moment. The bike trail brought us right into the centre of Bordeaux and we are set up in a two star hotel right in the heart of the old city, which is extraordinarily beautiful. Today we have been looking at some of the beautiful buildings, art galleries that are not closed, and eating lunch in a nice little restaurant, so this cycle touring is not all roughing it in the bush, dealing with ticks, slugs, ants and miriads of other crawlies, none as big and bad as those in Australia though.