A scorcher!!

Today was planned to be an easy day - with a short 50km ride out to the feed zone to watch the race go by. After a little sleep in, and a chat with home we set off at around 11:00 in the morning. Unfortunately though, the temperature was already high, and by the time we got to the top of the first climb it was over 40 degrees. One of our groups cycle computers registered a max temperature of 46 with an average of 36 for the ride. When I looked down into the valley that we were going to ride into all I could see was more time in the sun and given our huge day tomorrow I bailed out and rolled back down the hill past the hotel and into town.

l'Isle sur la Sorgue is a market town - famous for antiques and second hand stuff. I cruised around the small lanes on my bike soaking up a bit of French culture. I found a shady spot for lunch (with the obligatory ice cream) before cruising back to the hotel for air-conditioning, Internet and eurosport. Lunch was a ham and cheese baguette next to a pretty waterway just outside of town.

After the race was over on TV a few of us headed back into town for the obligatory Pizza entree. We wandered through the pretty little streets and found a place to have my first almost decent coffee in France as well as some bruschetta to take the edge off the appetite.

For dinner we were bussed back into town and left to our own devices for a couple of hours. Not surprisingly most seemed to stop at one of the first restaurants that we came to that served steak!. There was some conversation about having pizza at the place next door - but I think that had more to do with the attractive waitress. I had the all steak meal boef carpaccio for entree and steak and chips for main. Dessert was a no brainer - creme brulee followed up of course with the obligatory ice cream - this time it was lemon meringue ice cream.