Our approach to the Tourmalet was from the west side which required a 90 min drive to Argeles Gazost where we left the car at the entry to the gorge to give ourselves a 10 km warmup to the base of the real climb (19 km at 7%). The weather was once again fairly kind with rain clearing as we approached the ride and temperatures staying cool for the ascent. This made riding much easier but most of the ascent was in cloud and the views were limited to 20 metres of road and wandering stock. At the top we briefly broke through the cloud, saw the surrounding peaks, took our pics and snacks before descending back into the mist to "freeze our arses off" on the way back down.
While the others continued on to St Marie and the Col de Aspin I came back down to our starting point. I thought the bike was developing vibration problems only to realise it was me shaking with cold... the other reported similar issues on the other side of the hill.
Finally back to the car warm up, pizza for a late lunch and drive back to Bertren was my day done. Tim, Norm and Pete had a bit more to do and eventually arrived home at 6:30 cold and wet and still having to pack for tomorrows departure.
Today, is departure ..... were just getting used to it all and now it's time to go.
So, we were all relatively quite this morning, either tired, sad or sick of each other (I don't think so) we headed out of Bertren for Toulouse airport where goodbyes were brief as I needed to going to reach Pau to pick Gerry and Robert for the next leg.
Feeling somewhat alone as I headed out of Toulouse, the speedy departure and pressure to make it to Pau on time evaporated with a phone call and cancelled flights from Paris.
So I am now sitting in our hotel in Argele Gazost with a bit of time to spare catching up and having a casual look at what's on offer.
Will be picking Gerry and Robert up from the airport at 10:00 tonight.
Will report how this goes later.
Bon soir
BB
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