Tour de Force stage 16 - the final part

For the second morning running there’s this cycle-world cacophony on the go. It’s not even dawn, not even cock crow and I’m lying in bed listening to a shadowy clacking in the ether of feet in clip-in shoes and toilets going a-whoosh.

My open back bedroom window brings more sounds from the cobbled yard. You’d easily think a team of placid horses, Percherons perhaps, were being settled in to drive the punctual we-never-go-late delivery of mail to Paris or some big city far from here.

Yes, the Tour de Force, with all its trimmings, vehicles and riders, is on the move again. The do-it-all champions tackling Stage 17 will leave town by the low road. There is the harder option, as we could see yesterday from the signs, of a higher mountain to the north, taking in the Col de Madeleine, but that’s not on anyone’s agenda today.

Certainly not mine. I’m still in yesterday, Tuesday, in my own little a Stage 16 time-warp. That big effort got me. So close but still so far.

As no-one else is eating these tasty hot mini-croissants I grab another four (let me be honest with you…five) of them out of the basket. This hotel does proper butter. And ladlings of serve-yourself jam in an open glass dish.

I have a serious decision to make. It’s like this….I have one mountain left in my legs. Just one as there’s a carry-over burden that is going to restrict today’s activities. It’s called fatigue.

That means a choice.

If I want to get back to my car, I need to cycle over the Col de la Croix de Fer and I’d like to do that as it’s a lovely climb. But what about the closed tunnels? Well I’d just have to bluff it when I hit those stop barriers. I’ve been in and through pitch-black tunnels before where you can see nothing, absolutely nothing. Jason Edwards can vouch for that.

But that would mean going sketchy here on the blog, implying that I got to Toussuire and so earning my sponsors’ big bag of oats. Like I could wax lyrical, like I could ask Ted what it looked like up there and copy his second-hand picture to paint into this here blog-zone.

Or I could simply ride up to Toussuire and think it from there.

Toussuire wins.

So I’m in the kitchen with the hotel patron, Gilles Toutain, and he’s a grand guy. I’m hoping none of the other cyclists can hear me in this far corner as this is all sort of embarrassing. He’s happy for me to try out my French, that’s a bonus in a French patron who can do the English. Well to me it is. Does he know if I could hire a (sshh, don’t you let on) taxi to pick me up at Toussuire later this morning to get me across and up to the top of the Croix de Fer….I’m guessing there is a minor link-road between the two that avoids the tunnel problem.

There’s four or five of them in here in some coffee-backed cup-and-huddle gathering. One’s listening mulcho and he gives me a card. Say, he’s a taxi man and yes he can and I’m to ring him on this number. It’s a deal.

So it’s 7.45am and I’m off. The blood on my left calf, from the horse-fly bite is a thing of the past and I have a shiny new leg for all of… 200 metres. Then it’s under attack again.

A truck passes with a trailer behind, the kind of kit used to collect unwanted/stranded cars. That’s fine. We’re coming to a small-town roundabout with daily-watered flowers where you’re none of you goes through fast as they are built to a tight-fit to make sure of that. On top of that, I’m going slightly uphill anyway. Another vehicle comes alongside me. It’s his mate, see, and it’s like nothing in this world is going to come between the two. So he passes, well part-passes and then cuts in.

He also has a trailer and the nearside wheel misses me by less than an inch. Only behind that there’s this crude-cut metal sticking with the tail-light gubbins attached and he happily brings it through me. So I’m up on the pavement sorting myself out and the car behind is calling through a window am I OK and I’m nodding.

Everything out there is on hold as the roundabout is full anyway. I’m thinking bad thoughts towards the driver….what I’d really like would be to fill his cab with a thousand horseflies then spot-weld the doors shut with him sat inside. I’d even get my camera out.

But the sun is out and Toussuire beckons and the leg’s going to be fine. I hope.

What can you say about this climb? Like the Col du Mollard yesterday, it will be the first time that the Tour de France has ever been up this road and it shows. All the way up, where-ever you look, it’s like the ordinary people have voted “Welcome”. Even on the craziest of old barns, never mind the tidy garden fronts, there’s something cycling. Mostly some old bike trawled down from the attic, rusty and unridable, but found and hung up to see.

One is fully decorated with light-blue pom-poms and another isn’t a bike at all as the farmer has gone all creative and has produced a make-believe item out of two old cart wheels, a scythe and other bits from his yard…and the bike chain must once have been cut out of the bed of an old-fashioned muck-spreader, though I don’t think many of you will know what they even looked like. We’re talking living history.

It sort of feels like being in a happy place.

Listen, if you want to feel it you can…..you should do a cyclosportif called the l’Ardechoise. There’s no really famous cols so why is it the most popular one in France with 11,000 riders? Well I’d say that it’s the ambiance of the place, the yellow/purple bunting they hang up for you in every village, the accordions at the feed stations, the road-side singers with microphones….yes, all this for the riders. You go home wanting to return.

The morning is quite splendid. Backache-easing halts today are fine, a bonus almost. Lying down in the grass and pushing up the shoulders reveals…. a splendid panorama of mountain tops all around.

So….Toussuire at last. The road flattens out nicely and then it’s totally level. Alpe d’Huez is a vast bulky place, and intrusive, development-rich, brown-painted mud splat set in a glorious landscape and Toussuire is battling to become much the same.

Someone has recognised that there’s a few hundred acres of flat land up here at a great height and that means potential, so what might just as easily have been clagged on the coastline in southern Spain might just as well be dumped up here. I mean to say, if you’re going to develop the entire world, you may as well start with the best bits. You might be guessing that I’m not a skier. If you are…then sorry for the outburst.

There’s a fake chuffer train on the road, all painted white, with fake carriages, all painted white, six of them trundling along like ducks in a row. There’s a driver and a passenger. She’s in the fourth carriage. We’re on the complete flat and you could land a plane on the tarmac, it’s that wide.

But hello, what happens next is deja-vu. The ghost train driver comes past and cuts in, which means the snaking line behind him follows suit. It’s automatic, like a wave effect or a whip lash. You know. Two carriages come closer and hey, look and see, I’m off the bike, already across the curb and standing in a doorway for safety. More carriages come through and I see the exact spot where me, the ghost cyclist, would have been hit. But I’m not there. I’m here instead.

The driver gets a smile as I’m just happy to be in this place. There’s a serve-everything place open on the left and it’s doing business. Parasols and tables. Yes, coffee would be good. Grande tasse. No nearby tabac in view so no papers, no cycling to pour over, no copy of l’Equipe to devour. But they do have something comparable…. an issue of the Dauphine Libere for coffee-and-sunshine sit-and-swiggers like me. So that’s fine, I sit and swig and dig, taking in both coffee and news in eager gulps/spadefuls.

The Tour de France action is more sensational than mine. Yes, another coffee and a two-bowl ice-cream as well. Lemon and raspberry, please. I do that in French. So this is it at last - I’m celebrating.

There’s two girls at a table at the other corner. One keeps crying a lot, then calms herself and talks some more into her mobile phone. Perhaps she’s being told they can’t do TalkTalk here in France. Anyway I turn towards the sun and bury myself in the cycling.

That’s it….you can stop reading now if you wish.

Although I’m in mission-accomplished mode, I’m also indulging in a bit of what-next thinking. Like I’m here and my car is over there and two conversations with the waitress and a man have confirmed the lack of any back-road link to the Croix de Fer.

So it’s back off the mountain by the same road as I came in, all the way down to St Jean de Maurienne with its peaceful roundabout and back to l’Hotel de l’Europe. Will that taxi deal stand? Oh excellent, it does and he’ll be by. How long? Trente minutes. He’s muchly on time and I’m pleasantly surprised at how he flicks out my front wheel. I thought I’d be doing that and only then after a discussion. Like you don’t expect that from an ordinary taxi man.

Bit by bit, I see he’s very much not an ordinary taxi man. Like, as we spot the road up the mountain, over there to the right, he explains that the best-used climb up the Col de Madeleine isn’t the best at all, it’s far better (and harder) on the second road. It’s the lesser-used one. I’d been thinking myself from the carte verte (green map) there could be two.

Then he’s saying that his group sometimes do a big day out and get themselves to the Col d’Izoard and back. Another big one being to Col d’Iseran. This is most impressive as the Iseran is on my “still to do” list and is one of the three highest cols in Europe.

So here I am, a cyclist sitting in a taxi driven by another mustard-keen pedaller. His card says Taxis Roux and he’s Pascal Roux. and he’s taking me up to the top via the Col de Glandon valley because the tunnel detour if we went the other way would take far longer negotiate…we’re talking Col du Mollard I can see.

He quoted me 50-60 euros though I’ve not exactly said where I want to be.

It’s a lovely day and stopping off on a taxi on the very top would be too embarrassing, so we settle for a corner 1km from the top. That way I can arrive looking the part. Well, almost.

There this mighty flock of brown sheep with deeper brown flecking in and amongst it…that’s the goats with bells and stick-like horns. A shepherd watching over them. Crouched. He’s the real thing, old-fashioned garb and a stick that could have come off a Christmas card. He’s been watching it all.

I get up there and he gives me a funny look. He must be puzzled as he was crouching in exactly the same spot yesterday and I’m here again wearing exactly the same top. Only I think he’s more decorative than me. You know these pretend-statue people who dress up and act like they’re frozen, they’re often in Covent Garden Square and the like, all in grey face-paint, and you give them money….well I think that’s what he’s really at. He’s sure attracting the car-spill tourists and he don’t move much at all.

Not like the cyclists. Let me paint this little picture…off the top of the Col de Glandon there’s a gentle drop-off before you reach a T-junction in 300 metres. When I was here yesterday I went left which climbs some more to the top of the Croix de Fer, but today I’m going right to swoop big-time back down into the valley that holds my car. It there somewhere in the medium-to-beyond.

Its hot and sunny and there’s cycles everywhere. At least 30 parked up for a breather right on the summit, in the little Glandon car-park, and another 50 guys parked up having pizzas at the restaurant place down at the junction, their bikes spread out on the hillside, plus another 30 actively pedalling up the short bit of road in between.

One of these is putting in a big-time sprint, he overtaking like there’s some big deal going down. He’s in a mostly black strip. It’s that new Caisse d’Epargne kit that Alexandro Valverde rides in. I still like last year’s strip better with its multi-coloured panelling. Green, red and yellow. It had a holiday flavour.

Well this guy spots me and starts shouting wildly which is surprising given that he’s in a sprint and anyway there’s no problem with me and him having enough room. And he’s still shouting as he comes past so I slow up and then stop….I mean the day’s over for me and this is all retro now.

So I’m there when he turns back and pulls up. It’s Gilles Toutain, the patron from the hotel, the guy who appreciates a customer who likes to try out their French and who got me sorted with a taxi. Star man. So he’s another cycling nut!! What a small world. So we get a good – but short- chat. I know there’s a cyclosportif that takes in the Col de Madeleine only I’ve wondered where to stay. I think that’s sorted.

As for the rest of the day…well I got back to Bourg d’Oisans and the car was just fine and as the only house really overlooking the little gravelly car park built for eight cars had its shutters all firmly close I got downside from public view and stripped into normal clothes there and then…..and when I looked up all the shutters on the house were open and a 70-year-old couple were both on the veranda watching….but a thunderstorm broke overhead anyway and so I quickly drove away. Amazing, I’d been off the bike no more than five minutes.

Up another hill, and come 4pm I’m getting the new low-down from the various riders staying here. This back at the King of the Mountains and most guys are here getting ready to do the king-size cyclosportif called la Marmotte. That’s on Saturday, three days from now.

The two cake-queens from Farnborough & Camberley are still here, tapering madly and they can barely make it through the door by now. It’s OK guys, I’m not letting names slip…I’ve only had the offer of £10 so far. Your secret is worth far more.

Andy from Eastbourne, who I’m sharing a room with, is well psyched up. He might even do it a day ahead of the crowd as he doesn’t fancy 10,000 others on the descent off the Col de Glandon (like down the valley I’ve just pedalled up……pause for loud cough…. errr OK, taxied up….but I’m trusting you with my secret….well, but I did it yesterday for real so that counts).

There’s two more Eastbourne and they too are Marmotting….they’re also tripping off to some nearby viewing gallery where (in the below) two dogs are each digging a hole and if the two dogs’ holes become tunnels proper then one dog will be the first to get its paws into a little outdoor cannabis production unit. It’s quite a chuckle.

During the night, Tim and Sally drove here non-stop from Worcester and they are even more Marmotty as they’ll be doing the Marmighty on a tandem no less. Wow!!

Poor old Paul from Huddersfield (Blackmoorfoot to be precise) and his side-kick from rugby days, that’s Dave, are the only ones (apart from me) not doing la Marmotte. They’ve never heard of it. They’re here to just enjoy the rides and the cols. Which is perfect. But little by little they’re getting suckered in.

For me though, it’s over. The achievement is in the bag and if anyone needs some of this lovely home-made cake its me.

In the sitting room, the tele is running. It’s live Tour de France and it’s in French so there’s no commentary by that dreadful David Duffield.

Ahh, sweet bliss.