Beside the Seaside

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In Which The Heavens Open

August 21, 2007 by Mike

Saint Michel Chef Chef

Yesterday, Monday: the view from my motel window:

DSC04578.JPG

(Can you make out the Bonnie?)

I booked another night, and went back to bed.

--

Today: a brighter start to the day and a quick blast down the Route Nationale (RN) to Lorient, where I've located a Triumph dealer. The good folks at Access Machine put a new rear tyre on (the last having done 9000 miles since Stralsund, if you're into that kind of thing. They didn't charge for labour because.. well, because they're kind.

I also asked them to check the spokes -- a common fault on Bonnies -- and re-tension the chain. As they certainly didn't do the latter, I'm assuming they didn't do the former. The chain needed tightening, which I manage after a fashion. I plan to get a full service in the next couple of weeks -- somewhere hot.

Because, and sorry to bleat, the weather here's been lousy. I read that the UK is on course to have the wettest summer since 1766. I'm not far away, as the crow flies. I've missed a lot of the rain, sure. In Concarneau and last week in Le Conquet both locals and the local papers told me of "violent" storms that appeared the day before I arrived. And I'm getting quite good at weaving between the rainstorms as much as possible.

It couldn't last. Today, anxious to make some miles and dreaming of better weather to the south I ended up riding long and hard through the worst rain of the trip so far. It was hard to see where the low clouds ended and the sheets of rain began. The land was low and scrubby, what I could see of it, and instantly unmemorable. Taking the RN kept my average speed up but that simply meant the rain had an easier target. Which ensured the consequent flooding of my nether regions was all the more embarrassing. And this despite donning my all-in-one waterproofs.

To really rub it in, I've been noticing more and more shops and stores selling domestic swimming pools, sailing boats and BBQ sets. This should be the warmest, summer-iest stretch of the trip. Instead, I can't help reminiscing about the days spent sunbathing in the Arctic last summer.

Just look where I was exactly a year ago today. *sigh*

I stayed slightly inland on a whim. There was an option to hug the coast, slow down and head for a town called Bono. Or I could stay close-ish to the coast, on a faster road, and head towards Vannes.

I never did like U2. And as my dear chum Vann just found me on Facebook there was never any doubt in my mind. Ahhhh yes, but that's when the rain started.

I could plough on, inland, towards the almost-coastal city of Nantes. It's an historic cathedral city where the local football team are called the Canaries, play in the second flight and have just signed a tall Czech international striker who doesn't score many goals.

But, like certain other historic-cathedral-cities-where-the-local-football-team-are-called-the-Canaries,-play-in-the-second-flight-and-have-just-signed-a-tall-Czech-international-striker-who-doesn't-score-many-goals I could mention, sadly Nantes isn't quite beside the seaside.

Instead, and having spotted this place on the map several days ago, I came to Saint Michel Chef Chef. My mission, should I chose to accept it: to find out how on earth it got its ridiculous name, and possibly to offer to cook something for somebody.

The verdict so far: it's either a delightfully quiet seaside town, discrete villas nestling amid the woods, pure and unsullied French provincial fare. Or it's a deadbeat, empty ghost town full of concrete bungalows with the shutters up and nobody home.

I'll keep you posted.

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