DAY 1: ST. MALO - CHATEAUGIRON: 98.1km
SATURDAY 17th JULY 2010

I half woke up at 5am, saw that it was going to be a lovely day, and fell back into a contented sleep. When I woke up an hour and a half later I felt as if I had had a really good night's sleep. The beds in the cabin are surprisingly comfy and I had only woken up a couple of times in the night when I felt the boat roll on what was probably still a rough sea from the earlier gale. I sat up in bed writing my journal and enjoying a relaxing start to the day.

We somehow managed to take such a long time getting ourselves showered and packed that we totally lost track of time and were absolutely stunned when we heard the announcement inviting us to go down to the car deck. We had no idea we had arrived (our porthole was still misted up) and were disappointed to have missed the fun of going out on deck and watching St. Malo come into view.

When we got down to the bike shed the Cardiff Crew were there looking a lot more like cyclists and after a few team photos and good wishes they sped off in the direction of Barcelona. We were still untying the tandem and sorting ourselves out as we weren't being put under any pressure to leave.

We pushed the tandem out into glorious sunshine

Rob spent a bit of time setting up the garmin and the cameras with the correct date and time while I enjoyed the view of St. Malo harbour and ate a cereal bar to keep me going until breakfast.

What a lovely day to start a tour




Then we were off, through residential streets




Our first stop was the bank in a beautiful street away from the tourist area

We found a small supermarket where we bought water to top up our bidons and then left St. Malo via residential streets lined with splendid houses.

We were soon in open country




We stopped for breakfast at St. Jean de Guerets

It was lovely to be on our bike and cycling in France. The weather was perfect and we were feeling really good.

The Rance estuary was absolutely breathtaking




We spent a lot of time stopping to take photos




We were a long way from Gascony




We could have spent hours looking at the view but we had to move on

We had one very steep hill and then followed lovely rolling hills past fields of maize and corn. The leaves of the maize looked so green in the sun and we chatted excitedly about the journey ahead. We also kept singing a Dartmoor Pixie Band tune we had heard at a recent festival that seemed to be stuck in our heads.

We were really enjoying the ride




This lane was stunning and we avoided a puncture




We decided the cows were pessimists




The dark stone cottages were very pretty

We were ready for our lunch and cycled through a couple of villages where the bars and bakeries were shut. I had researched the route and noted which villages had restaurants but without phoning each individual restaurant (the majority of them don't have websites) there was no way of knowing whether they would be open or not and I had wrongly assumed they would be open during Saturday lunchtime. It never ceases to amaze us how difficult it is to find food at lunchtime in France!

ADD PICTURE OF VILLAGE WITH NO FOOD

We found a bar with a sunny terrace but unfortunately the baker's was shut so we could not buy a picnic to eat there

One of my searches had found a restaurant in Pleugueneuc which had a website and, according to the website, was open on a Saturday. We decided to aim for there and hope we were not too late to order.

Antre Terre et Mer was a real find




The food was fantastic

Although we were tempted to have the three course menu du jour we decided that we had to be sensible. A long lunch would've been very nice and was very tempting but we had to be realistic - time was ticking on and we didn't want to arrive at our destination too late. In previous years we would've ended up having a long lunch and then wondered why we had arrived at our destination so late. This year we had prepared an excel spreadsheet which on first view looks very rigid however, we were able to see at a glance what the consequence of a long lunch would be on the rest of the day and armed with this information we decided to opt for one course and stick to our target of a 7pm arrival at our destination. As it was we didn't leave there until got 2.30pm which was late enough really.

Most of the afternoon's ride was on a straight, rolling road

We made good progress and on one downhill stretch reached 54.9kph.

We passed through a couple of towns




and villages




We used photographing the cows as an excuse to stop

It had turned out quite hot and some of the hills, although not steep, were long and hard work. As we ground up them in the granny ring it gave us chance to admire the enormous hydrangea bushes that seemed to be outside everyone's house in varying shades of blue and purple.

Rennes was busy - then we remembered it was Saturday afternoon




I was ready for a sit down and a cold drink

It wasn't easy pushing the loaded bike through the cobbled streets that were absolutely packed with people but we managed to find a bar where we could park the bike so we could keep an eye on it. We only had a quick stop as we were conscious that we wanted to get to our destination at a sensible time.

Leaving Rennes was easier than we anticipated as there was a designated cycle lane - and everyone seemed to still be in the city centre

We followed rolling roads past fields of corn

I was feeling really strong, much stronger than I had at this stage of the day on previous tours. My training had obviously paid off and it was nice to be able to continue to enjoy the ride to Chateaugiron, our destination, rather than spend the last hour praying for it to end.

Chateaugiron was so pretty - it was a lucky guess for our overnight stop

We were pleased to discover our hotel was right in the middle of the town

We received a very warm welcome and the owner helped us put the tandem in one of the locked stores off the courtyard. The hotel was really old and our room was clean and functional although could have benefitted from a bit of updating. However, the bathroom was clean and modern (a good shower being our main priority on arrival) and the room's redeeming feature was that it had a little roof terrace although this was very tatty and could've been really beautiful.

We had a pre-dinner stroll around the town




It was a beautiful warm evening




Some of the houses had amazing carvings on them




After an apero in a bar we walked back to our hotel for dinner




We chose a nice table by the window

We enjoyed sitting down for dinner and reflecting on our first day's ride in France while we ate a meal cooked from ingredients supplied by local producers.

After dinner we sat on our balcony for a while and wrote up our diaries

We both agreed that staying in a good but cheap hotel in a small town and eating on our own was much preferable to what we had done in the past when we had stayed in chambres d'hotes or, worse still, camped. It was so nice to know that we had a real bed waiting for us.