My Tour de France… Without the Tour….with Chipps Chippendale
On Monday, July 6th, the Tour de France would come the closest to us in the Pyrenees Orientales since 2021, finishing 40km up the mountain from where I live near Villefranche de Conflent, as it made its way from Granollers (north of Barcelona, near the F1 track) north and up into the mountains before heading through Font Romeu, turning left at Mont Louis and finishing in Les Angles.
Our plan had been to ride up on bikes the morning of the race, via the quiet backroads, to Matemale and watch the race in the last 10km. Then I got an invite from Skoda to ride in the Tour Publicity Caravan, courtesy of P-O Life magazine, which would allow me to ride in the caravan of free stuff, from the start, all the way to the finish.
However, our recent wildfires had other plans… Just getting to the start the night before was a mission, as the main road to the coast was shut, so I had to get a lift from my wife, Beate, over the mountain and into Spain, where I could get a bus from Vic to Granollers on Sunday night.
Meanwhile, the Tour announced that spectators wouldn’t be allowed on the course for the French part of the race, due to the potential danger (and mostly travel chaos) of the fires, a mere 40km down the mountain.
Once in Granollers, I received confirmation that there wouldn’t be a caravan at all, not even on the Spanish bit. It would head straight to the next day’s start in Carcassonne.
This left me with a bit of an issue. The Tour/Caravan normally transports the cars of the people jollying in the caravan to the finish, so they can get home again. However, I’d planned to bring a folding Brompton bike, so that I could meet up with my pals in Matemale and (swap bikes and) ride home from there.
Now, on the morning of the Tour, I had the opportunity to visit the Village (a little VIP area behind the sign-on stage) and watch the start. And then… that was it.
The bus station was shut, as it was on the race route, and the trains weren’t running from there either.
So, having watched the start from a distance, and buying two litres of water, I rode 12km or so to the next town north (on a nice cycle lane, though in 34°C heat in street clothes…) to catch a supposed train north.
At La Garriga, the info boards showed all of the departures, with ‘Cancelled’ next to them. But after an hour, a train did show up that was going to Ripoll, halfway to the French border, where I might be able to get a bus north. I hopped on with my folding bike.
A few stops later, I looked up and saw ‘R3 Ripoll’ – so I hurriedly hopped off the train and it drove off. This is when I realised the sign was saying ‘This is the train for Ripoll’ – and I found myself in a deserted station in Centelles, only 1/4 of the way to the top of the mountain.
Luckily there was a tiny station bar, where I could get a drink and look at the timetables. In theory, there would be another train 20 minutes later… so I waited.
And there was a train! And even better, it went all the way to Latour de Carol, which is over the French border (and actually the final stop for the Train Jaune). So I sat on this new train for a couple of hours to Latour – where my solid pals, Sian and Dafydd (who’d been already camped up and watching in Matemale, a half hour away) could come and rescue me and bring me home by early evening.
It all worked out in the end. Not that I saw much of the Tour that day…
And to sum up the day…
In the VIP Tour ‘Village’ I had taken solace that, instead of riding in the Caravan, I’d at least get a close-up view of the riders signing in, as the open back of the stage sat in the Village, so we could see riders coming in to sign on and see them (or at least their backs) as they were presented to the cheering crowd.
I’d brought the Big Camera, so I snapped some good shots of some of the heroes, like Tom Pidcock and Jonas Vingegaard, while I waited for the ultimate photo of the Tour favourite, Tadej Pogacar.
Pog and shoe sponsor DMT have just signed a lifetime deal for him to ride in their shoes… And for someone who races in a $350,000 watch, that can’t have been a cheap deal…
And, then, with perfect timing, just as he was about to be announced, a full-length sponsor’s banner unfurled behind the riders, between us and them. All I could see of Pog was the bottom of a tyre and a shoe.
That ‘nearly’ seemed to sum up my day right there…
