Tour de France

In 2011 we planned our holiday around watching Le Tour. Once when looking at motor homes I had commented that we would be able to follow the Tour in the way that the seemingly thousands of others did that we saw on the TV coverage. We did not get a motor home but last year had a new Granddaughter arrive in mid June which put back our usual Mid may to mid June holiday and the thought came that perhaps we should go to watch the Tour. Last year the start was in the Vendee and travelling from Plymouth to Roscoff meant that it was a great start to our 4 week trip.

We had a great holiday and saw a total of 6 stages following on the TV,via satellite, for the rest of the time.

We tried to see a variety of stages and we found that a crucial thing is to get information locally regarding times of road closures etc and we also had to admire the level of organisation and effort that goes into making it a spectator sport of such massive proportions.

Our favourite would have to be travelling into Paris,by TGV from the Loire valley, to see Mark Cavendish win the final stage but watching the team time trial at a right angle bend which meant that the riders were as close to stopped as we saw was a day we will remember,if only for the great pictures we got of Bradley before he was a Tour winner!