Posted by: Kyle

Today we rode from Bourg d'Oisans up the Veneon Valley, which one of our guide books describes as one of the most beautiful valleys in the French Alps. It really was amazing. The route followed the Veneon River (which runs into the Romanche River further down the valley) much of the way. We stopped to soak our feet on the way up. Some of the rivers in this area are a chalky turquoise like this one. Others are crystal clear.

Some photos from the climb up the valley

On the way up the valley we went through the villages of Venosc, St. Cristophe en Oisans, and Les Etages. The road ends high up the valley at the village of La Berarde, where we stopped for lunch of gallettes stuffed with ham, egg, and cheese. From our table we had a good view of La Meije, one of the highest peaks in France. This old church is in the center of town.

The road up the valley was ideal for cycling, maybe less so for driving. Here are some photos from the way back down.

Posted by: Bec

The short course race did not start until 2 pm. That left time for a leisurely breakfast and a side trip to Oz. We got to the lake about 12:30, and I got set up. I was pretty nervous because it was my first mass start swim. The idea of starting with 1000 other people was more than a little intimidating. I made it through and was on my bike in less than half an hour. The bike was amazing. Hard and beautiful. People lined the street and would scream "ALLEZ, ALLEZ Rebecca!" It was great. As if the ride wasn't pretty enough, the run was gorgeous.

We had a post race dinner of pizza and crepes. Kyle's crepe was stuffed with apples, drowned in chocolate, and covered in ice cream and whipped cream. I've never seen anything quite like it before.

Posted by: Kyle

Today I had my race, the Alpe d'Huez long distance triathlon. It started with a 1.2 mile swim in Lac Vernay, a beautiful mountain reservoir near the town of Vaujany. The lake is used for hydroelectric power generation and is only open to swimming for these two races. The water is extremely clear - I'd guess the visibility is probably at least 50 feet or so. It's fairly cold too, at about 63 degrees. Here's a picture of the chaotic mass start.

After the swim was a 115km bike ride. The route started out going west down the Romanche river valley following the main road, then turned south to climb up L'Alpe du Grand Serre. This was a very long steep climb up a narrow mountain road with switchback after switchback. After topping out, there was a long winding descent toward Valbonnais, before beginning the long climb up to Col d'Ornon. The road from Col d'Ornon back down to Bourg d'Oisans is a long twisting descent down a narrow mountain road.

From Bourg d'Oisans to the end of the bike, the course climbed up the legendary 21 switchbacks of the climb to L'Alpe d'Huez. This climb has been included as part of a stage in the Tour de France 26 times. Each of the 21 turns is marked with a sign dedicated to a winner of a past stage (they've had to start sharing signs).

The bike was followed by a hilly half marathon (a very slow one after that bike ride) around the trails and roads of the Alpe d'Huez ski area.

Just under seven and a half hours after starting the swim, I made it to the finish line. The food at the finish included prosciutto, brie, dark chocolate, pasta with meat and cheese, along with the usual fruit and things. Here I am with a piece of prosciutto.

We had a great dinner in Alpe d'Huez before heading back down to the valley for the night.

After picking up our race packets today, we drove the bike courses. The transition area was cool.

The drive along the long course was amazing. Kyle should have a great ride tomorrow. His bike is 115 km with plenty of climbing. My short course ride is 30 km long. There is only one climb, but it is the Alpe D'Huez, that should be more than enough for me! The road up the Alpe has twenty-one switchbacks, each one named for a Tour De France winner.

We were careful to stop for lunch today before 2:00. A bust. In the small town that we stopped in, we could only find one cafe. They had already stopped serving lunch, but offered to make us sandwiches. All sandwiches had butter, of course, and an ingredient we didn't recognize, cornichon. The waiter told us it was a small green vegetable. Hmmm. Turned out it was a pickle.

Tomorrow = Kyle's race.

After a solid twelve hours of sleep last night, we got up around 9:00 and headed to a cafe down the street for some breakfast of pain chocolat, OJ, baguette, and coffee. After breakfast we unpacked and assembled our bikes and went for a short ride to a town called Allemont, and up to the Lac Vernay, where we'll swim for our races in a couple of days. Here's Bec in front of a church in Allemont.

And here's a view of Lac Vernay.

After our ride we tried to get some lunch, but a lot of the cafes stop serving lunch at 2:00, which is less than convenient, since they won't serve dinner before 7:00. We did find a place to eat and had some really good ham and cheese sandwiches on buttered baguettes. A ham and cheese sandwich should always have butter.

After lunch we walked around the town of Bourg D'Oisans. Here are some pictures. The flower baskets and planters here rival the ones in Corvallis.

Travel day - We thought we were ready, and then we talked to our neighbor Wiske. She made us take her European cell phone for emergencies, extra power adapters, and 25 euros. Off to a good start. At the airport Northwest tried to charge us $300 one way per bike. Luckily we made some deadline and got off with the bargain price of $150 per bike. They felt bad about the exorbitant charge and gave us a card for a free drink.

The flight from Minneapolis to Amsterdam was long. Eight hours in the middle seat long. The flight from Amsterdam to Lyon was much more pleasant. We sat next to Odile, she lives in Lyon and insisted that we took her phone number in case we had a hard time with the French people. This seemed pretty funny since she was French but whatever!

The drive from Lyon to L'Hotel Des Alpes in Bourg D'Oisans was about two hours. The hotel is in a great location right in the center of town and has a terrific view of the walking mall below.

This past week was full of numbers. We celebrated 3 birthdays

Tobin turned 3
Chris turned 30
Kyle turned 35

For Kyle's birthday there was coconut cake (2 cups of coconut) with coconut frosting (2 more cups of coconut) and a trip to Barney's Diner for some birthday corned beef hash.

Kyle and I spent the weekend working on the cabin. There are 148 rungs on the deck that had to be sanded. Another number from the weekend - 3500. That's the number of mosquito species in this world. Only the females bite. And bite they did.

Thank goodness for Red Truck wine.

How does our garden grow? Poorly. Apparently green thumbs skip a generation. We added some new plants (sages & succulents) and grasses to replace what we killed last year. We (Kyle) also built a privacy wall for the patio and are attempting to get honeysuckle to grow up it. Click on the daylily to see more pictures.