Sunday, June 29, 2008

La Route des Grandes Alpes Day 6: Jausiers to Saint-Sauveur-sur-Tinée

80.8 km total
Col de Restefond-La Bonette 2,715m
Cime de la Bonette 2,802m
Col des Granges Communes 2,513m

In the luxury of La Mexicaine, we managed to sleep our fatigue away and refueled with a lovely breakfast.

Riding up to Bonette we clearly felt stronger than yesterday. Everyone climbing Bonette knows they are doing something special. And there were many people cycling up... perhaps because it was Sunday?

So, as we rode on, we started conversations with quite a few people. It was funny how we would see the same people on this road over and over again depending on when and where we all stopped. That is, except for Rosario and Karsten whom we saw once and then the next time at the col.

We used a polluted, but virgin snow wall right below the Cime to write another Tour d’Enfer message to our friends Will, Martin and Barry back in Genève.

We had taken advantage of some of the (military) monuments along the road up to the top to include some stops and we did the same on the way down. Katy appreciated the limited descend speed. Sadly, we missed 1 great photo opportunity, which of course was the captain’s fault. As we descended from the Cime the la Bonette to Col de la Bonette, we crossed the path of another tandem team cycling up to the Cime. We should have stopped and shared a photo, but we didn’t.

Then, as we reached St-Etienne-de-Tinée, we encountered our first rain. Nothing too bad as we were almost completely wind-dried by the time that we bumped into our support staff in St-Sauveur-sur-Tinée. Everything was ready and well organized again for us to recover and relax.

Cycling becomes really easy this way and yes, we finished this day feeling very fresh.

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