Day 5 - Rest Day at Labastide Murat

Well, we could of had a better location for a rest day. Although nice, this hotel is in the middle of nowhere, in a village at the top of a hill which has 2 restaurants (1 doubles up as a bar), 2 hotels, 1 pharmacy, 3 patisseries and a mini-supermarket! So finding something to do for the day was challenging. As a result, a number of groups formed and they went onto do their own thing.

Mark, Spike, Luke, Rik & Phil decided to go into the local town, Cahors, some wanted to check out the bike shop, and some a local winery - I am sure you can easily guess who wanted what.

As we set off in the car, Spike soon became agitated - turns out he had a passenger on his body. Under his shirt was a "huge" wasp - he then flapped around like a big baby trying to get it off.

We arrived in Cahors and found the local bike shop - disappointed to say the least - you would of thought a country like France would have decent bike shops. Toys R Us put this one to shame! Shortly afterwards, we had lunch, and Spike had a huge bowl of mussels. This was then followed by a bit of culture - we went to a wine tasting place where we were educated about the wines of the region. Even Luke & Spike seemed to enjoy it.

Anthony went for a bike ride - headed 5 miles downhill and due to the heat decided that he did not fancy cycling back up much more hill so he turned around.

Dave waxed his legs. Gavin went back to sleep, woke up and did his washing. Paul went for an hours walk.

Simon and Gethin (one of the organisers), decided to go for a naked swim in the river. Turns out that they did not swim at all - but instead had a little paddle and a playful splash of each other!

Finally, Russell went with his Dad to a local historic fortified village called Cirq Lapopie.

Once everyone had returned from their activities, a few of us had a civilised game of Boules and somehow managing to upset one of the locals who was claiming we were playing it wrong (she was a little tipsy it has to be said).

The lads are now enjoying an evening meal and preparing themselves to get back in the saddle tomorrow, for our trip up to Limoges.

Observations from the Car

Having mentioned this to some of the team, they insisted I posted it up on the blog. When driving behind the cyclists, I have noticed that one person in particular seems to have different coloured cycling bottoms, which have a distorted font and a different sponsor. What should be NetApp, is Network Appliance - turns out Simon opted for the large kit when quite clearly he should of gone for XL, so Dylan if you are reading this - see if you can get him the right size and bring it over with you :-)