Tuesday 27 October, Wednesday 28 October

Tuesday 27 October Castellane to Gréolières 47km

With wet weather predicted we all opted for an early start, so got our bikes ready and lined up outside the boulangerie which opened at 7am. Breakfast was great here even the luxury of an omlete for breakfast.

Our first hill started almost straight away a steady reasonably steep 7km including going through a village. After a bit of downhill we went into the second climb for 3km ending up at about 1180m. Breathing a sigh of relief that most of the climbing is over we ploughed straight into a head with along a high plain. It was pretty hard going however we spied a coffee place so had some not too great coffee and read that we had a spectacular descent to come.

Coming to the descent into Gréolières it certainly was stunning looking down into the valley and going through several tunnels and some tight bends. All the while we admired the autumn colours amidst the limestone peaks.

As we descended we spotted our B&B so even though we were early thought we would leave our bikes and gear and then go into the village. Daniel greeted us warmly and we stowed our gear and headed off. Town was quiet, we got the last piece of pizza from the boulangerie and sat looking at the view eating lunch. The castle had a continuous history of being built and restored and attacked and rebuilt over and over. It was getting pretty cold in town so we headed back.

Back at our B&B we used the WiFi and waited for our rooms to be ready.The rooms were worth waiting for even though not ready till after 4pm.

We had the dinner as they provided table d’hôtes. Martini and pate, veal casserole on pasta, cheese and canned fruit salad.

By the evening it had started raining and we had more overnight.

Stayed Villa Regain: Gréolières

Wednesday 28 October Gréolières to Nice
48km,

As it was drizzling when we left and we anticipated the rain to get worse we left around 8.30am.

As promised once we left town the route was down fairly steeply at first then more gradual as we followed a river.

Kits bike had a serious issue which caused much contemplation and it looked for a while like it might not complete the journey. In the end Ron worked out it was a broken spoke causing the problem and Claire was able to remove it. Kit continued on one less spoke but only for about 35km.

Around 26km out of nowhere a hill appeared as we were heading into town what a shock. We also had to cope with some quite heavy traffic and big roundabouts a change from what we were used to. We climbed up another short steep hill to get us out of town and then landed down on the Mediterranean Sea.

The cycleway followed the waterfront for a while then had to go round a couple of airports. While we had to cross a lot of roads the cycleway worked well and kept us separated from the traffic till we hit the Nice waterfront. We went along as far as the old town before we considered our journey complete at around midday. The obligatory photos were taken and we headed into the old town for coffee and lunch.

Geoff and Kit went to their B&B and the Jacksons and us went to Hostel Smith. They were pretty disorganised and had Claire and Ron and Susan in different buildings which wasn’t going to work so they went elsewhere. We had a little apartment in the old town.

After wandering around town around 4pm thunder and lightning appeared so we were glad we arrived early.

Steve and I went walking in the old town and the new town and enjoyed it a lot more than our memories of 1983.

So our St Malo To Nice tour is over. We had a great time and saw a variety of provinces in France. There was a huge range of scenery, plains, mountains, gorges, rivers etc. Our team was excellent, different personalities, ages, outlooks etc but we all managed to work together and spend 5 weeks constantly together without any problems.

Steve and I had dinner in our apartment.

Stayed Hostel Smith, Nice