20th September (cloudy morning, sunny afternoon, warm) 46 km

We all know that the French are religious. Any sins that you’ve committed during the day, let alone the week, well, it’s off to your nearest church to confess those sins and pay the price. They come in all different types of payment styles from your usual Hail Marys to the lesser known varieties, which are not spoken about in rural France, less the church is seen in a negative way.

It just so happens that God around these parts, deems it so, that everyone must wake at 7am with the chimes of the church bells and start doing “His work.” It doesn’t matter that you are a young mum who has been up all night with a baby that won’t sleep, or you are a shift worker just arrived home and closed your eyes after a long nights toil.

In this particular part of France it starts with a solitary chime of the bell at one minute to seven. If you’re a light sleeper, such as I, you are now prepared for what is to come. But….just in case you’re not, this is what happens. At 7am you receive seven rings of the bell, followed a minute later by another seven rings. For the confused and bewildered, it is now 14 o clock and your day is half over. Two minutes after the second set, the place goes crazy and there are bells ringing everywhere. God is not amused with those who thought that they would take an extra couple of zzz’s, hence cutting back on productivity.

What the majority of non-believers don’t know is that those bells are not, as you would imagine nowadays, computerised, there is in fact someone ringing those chimes. Take the case of 94year old Maree-Louise.  A devout church goer all her life. You’d think she’d get a reprieve….1 for being 94 and…2 for being a believer all her life. No… here she is at a few minutes before 7am trudging slowly up the cobbled streets to the bell tower. Every time she pulls on the bell, it shoots her twenty feet into the air. She manages to control it for the first two sets of precisely rung seven chimes, but then, because of her age and lack of muscle strength, she loses it and so the cacophony of chimes. All this because she put too much lemon rind in her lemon meringue pie, for the local church fete.

So after Pete’s rant, you may have gathered that we got up just after 7am.  Started with the obligatory cup of tea, muesli and yoghurt followed by coffee, and for Pete (aka the bottomless pit) some bread and cheese.  Packed up a very wet tent due purely to condensation – still haven’t had rain.  Kept the flysheet packed separately to drag out later to dry. 

Set off at 9.30am and began the day with a minor disagreement about which way to go.  It didn’t matter that I was holding Maps Me in my hand (plus the fact that I’m always right), Peter insisted that we go the way he thought.  I tried to show him that yes, his sense of direction was intact but if we wanted the coastal route, we had to go this way first.  I think he thought I was on a mission for a swim and was going to drag him round a few unnecessary kms to achieve that objective.  However, it was pretty cool still and I was not dying for a swim although I have to admit, I was keen to at least see the ocean.

Anyway, he soon thawed out when he realised I was not on a mission to kidnap him and drag him kicking and screaming to every appealing swimming spot that was in a 10km radius.  We had a stunning day of riding following a cycle path for the 35 km to Les Sables d’Olonne.  No traffic, often through the woods or over the sand dunes or along the beach.  

Our first look at the Atlantic Ocean - not very inviting !

Some impressive rock formations on the Cote Sauvage

Our first sight of the Atlantic Ocean was very rocky and grey looking, not appealing at all.  But as we passed the town of Brem sur Mer, we spied an expanse of golden sand and decided this was a good spot for a swim.  It felt chilly as we first got in but once we’d been under a few times, it felt great.  We both reckon it was about 16-17 C, so we only stayed in about ten minutes.

First ocean swim - yeeha!!

Got dried and dressed and pedalled round a little further to watch some surfers in what looked like fairly big surf from down the beach, but when we got there, it wasn’t that big and even though there were about ten guys out, only saw one catch a wave, so we pedalled a bit further on.  Found some picnic tables so stopped for lunch and dried the tent fly out at the same time.

We had a lot of beautiful tracks like this one to enjoy today

The canal area was very scenic 

Most of the houses have a mediterranean look to them.

Lunchtime

After this we cycled through some canals and man-made ponds.  Not quite sure what this was all about but surmised they might be private fishing ponds, even though we didn’t see one person fishing.  It was very scenic in a different sort of way. 

What really impressed me today was the constant smell of these hedges they had growing everywhere – they smelled very much like jasmine and it was lovely.  

The day was warming up and we were getting keen for another swim, so after cycling all round Les Sables d’Olonne, we came across the main beach of this city by Tourist Info.  This place reminds us a lot of the Gold Coast with many high rise apartment buildings and it was pretty busy today, so it must be chaos in tourist season.

Our first look at Les Sables d'Olonne

The beach at Les Sables

We enquired at Tourist Info first about what campgrounds were open and found there was one just 4kms down the road.  So decided we would stay here for the night and hopefully Phil and Elizabeth would catch up with us.  We went for a couple of swims and even though the waves were quite weak, I managed to bodysurf a couple which felt fantastic. We felt it was a degree or two warmer here as well.  Just as we were putting our shoes back on, Phil and Liz roll up.  So Pete and I got an ice-cream and watched over the bikes while they went for a swim and then we all cycled to the supermarket together.  Bought the evening’s supplies and then cycled to the campground.  16 euros per couple, and no free wifi – bit of a rip-off but by now it was 6.15pm so we weren’t going anywhere else.

The guy at reception was a miserable git, the first person we’ve encountered like that since we’ve been in France. It’s Pete here, by the way. The best part about today for me was in fact swimming in the Atlantic and it being reasonably warm, we reckon around 17 or 18 degrees. You can tell what the people who live here do most of the time, by the tans that are on show. It was good to catch up with Elizabeth and Phil, but alas, we have not heard from Dad yet, which is a little concerning. However, Elizabeth did tell me that when she was last in Switzerland, she had no reception whatsoever.

Hopefully this means that Dad is not laying by the railway lines in Basel, Switzerland, the last place we heard from him, having been mugged and assaulted and now suffering from dementia, hence, not knowing how to contact us….or even, what a phone is used for. I am now off for a shave and shower before hitting the hay.