Ballancourt-sur-Essone, FR to Fay-aux-Loges, FR

47.6 mi / 9.9 mph / 1110 ft. climbing
Home: Camping Le bois des Elfes

We’re riding to the legendary Loire Valley. There’s a EuroVelo route (#3) that heads southeast from Paris, hits the Loire, and then turns back northwest to follow it downstream. We ain’t got time for all that though, so between yesterday and today, we’re cutting off that corner and taking as straight a line as possible, to hit the river just east of Orleans. Rett said she was up for a 47 mile ride today (longer than anything we’ve done in months), that would take us to a campground on the Orleans Canal, shortly before it joins the Loire.

So we were out at 8:30am, again immediately on off-road bike paths, now even further out from Paris. We’d need lunch and dinner, but Rett made a good call to skip the grocery store I’d planned at mile 5, to instead maximize our riding time in the cool morning air, with the hopes of speeding ourselves to the next store (at mile 30) before we needed to eat lunch.

Early morning sun in the French countryside.

A field of frosty-tipped fronds (not frosty with actual frost).

Why is there a bike path out here? I don’t know, but we’re happy to take it!

This little “house” turned out to just be one of (presumably) four, each at the corner of a vast walled estate.

Lamby was proud to finally set a flock of sheep a-running; French sheep are more fun than British sheep, apparently. These guys were living right in the center of a small village.

In addition to beating the heat, Rett’s decision to press on (unbeknownst to her) was also helping us to (partially) beat the day’s headwinds, which would increase in strength as the lands warmed. On paper, the winds weren’t too bad, about 10mph. But I’d failed to factor in the terrain we would be crossing. We had climbed a couple hundred feet up to a sort-of plateau, overlaid with a quilt of farm fields. But the fields were so denuded, they might as well have been a flat quilt, for all the wind-stopping power that they held (there was in fact a moment where I was looking for alpacas, it felt so much like a barren 14,000 ft. plateau in Peru). With absolutely nothing to make the wind even think twice, it cantered over the defenseless ground and pressed into us with “only” medium force, but draining consistency.

The empty farm roads meant that we didn’t need to devote any portion of our energy to traffic-awareness, so all of our focus could go into the pedaling (for better or worse). Our savior was the return of trees for the last 12 miles, which really underscored that we don’t just love trees because they look cool and make shade.

Not a windblock to be found anywhere on this agricultural plateau.

A field of downcast, dying sunflowers is as depressing as the lively yellow version is delightful. I don’t know if we’re just past blooming season, and this is a normal phase of the sunflower-growing cycle, or if this is an effect of France’s blazing-hot summer.

I’ve been vaguely aware that low-cost airlines have enabled a lot of short-haul flights through European skies, but seeing the proof here was something else. It seemed like almost every bit of cloud in this sky began as an airplane contrail.

Three deer gallop across the harvested field.

Pithviers seems to be an interesting small town built around a walled hill (topped by this impressive church). My planned route to bypass the walls and hill was foiled by construction, and a guy walking by stopped to give us directions we couldn’t understand, so I ignored his advice and we found a way through on these narrow paths anyway.

Despite the increasing winds, we nonetheless made it to our Mile 30 grocery store by noon, a much better record than yesterday’s unexpected slowness. We still had to do a buy-lunch-first, shop-later two-step due to hunger, and Rett’s soreness-induced-slowness meant that all took a lot of time.

See if you can guess which side of this road has an irrigator. Also, look how much easier it is for the rare car to squeeze past us than on a British road of the same with, since there are no hedges squeezing everyone in!

A warm welcome (mostly in English) from the host at “Forest of the Elves” Campground soothed some of the exhaustion at the end of the long day. And so did Rett’s idea to buy us a couple of ice creams from their inviting snack bar (which is set up more for the many users of the Orleans Canal Trail that it opens onto, but it serves a nice double-duty). I don’t know if all campgrounds in France will be this nice, but it was better than any we had in England: a large, well-defined site, trees for shade, and green grass. Still no picnic table, but there was a near New Zealand-level kitchen/lounge building where we microwaved a surprisingly-good paella (augmented with a bag of frozen veggies).

There were only three or four other parties (in a campground that could hold at least 30), and since it’s a Saturday night, I think it’s safe to conclude that we’re now past the peak summer season. Finally, it’s been a long wait!