Day ten

 

I leave camp site De La Saone. Looks can be deceiving, it was the best so far.

Another clear sunny day. I slept well apart from some strange creature that awoke me. Initially it sounded like a small animal and it was hanging around my tent making strange noises. It seemed like a small animal, like a pine martin but I was unsure if it was an animal or a bird. It came and went in complete silence, no flapping of wings or rustling of grass. Eventually it moved away and from a distance it began to sound more like an owl. It is hard to describe the sound it made, a sort of mix of an owl and fox. I have never heard such a noise from a creature. Any ideas let me know.

Various bridges featured along the way initially, I suppose this was once a horse and carriage way.

The route is up and down today but seems more uphill than down. I think I took the wrong route out of Chalon and should have followed the Saône river and instead found myself more west than intended. Tomorrow I will head for Mâcon hopefully pick up the Saône river again. However it looks like I may have some mountains to climb tomorrow. I waste a lot of time waiting for my phone to charge and finally rig up a system whereby the power bank can charge the phone on the run. Time spent taking photos, chasing water supplies and unproductive tours through towns and villages looking for supermarkets also takes up a lot of time. It seems most French villages survive on hairdressers, Pizza restaurants, and bakeries. Setting up camp and decamping also takes up six hours a day, three hours in the evening and three next morning, so that in the end there is not even a lot of time for cycling. The advantage of a hotel, apart from Internet and electricity, is you gain those six hours and avoid the stress involved in packing and unpacking. Of course if I was a millionaire I probably would not be camping at all.

A break in the shade with a background of sunflowers where I enjoy an apricot tartlet and charge my phone.

I considered wild camping this evening as here looks more promising, however with all my batteries dying on me and no solar panels, I search for a camp site. Once again I am tempted off the beaten track by a sign, 'three star camping'. I reach a T-junction and nothing, no signs, no camping in sight. I hear some walkers speaking German and ask them if they know where it is. After a brief smartphone search they point to the way I have come and it's has little to do with the sign I followed. I give up and continue until I reach a pretty town with hotels. I book into one having first checked Booking.com. The Hotel de Bourgogne charges me 1 euro less than Booking.com and I am supposed to be on level two Genius with 30% discount or something. Just more Internet BS. Anyway despite the hills I manage 68km today and can still type this blog. I will have a bubble bath later tonight to celebrate and to prepare myself for a tough ride tomorrow.

Another town (Givny, I think) that I am lured into looking for water and a grocery store or supermarket. Even asking around I come away empty handed and it may account for why I had traveled so far west as Maps.me just takes up the route from your present location. Eventually I resort to asking locals and a bar tender for water, which seems to be the best way forward.

Roughing it in France. Bath time and what an end to the day, I could have stayed there all night. Roughing it is the only way to really appreciate luxury. Hope it sets me up for tomorrow. Looking at the 3D relief map of this area in the hotel reception it looks like there is some serious mountain terrain between me and Mâcon.