Something to Declare by Cyclist

Chapter 39

And then we were there, with hundreds of other cyclists, going through the rigmarole of registering riders and support vehicles.

Some very odd-looking people were there, and for some reason nobody seemed to be talking to anyone else. Geoff looked remarkably out of place, his arm around my waist and his hand slipping down to my bum every so often, but he explained that AUKs were solitary birds…..

Brevet stamped. I waved him off behind the initial escort of cars and motorbikes, and then busied myself in getting ready for the dawdle along the approved route to the first control. There would be 15 stages, over 80 hours, and the earliest start for Geoff was at five pm on the Sunday, so he had to be back by one am on Thursday morning to be successful. So, some time in the small hours of Tuesday he should be in Brest, only to wave at the sea and turn around.

The next few days are a blur. I seemed to do nothing but drive, sleep fitfully until the alarm went off, cook pasta and brew coffee, and swallow packet after packet of those wonderful little friends, chocolate-covered coffee beans. I don’t remember Brest at all, and to be honest, I don’t think Geoff really remembers anything after his first stop at Fougá¨res. We grabbed a too-short cuddle in the Edifice that time, but on the way back he was running near to the edge of his permitted time, and all we could do was snuggle together as he fed himself.

I had seen many people simply lie down at the side of the road and give up, to be covered over by a blanket and left to sleep, or in two cases collected by ambulance. Even though the ride was taking place around the clock, it always seemed to be dark, riders coming in with obscenely bright lighting rigs hiding hollow eyes and grey skin. I began to see the odd person with head straps, reaching from the back of the helmet to their spine so as to hold their heads up even when so incredibly tired. There was also the confusion, and crowding, in the controls on the return stages as outgoing riders crossed those heading back to Paris. Fortunately, Jan had taken Kelly and their car back to St Quentin and Bill was with me to spell me at the wheel. I found myself having conversations where Bill told me I was falling asleep in the middle of a sentence, only to resume it after a minute or two.

At the last control, at Dreux, Geoff was only quarter of an hour within the allotted time. It had been raining for some time, and a nasty little headwind had sprung up. It was heartbreaking to see a man I thought of as being able to ride endlessly now almost grovelling after over 1,100 kilometres of pain. I fed him, massaged his legs, refilled all his bottles and sent him off with a kiss. There was nothing more I was allowed to do, and he now only had 66 km left, just about41 miles. Bill and I packed it all up, and I slumped in the passenger seat for the short drive to the finish.

Three and a third days. 1,225 kilometres. Rain, wind, hills, three flat tyres, countless bowls of carbohydrate-loaded food, four pairs of shorts; Eighty hours were allowed for Geoff’s group, and four of us standing in a crowd of what seemed to consist largely of Brits were getting worried. There was only an hour and a half left, and the rain was slicing though the air like grinding powder, turning our cheeks pink and numb. Riders were stumbling in, some looking obscenely unruffled while others were weaving and swerving as they tried to keep legs turning that had bonked several villages ago.
And there he was, yellow waterproof zipped up to the chin, fleece hat under a helmet with a waterproof cover, front LED lights almost dead while the dynamo continued to burn.

He was in, and after the formalities of brevet card and frame number we loaded up the vehicles and headed back to our hotel, Bill driving Geoff and myself riding with the other girls. I busied myself with sorting some things for the next day while Geoff hit the shower, and when I went into the bathroom to wash his back I found him sitting on the floor under the warm spray, fast asleep. It took me a little while to stir him, dry him off and get him into bed, and just after I crawled under the covers with him I realised it was full daylight. I couldn’t even remember pulling the covers over me.

We wandered down to the little dining area after calling up the trio, and had the rather unsatisfying snack that French chain hotels call breakfast. Bill seemed terribly smug, and the girls kept giggling. I noticed two suitcases next to the table. What exactly was going on?

“Come on, Bill, stop smirking, what are you up to?”

“Well, I still have Geoff’s van keys and I have no intention of giving them back”

“Woodruff senior, it is only ten o’clock and you cannot have been on the juice already. What are you talking about?”

He smiled, and said “Does Geoff have his house keys with him? I will need them”

He laid two envelopes down on the table. I picked them up, and he just smiled.

“Happy rebirth day, in advance”

The envelopes were a pair of air tickets for three days’ time, from Paris to my own airport, and a hotel booking for three nights near Montmartre. Geoff looked on open-mouthed as our family sat doing an impression of the Three Wise Monkeys. Jan laughed, and said

“If you only knew the trouble I had keeping this one’s mouth shut! You two go and enjoy, we will take the van back and leave it in Churchwood, as long as you don’t mind us being in there when you are away”

For the first time in a while, I started to cry.

“Why would I ever mind having my family in my home?”

I looked at Geoff, and took his hand. “I mean our home, of course”

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We took the RER train up into the city that afternoon after waving off the troublemakers, and I was consumed with the excitement always felt arriving there, looking for the first sight of La Tour. It is amazing how it can be seen from a great distance away and yet be invisible from close to, but there it was as we wound up the Seine. Our hotel was definitely French; the floors sagged and creaked, the pipes groaned and gurgled, and on a metal rod in the bathroom a cake of hard soap was impaled, not far from the bidet, which gave rise to all sorts of odd visions. The pillows were hidden in the top of the wardrobe, as a French bolster was in place on the bed. Horrible things, designed to leave your neck with a permanent tilt to one side. No wonder the French shrug all the time, they are trying to ease their seized cervical vertebrae.

The landlady was an elderly husk of a woman with a smoker’s dry rasp of a voice and a taste in breakfast coffee that could restart a heart, or more likely stop one. I had an argument with her over breakfast, trying to explain how tea is not made with water from the hot tap. She took the kettle away, so I stuck with coffee.

The second morning she left the first rose on my breakfast plate. She had obviously been watching us; obviously not such a dried up husk. I kissed her cheek in thanks, and nearly choked on the smell of stale Gitanes.

I do like France, but they could do with a little less smoking.