Up and Over

Val looked at me the other day and told me I was getting too fat, dumb and happy.  Well, her remark made me unhappy so I’m pretty sure that means she was wrong on one count.

She proposed a solution – more biking.  She suggested we bike to Maussane for lunch via the Val d’Enfer.  You may recall that the Val d’Enfer (Hell Valley) is at the end of a long, uphill ride.  Basically you bike straight up for a very long time, then you turn around and coast straight down for a very short time.

Val said that instead of turning around at the top, we should continue on to Maussane.  I figured that since it was downhill from the Val d’Enfer to Maussane, this would be great. We’d go on a vigorous bike ride up up up, then an easy coast down and then lunch.  What could possibly go wrong?

Oh yeah, we’d have to ride back.

That meant two of those gigantic uphills, basically going up and over the Alpilles mountains twice.  Now for a stud biker like our friend Glenn, this is nothing.  He could probably do it with one leg tied behind his back.  But for us it’s pretty challenging.

But we decided to do it so off we went.  The first ascent wasn’t too bad.  And lunch at one of our favorite restaurants was delicious – fish tempura and then quail with risotto for Val, artichoke tart and then seam bream for me.  No wine though, dang it.

The ride back started out ok but that darned hill seemed to get steeper and steeper the further we went.  Whose idea was this, anyway?  I kept asking Val “are we there yet?” until she threatened to push me off the edge of the mountain.

We finally made it home.  Val was pretty much fresh as a daisy while I was a bit worse for wear.

Not as fat, though.

KVS

After the first ascent

 Fortifying ourselves

 We have to climb what??

 Triumph

Ouf !