May 14: Day 17, Saint Cyprien-Agde

Today's route was accidentally was 8 hours not 7. But it's flat, and mostly asphalt, so I’m feeling optimistic that it won’t finish too late! The forecast said a 17% chance of rain - but on reflection, it said that yesterday too. The forecast says a 37km/h headwind can be expected... but after all that training in the Netherlands, surely it won't be anything I haven't seen before?

(Despite this catastrophe-provoking setup, the day does end well, I promise.)

The first part of the route was excellent: flat French back roads, little traffic, no headwind. When the route got to the seaside it got noticeably more affluent - there were even golf courses! It’s probably not a coincidence that there were very good cyclepaths too: wide, well marked, in good shape … with excellent connections.

The seaside route led through some seaside towns, with tower blocks with sea views, restaurants and cafes everywhere, and a nice wide promenade by the beach. There was a strong headwind … it was just like the ones on the way to Barcelona. Less time pressure this time so I could just roll with it.

From left to right: quiet French back road, with no headwind. The beachfront - note the flags all blowing towards me. Carousel on the beach.

While on the sea, the route visited a more isolated beach spot, here's a panorama:

The route turns inland tomorrow, so this isn’t the last view of the Mediterranean, but it’s one of the last…

The cycleroute passed through another section which was under construction. There was the usual dilemma of running the route anyway, or taking a massive diversion … I won’t admit to anything in public, but I will observe it was a Sunday, the worksite was shut down and presumably wouldn’t be bothered by a lone cyclist?

I'm still feeling the aftereffects of that massive three-course French meal last night. So I went for a quick and cheap supermarket lunch today; I'm not burning enough calories to keep up!

This was the second supermarket I've visited today, and neither one had Aquarius isotonic drinks. The first one was a massive Lidl, this one was also big - so maybe Aquarius isn’t sold in France. They didn’t have other isotonic drinks either, except for Lucozade, so I picked up two bottles. I’m not a fan, it looks like a strong cleaning product and tastes like something you’d serve at an 8-year old’s birthday party. It seems to do the job though.

I'm going to mention the headwind again because it was a big part of my day. I think that 37km/h forecast was depressingly accurate. When there were trees around and the air was calm I could go up a few gears. When back in the headwind, down to a lower gear. That the 8h estimate was already looking quite low...

The route followed the coast, but the coast was not a simple curved beach: it was a series of islands and causeways which were so thin I wonder if some engineering was needed.

Here's a panorama just after a bridge connecting two of these little islands. There were some windsurfers enjoying the wind, and they were going extremely fast; not sure if they're in the picture though.

The road went through the distant trees on the center-right of the panorama, the wind dropped noticeably and I could pick up the pace a bit.

From left to right: Map of the area; the panorama is roughly at the arrow 1/3 of the way from the top. Me on the bridge, trying not to get daunted by the headwind. Among the trees means shelter from the wind, and yes, it was so memorable I took a photo. Flat ground means no shelter; the wind got pretty strong here. This is the path beside the railway line, would you like to guess if there was a headwind?

Those last two pictures really don't communicate how bad the headwind was there! It was flat land, close to the ocean, nothing to block the wind, so it was fierce. No blown sand though fortunately; maybe everything that could be blown away, has been...

The cycleroute diverged from the road - it probably gets an efficient series of bridges or something. The cycleroute didn't have bridges, it followed the single tiny thread of dry land that connected things up. It's quite picturesque to see water close by on both sides of the path! Until now I haven’t seen many other bikepackers, but there were hordes on this path: there must have been at least forty going one way or the other. I suppose it is the only route along the coast.

From left to right: the map; the route runs along land so thin it’s hidden by the line. Water on both sides.

A bit later on, the route found its way back to the waterfront. There was a cyclepath, but it was closed off by metal barriers. Odd. A bit later on I could get back on the cyclepath, so I did so. Then the barriers on the edge of the cyclepath formed a continuous line, tents and spectators appeared, and it was clear that the cyclepath was leading to the start or finish of a race ... and I definitely shouldn't be there! I started looking for breaks in the barriers, and when appeared I ducked out of there promptly.

But the route onwards that I wanted to take was actually the race course - it was going the other way, to the finish line. I rolled past behind the spectators, in the carpark, then got on the sidewalk, staying off the road where an occasional competitor went past. They looked like they'd been racing for hours, they weren't going much faster than I was...

Unfortunately my path matched the race route for about an hour, but the marshals were happy for me to use it. I was on the other side of the road from the competitors anyway.

From left to right: impending storm, taken near the race. More impending storm, from a river. Rollercoasters - there were many other parks, this one was the best. An especially nice part of the route.

I passed a lot of holiday camps in this bit. They were all owned by the same company: "Capfun". Each of these looked like a minor amusement park - I saw seriously big waterslides, for instance. At one point I passed a full funfair, among a whole clump of similar attractions. Looks like this is serious holidaymaker country.

But the roads here were great. The headwind direction changed a bit - at one point it was behind me, providing a very welcome tailwind. The ETA was 7pm, but I was making such good time it was progressively getting earlier. The was some light rain, but not enough to slow me down.

I eventually got into Agde at about 1815 - much better than the 1900 I was expecting at lunch. The flat asphalt roads at the end helped a lot!

I think I was the only person staying at the hotel. Unfortunately it had no Wifi - but I was able to use some at the restaurant to book and plan for tomorrow. The remaining days this week are going to be short. Maybe I can finish it in two days instead of three, and take an extra rest day...