Pézenas

It was mid afternoon and we had only 30Km to complete before Béziers. We had done about 110Km and with temperatures around 29'C and it was thirsty work. No beer was taken ("our bodies are temples" etc) but Pepsi, cafés and Perrier Citrons went down well. The girl behind the bar cleaned our water bottles in her glass cleaning machine before filling them with ice cold water.
We had left Nîmes at 9.30am with one of our relaxed starts. The sky was overcast and it was cool. Being British, we were the only ones in tee shirts but by 10.30 we felt fully justified as the temperature climbed in to the mid 20s. The route from Nîmes used 20Km of "Voie Vert" initially and as it was based on an old train route, the gradients were gentle. Things changed when we took to the road and we eventually climbed over 900m over our 148Km. The roads were quiet, the countryside beautiful, it was another great day of cycling.

The bike? It belongs to Paul Lazarus, a retired G P from Leicester who has come along on his first "Pyreneen Cycle Tours" trip. A strong steady cyclist and particularly good on the hills. Used to cycling on his own and not good at drafting so tends to get left on the faster sections.

Molière? He lived in Pézenas for a time in the 17th Century before his untimely death from Pulmonary TB. He had a coughing fit whilst performing one of his plays and started to cough up blood. He collapsed but recovered enough to complete the play and die 20 minutes later.

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