Somme

Just a quick update. After I left to find a place to camp last night, as soon as I rode out of Abbeville, the rain stopped. The path I was riding along was dead flat and dead straight so I ended up doing the 20km to the coast in under an hour. What a difference the conditions make. For comparison, the last 17km into Abbeville took around 2 and a half hours.

I rode into Saint Valery der Somme around 9:15 last night. It was beautiful when I arrived. Fishing boats docked, a long esplanade along the river, families taking an evening stroll, soaking in the fresh sea air. And me. Filthy dirty, stinking to high heaven. Nobody seemed to mind. A few people smiled at me, I think because I was grinning with delight.

I hadn't sussed a camp spot here. I googled proper sites and booking.Com wanted to charge me $190. I ended up finding some likely places but there was a constant stream of people, so I waited until dark and made my way deep into some bushes right next to the water and set up in the dark.

Earlier in the day a car load of young blokes followed me really slowly up a hill and when I got off the road they shouted something French at me. I've seen Monty Python, I know what they are capable of. When I was heading along the muddy path to my little hideout the same car went past blaring music. It was dark by this stage so I got off the road and into my spot and they came tearing back past. I'd say any ill will towards me was probably in my imagination, but I'm also in a pretty vulnerable situation if someone decides to mess with me, as Divya continuously reminds me. I waited quite a while before setting up.

When I woke up I could hear the wind roaring so I figured the best place in all of France to be in that wind is amongst those bushes. I guess I momentarily forgot about houses, cars, hotels and the many other things that also block wind.

I'm not going to cycle today, it really is too windy. I've tracked down a proper camp site so I'll go set up there for a night or two.

I'm almost ready to stop pretending it's summer time.