Puncture

Not much to report today. Woke up, packed up, set off, bike had a puncture. I checked the tyre last night and it was fine so it went flat when I was asleep. Bloody annoying. This place has a bike shop so I wheeled my bike over to there and it was shut. It was supposed to be open. I waited until after lunch to see if they were having a lie in, but it didn't open.

So I went to the tourist information and they said there is another one 4 kilometres back the way I came. I decided to have a go at fixing it myself. I don't have any spanners and the multi tool I have was useless. So step 1: Take the wheel off was a failure. I pushed on to step 2 regardless, took the tube out and found the hole. It was more of a split. It looks like when the bloke fixed the spoke he pushed aside the plastic that protects the tube from the spokes inside the rim. So the tube was a bit mangled. Step 3 is to mangle the tube so that was already done. I put the plastic back and patched the tube but it just split more. That wasn't part of the steps.

So I pushed the bike 4km back, replaced the tube and went to McDonald's . Not to charge my phone, but to eat McDonald's and watch John Oliver.

Now I'm back at the same place as yesterday.

I did meet a French couple and chatted to them. They taught me how to say more names of towns. They also gave me a map of the Paris Hilton route. It goes a fair way beyond Orleans (pronounced Awly-on). At Nevers it continues on as the EuroVelo 6 to Vienna and Budapest. So I think I might have a go on that. I'll probably use cheat codes though (get a train) for some of it.