Things get hot

Owing to a need to visit the bike shop and purchase a new pump for our toolkit (and also replace the pump of our neighbour which we broke the previous day), we didn't get riding until ten-thirty, and the day was already getting quite warm.

The plan was to ride some 75km, so the 10% rule meant we figured we only had about 85km to do, mostly following the Maginot Line.

Probably a bit of the Maginot Line, though we didn't go close enough to see a label.

Unfortunately, by Sarralbe, Tim was really struggling with the heat and his Achilles. He declared a preference for the longer but flatter (and hopefully shadier) canal towpath, so we followed it down to Bissert and then cut across to Sarre-Union. Still struggling with the heat (it was 29C, according to one pharmacy we passed), some drastic re-routing was planned. Rather than take the more direct route into Saverne, we decided to follow the river valleys from Drulingen and Bust around and enter Saverne from the North-East.

Bust! (And not bust).

The road down from Bust was one of the prettiest we rode all week - a deep ravine with a burbling river and troll-haunted forests. I took no photos, since we were riding (downhill) at a fast pace and on a new tyre whose traction-limits we didn't yet know.

I forget the name of this village, but it was after Bust

After a brief getting-lost on the road into Saverne and doing a section of hard-shoulder on a dual carriageway, we eventually found the town centre, removed debris from the rear tyre and blessed its strength, and found the campsite (plus a bottle of Beaujolais).

Saverne campsite!