Day 3 - Road Trip

Written by Stephen Hall with Glenn Harris, Matt Irvine & Brad Robson

With free breakfast provided at the hostel we were all up fairly early to enjoy the international standard ‘coco pops breaky’. When you throw in a croissant or seven we were some pretty happy bike riders. The car rental at the airport wouldn’t have our van ready until at least midday so we had several hours to continue discovering Paris. We walked back up the Montmartre to enjoy the sights in daylight and explore the shops and cafes surrounding the summit. The Montmartre was even busier than the night before with many tourists enjoying some lunch on the steps and walking through the Sacre Couer. Tucked away in the corner of the town we found a few artists who offered to draw us in cartoon form which we unfortunately had to decline as it we were stretched for time.

We found a small cafe on our way down the steps which we stopped at for an espresso and to listen to a talented busker playing nearby. Slowly we made our way back to our accommodation stopping every few minutes to take photos and to absorb all the incredible sights surrounding us. After packing our bags and checking out of the hostel we headed down to Gare du Nord to catch the train to Charles de Gaulle (Paris Airports). The train ride took about a half hour so a few of us caught a bit of shut eye until we arrived at the station. We collected our bike boxes and found our way to the car rental section of the airport however a slight miscommunication with the rental car clerk cost us an hour or so before we finally had the keys to the Renault.

Getting all 4 of us, plus our bike boxes and bags into the van was somewhat of a real-life tetris game and took another 45min or so. At first we thought we’d be able to leave the 3 seats we removed from the van at the office but they refused and we had to start all over again. With a bit of elbow grease from all of the guys (bar me with the excuse of recovering from a broken collarbone) we were able to successfully fit everything into the Renault AND close the boot. The drive from Paris to our home in Belgium was approximately 400km providing we didn’t get lost. We did fairly well for ourselves considering the amount of time we were following a French tom-tom that cut out the minute we crossed the Belgian border. A traffic jam had us travelling at 15kmph for a while ruining the good run we were having down the A1 motorway. Glenn managed to navigate us the remainder of the way having travelled to Belgium at least 5 times prior to our most recent trip.

A friend of Glenn’s Martyn had organised for us to stay with him for our entire trip so we met him at a local bar as soon as we arrived in our hometown of Mol 3-4 hours after leaving Paris. Mol is located only 10km from the town of Dessel where we stayed last year, approximately 70km from Antwerp. By this time it was late in Belgium (-6 hours on Perth) but they were currently enjoying an uncharacteristic streak of good weather so we sat outside with a few friends and enjoyed the sunshine until well after 9pm. The sun slowly began to set so we forced ourselves up and drove 10min down the road to Martyn’s new house. We barely unpacked our bags instead opting to find the first available bed and crashing. Tomorrow we will have our first ride out on the road and both Glenn and I look forward to taking the boys over their first cobble section as well as watching them drink their very first Cecemel.

Dankjewel