On the way to the Metro to get a train downtown we run into a local market on the boulevard. Wow, how impressive! It goes on for blocks and there is everything. Fishmongers and butchers with glass cases and ice…a complete store, but under an awning instead of a roof. How very cool. There are cheese stalls and cider and jam and the usual clothes and jewellery – I buy a Labradorite bracelet that catches my eye with its blue opalescent twinkle. There are hats from Panama and fruit and vegetables from all parts of France and beyond. We settle on some made-on-the-spot cheese crepes for breakfast and enjoy them watching Parisians shop for their groceries.
Grabbing the subway we make it to the Concorde stop and we become aware of how much this day will be like Bastille Day with the crowds on the Champs Elysees and the streets surrounding the Louvre. Already police are directing people away from some areas.
We wander some streets thinking we might try to get into the Tuileries area, but it becomes clear that we cannot cross the road anywhere and the Tour cyclists aren’t due here for hours. The atmosphere is infectious. People guard their places at the barricade at the side of the road as if it were their home. We settle for awhile behind four British guys that are in their forties and have long hair and face piercings and tattoos – perhaps a rock band? If not it’s just kind of sad! The pre-race buses and semi-trailer trucks that carry the team equipment and “stuff” for the three weeks of the Tour start to show up and park by the side of the road which bums out people who have been standing by those view spots to no end. In another half hour or so, some of the actual support vehicles show up and the semis pull out behind them to get their parking spot on the Place de la Concorde – handy to have the biggest assembly point in France right there in the middle of the final route to use as a parking area!
We wander up the street a bit, naively thinking we might make it down to the Champs Elysees to watch the actual racers. In a couple of blocks it becomes apparent that the congestion will be too great and we spot a small space near a low window that has a big old iron grill on it. Perfect…a place to sit and a place to jump up on to see the cyclists over everyone’s head, since it is apparent we will not be at the front anywhere. There are still several hours until race time, a fact that has us both chagrinned, we are not good at waiting.
Strange floats, and a parade of sponsor support vehicles that must accompany the Tour, begin to appear with music blasting and girls dancing on them. The promo vehicles were like nothing we could ever afford when I worked in the field, each individually designed with giant product sculptures like sunglasses or cookies or jerseys built onto them: very cool. We gather this is what they call the “Caravan” that accompanies the Tour. We are glad of the visual diversion as we cling to our spots on the wall like limpets as a sea of people surges back and forth in front of us. We wait and when the caravan seemed to be exhausted we think this is a good thing because they will have to clear the road before the cyclists. We wait some more, and even though the “people watching” is very good, our patience is wearing thin and our legs are tiring.
Then there is great excitement: the police motorcycles that front the pack leaders are coming! There is a helicopter overhead filming, the crowd is so excited it just about combusts. Up the road a couple of blocks we begin to hear cheers and clapping. I jump to my ledge on the window; Dennis holds the video camera by the monopod in a Hail Mary position. And…they are here, going so fast, they are like a blur, about eight or nine of the leaders, a relatively small break, then dozens of bikes flying like a school of fish. So exciting! We watch the following support vehicles and hear the crowd around the Place de la Concorde leading to the Champs Elysees cheer as we had.
What seems like only a few minutes goes by and the scene is repeated. The lead group has grown smaller and their separation from the pack even bigger. On the third lap a rider has to change his wheel and it happens right in front of us…they have it down to a science and it takes only seconds, but we are sorry for the rider, because they may have been crucial seconds this close to the end.
We are not near the finish line, and decide to relinquish our primo spots to some young girls who have been patiently waiting for a place to just see the action. We begin heading toward the Champs, hoping to see more of the race from a different angle. By the time we get around the road closures the police have imposed, we are in time to see the last lap down the Champs Elysees and hear Spain’s Contador declared the winner…which was no surprize to anyone. What is great is that there are loud speakers all along the miles of the Champs and the roads around the Louvre so everyone gets to hear the commentary or music, or whatever is happening, and somehow they are set so there is no annoying echoing or gaps in coverage. We cannot understand the commentary for the presentations that are going on, but trophy presentations are about the same in any sport, so we infer the content as we walk the length of the Champs Elysees and take pictures of the Arc de Triomphe from the middle of the closed street.
We hope we have gotten some good video and pictures for Phil who we know will have watched it on TV.
Dinner is at a brasserie across from city hall, where I enjoy the best onion soup so far and Dennis has a great pizza! We walk in the old city then ride home to sip some wine and plot tomorrow as our trip to France begins to wind down.
(Just a note: When we returned to the apartment and checked the final standings we were thrilled to see that Victorian Ryder Hesjedal was ranked seventh overall in the Tour de France – quite an achievement for a twenty-year old with many years left to cycle!)
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