Sept 12th Mouliherne to Thouars

 I stayed two nights with Holly and Rob, making a bit of music and visiting the nearby town of Bauge and France's oldest surviving apothecary. It's in a huge old convent building that was run as a hospital and is now an impressive museum.

Holly and Rob's place is so far away from towns and main roads it is peaceful, quiet and there is no light pollution at night so the skies are really profound. I would love to have stayed a bit longer but my mind is on the possibility of colder weather moving in to the Pyrenees from the beginning of October, and there is some difficult cycling country to cross before I get there.

So I set out for Saumur on the river Loire on Monday morning, in brilliant sunshine. It was a great route along back roads all the way and because of the previous day's rest, I made good time. There is a large island where the road crosses the river, and this was what the northern side of the channel looked like.

 Quite shocking as the river is normally one of France's mightiest streams. The southern channel was happily a lot deeper, but I forgot to take a photo(!) I found a launderette next to a bar in the town and was treated to omelette and chips with salad while my washing went round. I say treated because it wasn't actually on the menu but Nabil, the patron, very kindly cooked one for me with four eggs that he had from a local biologique (organic) farm. Nabil was a real character and seemed to know everyone in the street. Making people happy was his business and he had a real talent for it. While I was there an old lady in a wheel chair turned up for lunch, out on the street, and Nabil had us all move around so she could sit more comfortably. It was like being in a big family.

 From Saumur I traveled South on a cycle path called La Francette to the beautiful old town of Montreuil Bellay, on the river Thouet, which I would get to know quite well in the next few days.

South of the Loire things change quite distinctively. To begin with there are grape vines everywhere, and the buildings begin to look a lot less Norman and a lot more Mediterranean The river Thouet flows due North into the Loire and the path follows it South into the increasingly higher plateaus from which it rises. I'm not sure which geographic processes are going on, but the river winds through increasingly deeper and more spectacular gorges. And so the cycling becomes increasingly tiring as there are frequent ascents and descents.  At the end of the day I arrive in the town of Thouars perched on a promontory overlooking the river. Down a very steep hill, almost in the centre of the town, there is a camping municipal sitting fragrantly alongside the river which is so wide it hardly appears to be flowing at all. I spend a very restful  night there.