11 June 2025 (sunny and very hot) 53km

I've never been a particularly good sleeper. At 4am this morning, it was traffic noise from the main highway. This camp happens to be in the centre of town. Well, as much as it can be without people pushing their supermarket trolleys past our tent. Yet the car and truck noise carries a huge distance. 

Conversely, Ju had her best night's sleep of the trip getting a solid 8 hours from 9am to 5pm. Last night was a lot warmer with us just sleeping in our silk liners for most of the night.

And wouldn't you know it, this morning, my old nemesis the pigeon was back with about half a dozen of his mates, taunting me with their coo bloody coo's, til it was implanted in my head like tinnitus.

Lovely light on the cathedral this morning so it deserved another photo.

Up and riding by 9am. Picked up some food from the shop and enjoyed pleasant scenery all morning, working our way from village to village. 

In La Chapelle Vendomoise, we decided to stop for a coffee. Little village Tabac with all the locals gathering. Chance to use some more French and these are the places that appreciate you using as much as possible, as most are older and a lot can't speak English, so they will go out of their way to help. 

It was seriously hot by now.

Popped into a boulanger for a baguette, then sat in a park in the shade to eat. Brody called so we chatted to him and Aimee for about twenty minutes. News from there was good and we cycled on into the ever increasing heat.

By the time we reached Blois, we were roasting hot. Found the Decathlon store and set about replacing our stove. They only had one that suited us. It was Euro 34. Approx $60.

Will let you know if it actually does the trick. Bought a couple of new drinking cups and back out into the sun....phew. 

Further along checked out a Sim card at a small store where no one spoke English, but the one thing we did understand was Euro 75. If we're going to pay that much, we want to know exactly what we're getting. So we'll stick to the free WiFi that is quite plentiful to be honest.

The temperature was over thirty degrees and we were sweltering.

At a Lidl, Ju went in to buy an ice cream, but they didn't sell single ice creams. So she bought a box of six mini magnums and gave two to a woman and her son, who both looked surprised and delighted. After we downed our two each in quick succession, we realized we could have done a third.

We pushed on into town. Just along the road a young girl stopped us and asked (with the help of Google Translate) if we could help her. Apparently, she'd left her keys at an eatery about a km away.

Because it was so hot and she had some heavy items in tow, she asked if we could go and pick them up for her.

So we turned around and cycled back only to find the shop was shut til 6pm. Very common in France to close for the afternoon and reopen later.

A young woman in the next shop, said the eatery didn't open til later, so she would drive and pick the girl up and take her back to the shop, where it was cooler.

We rode back to the girl who had lost her keys and the shop woman turned up too. So we left her in good hands and headed down toward the "Centre Ville" where I took some shots and Julia got talking to a Dutch couple, who she would later run into again at camp.

Over the bridge that straddled the Loire and now cycling east toward our campsite for the night. It was about 4.5 km out of Blois, but in the heat, felt like 45 km.

Paid Euro 17 for our pitch, one of the cheaper prices, and set up under a tree, hoping the sun was setting in the right position for us. 

A lovely surprise for us was this camp had access to a pool 200 meters down the road, but only on Wednesdays and weekends. And wouldn't you know it, today was....Wednesday!!

Got that tent up in no time and then it was over to the pool, which Julia promptly dived into and then noticed the "No Diving" signs. Luckily for me, Ju had read that in France and Italy they don't like boardies and insist on men wearing speedos. So she told me to bring mine. Not sure of the reasoning behind the tight fitting togs for men but I was told at the camp and again at the pool to wear speedos. 

What a relief it was to get in that water. It was absolutely devine!!After slogging through the intense heat today, the water was bliss. We wanted to be in it for the rest of the day but it was in full sun, and with no waves to catch, kind of boring.

Spent about half an hour in there, but the two hundred metre walk back to the tent, wiped out any benefit. 

There was a snack bar set up within the camp so we thought instead of slogging back into Blois, we'd grab something from there.

No sign of it opening, so we figured we'd get a couple of drinks from reception and just have an apple for dinner. Stroll over to get said drinks and bugger me....reception is closed. Now we have to cycle back to Blois for supplies. A 9km return trip in that heat was not appealing.

Got talking to an English couple, Morgan and Libby who were travelling in a van. They said they were going to get burger and fries and Uber would deliver it. We asked if we could jump on that order and give them cash, so for Euro 22, we got burgers and chips delivered along with theirs, by Uber. When you're hungry, doesn't food taste better? And all washed down with a beer that Morgan kindly gave us.

At this point Julia informs me that for the next two weeks, there will be temperatures over thirty degrees everyday, with thunderstorms in the afternoon. Because of this we have rethought our route. 

We figure it will be cooler in the mountains so we're going to head for the hills.

Up to the reception area to do a bit of research and do the blog, but coverage was rubbish.

Sooner, rather than later, we need to charge the two powerbanks. 

At 9.10pm the sun was beginning to set and it was the coolest it had been since 8am.

A long day had come to a close.