So the Stantons are officially defeated… Miles marched off this morning to hire a car so at least we can go back saying we have seen a few of the local sites. Rory thought it was a waste of money, but truly, we wouldn't have had a chance to make up for 2 days in the last remaining day of bicycles. We had a leisurely breakfast, and hit the road. After 25 miles East we came across the Chateau of Chaumont, a beautiful and rather sleepy location on the Loire, ...

Kyra's last words are worthy of repetition as we look to the start of our day, Mon 24th June. 'exhaustion is not quite the word, there was no part of my body that was not aching as I fell into bed.' If she thought things were bad on Sun night, they were 100 times worse the next morning. The alarm screamed at a horribly early 8am. We finally pulled ourselves along the floor and into our clothes for breakfast around 9:30am. Over breakfast we conducted a fami...

Up at 7:30 to be able to get a good breakfast before going to the market before meeting at the canoe rendezvous at 11:15am. The breakfast was served in a beautiful French provincial type room, absolutely beautiful, with a wonderful breakfast, complete with freshly squeezed orange juice, baguette, boiled eggs, jams, honeys, yogurt, compotes, tea, hot chocolate and coffee… mustn't have too much as I'll be carrying it with me for the day. Off the the market in...

So today has come - the travelling day, good-bye England, and hello La France… an early start so we could settle in early-ish had been planned, so alarm on at 5:15am… After a late night last night, feeling slightly creaky (and cranky) in the morning and awoke to some London rain (not really drizzle, truly rain!) No taxis to be seen outside the window so the hotel called us one and we were on our way to Kings X Pancras to catch the Eurostar. I am in such ...