Boring Burgundy: Fountainblue > Macon [7/07>7/10 - 227mi]

On Mike's good advice, I opted to take the commuter train out of Paris instead of fighting another couple of hours through the 'burbs. Fountainblue is the original vacation estate of the monarchy, before the more famous Versailles was built. It's a monstrosity- 1200 room mansion, sprawling gardens, lakes and private hunting grounds (at the time, stocked with game.) Now it's a tourist attraction, but I saved my 10euros and skipped the tour. I knew I'd just scoff at the excesses anyway, but did have the pleasure of eating lunch in the rain on the estate grounds.

Not a whole lot to say about following the Loire River south: rolling hills of wheat, corn, grapes, cattle and the occasional sunflower field, it got boring fast. Nifty old-world villages every 5-15km, which are cool at first but quickly becomes a "you've seen one and you've seen them all" type of thing. And being in the midst of a monsoon cycle, it rained intermittently the entire time- never terribly hard but just enough to keep me jumping in and out of my rain gear every hour or so. 

One of the mildly interesting aspects is the system of canals- built long ago to make rivers navigable in either direction via a series of locks, many have pedestrian/cycle paths alongside. They made for pleasant pedaling sans vehicles, although you then didn't go through the town centers or have the aid of signage to know where you were at. I was very curious to discover this, however: a canal bridge going over a river. Pretty cool to pedal the sidewalk next to a waterway, with a river rushing below.

My last day of this leg necessitated a huge 105mi push to get to Macon by Tuesday night in order to see the Tour de France stage 12 begin there in the morning. The easy roller turned into really hard rollers and the last 40mi was super tough short climbs into the vineyard regions. I rolled in after dark, snuck into the municipal campground and eagerly awaited the Tour events.... knowing that most all the world's best roadies were sleeping nearby was an peculiar feeling.