We’ve left the luxury and comfort of the B&B and continued west into Brittany. We’ve also cut ties from the car and any other extravagances and are now operating in ‘minimalist’ territory. We always feel a little apprehensive, setting off on a expedition, but it felt especially so this time, given so many unknowns. We’ve got plenty of options available to us here, but the end of the journey is still very much unknown. Once we left the car, things felt loads better - we were committed.
We began riding in Taden, which is near a bigger town called Dinan. The rough plan is to head south, following the canal and river paths, which are all traffic free. The bikes felt heavy as we’ve not ridden them fully laden for quite a while, but the terrain is flat and the weather promising.
We’ve crossed the river many times on our journey so far. In the early morning stillness, the reflections were so clear.
The river is quite busy with barges and boats. The best craft we saw though was this paddle-wheel dredger, that was cutting out weeds.
The path is well maintained, but topped with very fine sand. It’s fine to ride on, but it made a nice change every now and then to enjoy some quiet tarmac.
Lunches, and all food for that matter are being bought at shops that we pass. Some classic French baguette and Brie seemed a good start.
We arrived at St Medard at around 4pm. The campsite costs €8.50. Sadly, we only had €7 in change, so went up into the village square to see if we could get some cash-back from the village bar. It turned into a stroke of luck as the square was gorgeous and a very friendly lady, not only sorted us out with the missing €1.50 but also furnished us with an ice cold demi-biere and a delicious milky coffee. We sat outside with a handful of locals, enjoying the view and finally feeing like we could rest. Day 1 - We’d made it.
Day 1: Taden to St Medard-sur-Ille : 53km (108m ascent)
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