south toward Italy

Now that is what I call a team bus.


Mika and Paul Weller (formerly of The Jam)... and ZZ Top, were playing a a music festival in Aix-les-Bains. No time to stay and rock out. We did get to see the Gypsy Kings though. They were doing an extended sound check, or practicing at full volume in the city park. or both. Very nice park, excellent band.

We left Aix-les-Bains, but not the mountains. It was a not a terrible drive to the next finish line in Gap. We checked in with the teams, and only one wheel had been whacked. That was the easy part. The hard part was getting from Gap to our hotel. I had booked the closest thing that Hotels.com could find. It sounded nice, a ski area 40km (thats 25 miles in american) from Gap. After 20km though, Jill told us where to turn, but the road was closed. We continued on and Jill sent us up another road. It was tiny, and twisty, and very bumpy. I expected to encounter the Clampettes (you remember them, right? Granny, Jethreau, Elle, Jean Pierre) at any turn. Compounding matters, you may remember that Jill is not completely up to date. She did not know the location of the hotel, so we entered in a gas station in town. Well, she did not know where the hotel was because it was brand new. I think we were the first people to stay in the room, so and it was spacious, and clean so we couldn't complain. To get there, we just kept driving up the mountain. Eventually the road ended and we found the place.

There was time for a ride before the local (and only) restaurant closed. It happened to be Bastille day, so though there were a few other shops at the mountain top, they were all closed.
John managed a smile as we went up a hill.