Tuesday, October 9, 2007
Preparations Begin
With only 12 days to go to the cycle I thought it was time to start the blog. This also marks the beginning of any serious preparation for the trip. I dropped my bike in to get a service today and my spending on cycling paraphernalia has risen dramatically in the last 24 hours. I have the Rough Guides to the UK, France and Spain as well as the corresponding maps and I am trying to find out information on prevailing winds on the continent. For example, one of my potential routes follows the Rhone valley and I've heard of a strong wind called "Le Mistral" in the area. If it is a northerly wind it would be a great help but a southerly wind could make the Lyon to Avignon cycle a bit of a nightmare. The best information I found on Google was that many cyclists before me have found the Lonely Planets Cycling Books very helpful so I'm off to the bookshops now to pick up a copy.
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Check out the thorn tree forum on the lonely planet website(see link at end), its a pretty good resource for finding out about road conditions etc. Its pretty active, and its members are great for replying no matter how obscure the questions are. Check the archives for posts pertaining to areas en your route.
To my knowledge the mistral blows from north to south down the rhone to marseille.
For climate info see the links below. Also a quick search on the images setting in google should yeild more localised climate charts.
http://www.worldclimate.com/cgi-bin/grid.pl?gr=N48E002
http://www.islandnet.com/~see/weather/graphics/photos0708/mediterranian_winds.jpg
http://thorntree.lonelyplanet.com/categories.cfm?catid=32
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