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Day 10 - To Châteaubourg, Ille-et-Vilaine, Brittany - 223 miles
Day 10
Day 10 profile
On the road at 10:02, back into Mansle and then on to the N10 towards Poitiers. Just for a change it was raining.
At 10:59 we had covered 51 miles and were on the outskirts of Poitiers and Andy confessed an urgent desire to visit the boy's room. Unfortunately it was some 16 minutes later before we found a petrol station with that facility at Neuville de Poitou. I think Andy was off the bike and into the shop before his crankshaft had stopped spinning.
Fuelled up and more comfortable we headed north up the N147. As you may know this road is mainly straight, ruler-straight in one section for 12 miles.
Into Fontevraud L'Abbaye at 12:18 to show Andy the final resting place of Richard I. No time to explore the Abbey though, and then on to the Loire and along the northern bank.
View towards Fontevraud L'Abbaye
13:41:32 (UTC+2) 84 ft N47.33407 W0.19209 stopped at a restaurant, waited ages for the waitress to appear to be told that there was no food - so what was the sign outside advertising the Plat de Jour for then! Not impressed and 15 minutes wasted.
We carried on another 6½ miles and found a restaurant at La Ménitré with friendly staff and had a very acceptable lasagne. 45 minutes later we were on our way.
Most of the roads up to this point had been mundane so the smaller D roads were more to our taste. However, the further north you go the less exciting the riding. Still quite pleasant by middle England standards but not in the same league as Spain and southern France. Scenic riding, but not demanding.
Châteauneuf sur Sarthe saw a detour as the road we wanted D859 was closed. GPS was flawless this time and Andy didn't even realise we had diverted.
We refuelled at Château Gontier and headed cross country to join the N157 and into Châteauberg and Ar Milin' 17:15:02 (UTC+2) 125 ft N48.10924 W1.40119
Not one navigational faux pas this day :-)
Interestingly, Andy made a comment about me making heavy weather of some of the bits of slow speed manoeuvering we had done during this trip. In invited him to feel the weight of my bike and we compared it with his. The ST fully loaded feels nearly half as heavy again as the Fireblade, it's not quite, but the weight being high up with all I had in my top-box, panniers and tank-bag would have made it seem that way. The Fireblade is 179 kg dry, the '99 ST 233 kg (the newer ones are lighter at 207 kg); Andy's luggage was probably about 15 -20 kg mine was about 40 - 45 kg including the hard bags. 200 kg vs 280 kg (440 lbs vs 617 lbs). I said his bike felt like a "toy" :-)) The wheelbase of the ST is also 6.5 cm longer than the Fireblade. But the Fireblade did get all the admiring looks in France :-(
Ar Milin' is another one of the Châteauhotels and is excellent. In easy reach of Roscoff or Cherbourg so good for a weekend trip with your wife or girlfriend (perhaps not both at the same time). The food and service were the best of the whole trip.
View from my room
Hotel Ar Milin'
Stats
Moving time 4:49
223 miles
Moving Av 46.3 mph
Overall Av 34.3 mph
Total Time 6:30
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